This has been floating around for a couple of days, but there’s now a high quality version of the Torchwood: Children of Earth preview here.
There is also a fuzzy YouTube version here:
That looks quite good. Jack returning from being very, very burnt to death will be fun.
I worried about Torchwood switching format because season two wasn’t really good enough to warrant it after a very slow start. Feeling better now!
I have to say I’m struggling to understand the calls on the Government to follow Barack Obama’s move and cap banker’s bonuses and even salaries.
Yes, bankers the world over were too reckless. Yes, that recklessness has been a big contributory factor in the credit crunch and the recession which has followed. Yes, the attitude of recklessness needs to change before these problems can be fixed.
But it is not, emphatically, powerfully not, the Government’s job to set wages to that end. Government is very bad at things like wage setting. It defeats market forces, it’s anti-competitive and it will force the brightest and best out of the British market.
We all now own massive stakes in some Britain’s biggest banks. I want the very best people at the top of RBS, Lloyds and Northern Rock sorting them out. We’ve already lost billions off the share prices and we need that investment back.
But the best talent comes at top-dollar prices. The market determines what the CEO of a bank is worth and the UK Government has no place even trying to do it.
We don’t have to like seeing big bonuses and staggering wages paid to big bankers. As the owners of some of the biggest banks, we can call on the Government to sack under-performers.
But we can’t stop them operating in the market and that means the people in the board room have to have the final say on salaries in the company. At the moment, it looks like the Government understand this and that cannot change.
The developing story about Jacqui Smith’s second home arrangements is beginning to look like a bit of a deal. David Cameron is right to say she has questions to answer, though arguably he should have gone further.
It does look like the Home Secretary has stayed within the letter of the law in what she has done, but I would suggest the law is incorrect. She’s claimed a small fortune for her supposed ‘second home’ when any rational assessment would see it as nothing but.
What has really leapt out at me is the fact the relevant Commons office doesn’t check what MPs claim under this ruling. They take MPs word for what they claim.
This opens up yet another angle for attack on MPs and the House of Commons.
I don’t happen to think that many MPs are corrupt. I don’t think the vast majority of them are on the take. From everything I can see being a back-bench MP is a fairly thankless task and most of the people who do it are well-meaning public servants.
But the system is open to legitimate abuse. Smith is not the only MP to be pulling this particular ruse. Ed Balls and Yvette Cooper are at it as well and it is just not good. It shouldn’t be allowed. It isn’t like any of them need the money on their Government salaries.
A complete outsider needs to be brought in to pick apart every rule related to money MPs can claim above and beyond their salary. Every right of expenses, every allowance. I don’t think it’s much to ask to suggest receipts be produced for every expense going forward and the current housing allowances are clearly mad.
There’s no way I have the budget to get high definition television. No way in the world. Which makes this news maddening.
Doctor Who in glorious high definition. In surround sound. Heaven.
The biggest surprise is it hasn’t already been done that way already. Torchwood has been shot that way from the start and I would have thought the production schedules could have been made to work. Who knows.
Hat tip: Tom Harris
I’ve been mulling what to say about England’s dire performance in the second innings yesterday.
But I’m at a loss.
The trouble of only having two good players in the side is there isn’t much we can do. Yes, we can drop Bell for Shah. Yes, we can play Swann and/or instead of Panesar. But it’s not going to fix the problem of us only having one good batsman and one good bowler.
Strauss isn’t going to last as captain because he has no real form. 18 months ago he should have been dropped. Collingwood is a spent force. Harmison can’t tour. Broad, brilliant on his day, is inconsistent.
I don’t want the Ashes to roll around. It’s going to be horrible.
One of the more bizarre aspects of the furore around Carol Thatcher’s language in The One Show green room has been the falling out between Iain Dale and Derek Draper.
Dale said everything must be taken in context and Thatcher’s remarks shouldn’t necessarily be taken as evidence of racism. Draper insisted the mere use of the term Golliwog showed racism and through his comments, Dale was endorsing or advocating that racism.
Both have made multiple posts on the topic and both have been fairly ill-tempered. But the row now seems to be the only thing being talked about on LabourList. It’s mad if this is what the supposed ‘voice’ of the Labour Party in the blogosphere considers to be the issue of the week.
Just as a simple illustration, this is the Wordle graphic of everything Draper has put on LabourList himself since its launch.
It speaks for itself. ‘Iain’, ‘Dale’, ‘Golliwog’, Derek’ and ‘Draper’ all leap out of the image. And this is every word of the main posts Draper has made, not just the in the row with Dale.
On the issue itself, from everything I can see Thatcher made unacceptable remarks in a public place of work and then hesitated over a full apology. In the current climate at the BBC that isn’t a very tenable position.
But it’s sparked a whole debate about what it is acceptable to say in private. The debate on Question Time on Thursday night was ludicrous. There were people, particularly in the audience rather than on the panel (though Theresa May sailed close to the wind a few times), who seriously suggested what is said in private should be open to scrutiny in the same way as public statements.
