Take Away Those Children In Need

Children in Need, X Factor, The Trip



Children in Need (It’s Charity/10)
When I was wee my family always had a Children in Need/Red Nose Day tradition that I have carried on, but now that I am older and more cynical it really isn’t that nice and I don’t want you to judge me for it.

We order take away!

We sit in our warm house and gorge ourselves on the best of grease in a box and watch those hungry unfortunate blighters until we feel bloated and guilty enough to donate. Just a couple of quid mind, not the value of the take away we couldn’t possibly afford that.

But we shouldn’t let cynicism effect traditions, just ask the pope.

If it makes you think better of me this year’s takeaway was pretty poor. We were staying in the countryside you see and the problem with ordering ethnic food in the country side is that there is no one from a relevant ethnicity to cook it. The only Indian that I have seen in the town is an accountant and I am reliably informed it would be counter to good race relations to expect him to be able to cook a curry let alone deliver it. When I once raised the lack of ethnic diversity it was pointed out to me that a gentleman on a neighbouring farm had started breeding alpaca, so I guess things are improving.

Anyway back to the Idiot Box:

This year’s award for the most genuinely amusing skit goes to Coronation Street and Eastender’s who offered up not their usual tongue in cheek musical number but a mini sit-com which saw the inhabitants of aforementioned areas partaking in a cultural exchange. Highlights included an Asian off between the two soaps Indian families, (think goodness gracious me in reverse) and one up man ship between Gail ‘the Gerbil’ Platt and her Eastender’s counterpart on the subject of who married the biggest psychopath.

The news casters put in their usual amount of effort, but it was disappointing to see the male newsreaders take a backseat to the girls. Has Jeremy Paxman ever partaken in a musical number? I would personally donate very generously to see him singing a song of disproportionate joy to his personality.

X Factor 5/10

X-Factor exposed two things this week the first being the train of stupid that is Cheryl Cole and the genuine (as opposed to pantomime) nastiness of Simon Cowell.
Following Wagner’s performance Cheryl Cole decided to unleash some rehearsed fury on Wagner sighting some remarks that he had made to a journalist about her being from a council estate. Whilst this wasn’t the time and the place for grievance to be aired Wagner handled it brilliantly pointing out the unreliability of the British media and talking about her as a role model in glowing terms.

On a separate note they have obviously decided to continue to mispronounce Wagner’s name as some kind of joke, not only is this unbelievably rude it also makes them all look rather stupid as Wagner isn’t exactly an uncommon pronunciation. World famous composer, anyone? I don’t think that even the most ignorant of the panel isn’t aware of this.

Cheryl Cole, the ‘mentor’ of Cher Lloyd (you know the one who raps a bit and was looking slightly relevant at the start of the show). We were led to believe that this week John Lennon’s Imagine was chosen for her to sing by Cheryl, we were also led to believe that Cheryl (as we are with all the mentors) chose the cleaver spiral stair case staging. For those of you who didn’t know a spiral staircase was pertinent as it was modelled on that of the Bank St apartment shared by John and Yoko. Mr. Cowell clearly was aware of this and pressed Cheryl on her reasons for making the choice knowing full well that the choice hadn’t been hers and that she was clueless about its relevance but also knowing that she had to act as though the decision was entirely hers. For anyone still under any illusions that ‘mentors’ actually play much of a role I think this is some more evidence to contradict that script.

The Trip 4/10

I’ve decided. I don’t like it that much. The melancholy drama is genius but the improvised dialogue in the restaurants gets a little tedious.
I’m going to see Harry Potter tonight… Just so you know…

A Horror History X Factor Trip

X Factor 3/10
A History of Horror 9/10
The Trip ?/10

Simon Cowell’s personality is a vacuous cavern so deep that it is playing havoc with the studio’s acoustics. Either that or the sound engineers only previous experience working with microphones was at the karaoke night in a Mcloed Gauge, “More echo Frank, you really need it to create an atmosphere in here.” (Oh yes I did. That was a Joke that requires knowledge of historic lab equipment used in the study of Vacuums, big up to the chuckling geeks.) But really what the fuck is going on with that echo. This week there was only the one outstanding performance, that of Rebecca Fergusson who oozed class although the fawning over