According to who? Everyone says things in private they would not utter publicly and it’s hypocrisy to suggest otherwise. A woman in the QT audience insisted she was the same in private and in public. I was desperate for someone to ask her if she ever swore. Obviously not appropriate on QT but perfectly acceptable in your own home, if you choose.
Everybody censors themselves in public. I’m not suggesting it is acceptable to be racist at any time – it is categorically not. But it is wrong to suggest that people should have their private comments policed.If someone says something that offends, you have a right to say so. You don’t have the right to tell their employer, or their spouse, or the police, with the intent of getting them into trouble.
Language which does no harm, which is not directed with malice or with incitement to violence, should not be punished.
Words in and of themselves are powerless. Damage only comes if they are used to cause damage.
Andrew Flintoff will play in the first Test against the West Indies.
Phew. It’s not like he’s an important player in a shaky line-up. Drop Bell and play Shah, we might even have a team.
I spend much of my time plotting ways my career will get me to London. Days like today are those rare occasions when that’s simply not true. Scunthorpe is better on days like today.
I understand the argument that says because this doesn’t, really, happen often we’re not Moscow equipped. We don’t have all the gadgets, we don’t have a snow plough on every corner. But really? All buses cancelled? Barely a handful of trains in and out of the capital? Hundreds of flights cancelled at Heathrow. Come on.
Boris Johnson has really got to do better than claiming the capital coped well under the circumstances. Suspending the congestion charge didn’t really cut it. This was dismal.
The nuts and bolts of gritting the major routes isn’t difficult. Local authorities manage it up and down the country and it’s not like the weather wasn’t forecast. And I genuinely can’t fathom why snow should stop a train from working properly.
And the rolling news is amazing. They were filling 30, maybe 40, minutes of every hour talking about the weather. I don’t think the BBC took the breaking news ticker off all day. And then they had an hour of ‘special coverage’ between 7pm and 8pm. Lord why?
John Prescott is busy establishing himself as one of the best bloggers on the left of the sphere. The former Deputy Prime Minister has been writing for a couple of weeks on Go Fourth, the campaigning site he created with Alastair Campbell.
With 10 years in Government, Prescott has plenty of anecdotes and stories to tell. And, despite his long history of doing terrible things to the English language, he is a surprisingly effective communicator.
Unlike most of the people on his side of the argument, he is both able to attack David Cameron effectively, be funny, and use his experience to add gravity.
The blog is still a young creation and, based on the Go Fourth website, doesn’t obviously have a home a year from now if Labour lose. But compared to Labour List, it’s a delight.
The Writer's Tale; by Russell T Davies and Benjamin Cook
The Writer’s Tale goes behind the scenes of Doctor Who‘s fourth year and, even better, behind the scenes of showrunner Russell T Davies’ mind.
Email conversations between Davies and journalist Benjamin Cook sit alongside early drafts of Doctor Who scripts. The finished product is outstanding.
More a book about writing than the story of Doctor Who, Davies is endlessly honest and open about the pains of writing the BBC’s flagship show. Creating Doctor Who is revealed as difficult, immensely stressful and a time-consuming occupation.
Added to this, you find out about how much more Davies does for the show. As executive producer he is involved at every stage, re-writing other scripts, casting, haggling with the BBC on budget and time, shepherding the whole, mammoth, project from start to finish.
Cook, a regular contributor to both the Radio Times and Doctor Who Magazine, follows Davies for a year. He takes the reader from the earliest seeds of Christmas special Voyage of the Damned to the opening scenes of The Next Doctor. The reader is also taken line-by-line through Partners in Crime, Stolen Earth and Journey’s End. Without Cook, The Writer’s Tale would never have been what it is.
The pair also vividly demonstrate the enormous team behind the show. Julie Gardner and Phil Collinson stand out as key partners; both leave the Doctor Who team with Davies before the fifth season is put together for 2010.
For much of The Writer’s Tale Cook, more often ‘invisible Ben’, is sent page after page of work-in-progress script – all reproduced in the book – giving some input, offering a sounding board. It’s fascinating for a fan of the show to see what could have been, the ideas that fell by the wayside, the sequences cut for budget or failing.
The two authors corresponded almost every day for a year. The insights into Davies’ life and work are fascinating. He tells Cook of his flying heights and dark, dangerous, lows. He layers on the back story, revealing how personal experience fuelled much of his famed Queer as Folk.
The book is funny. Both men have a brilliant sense of humour and it pours forth from their writing. The subject lines on their emails, sometimes lasting weeks, are a nice touch above and beyond the conversations themselves.
Beautifully produced, the 500-plus pages are lavished with stills from the show, pictures from the set and dozens of Davies’ own brilliant cartoons. Simple layout touches throughout add to the overall impression of a hugely high quality piece of work.
As much faith as I have in Steven Moffat, who takes over the show following the 2009 specials, The Writer’s Tale underlines the irresistible force of Davies’ – without whom Doctor Who would never have returned to millions of televisions in 2005. He is the life blood of the reinvigorated programme, forcing his exuberant personality onto the show.
He will be missed.
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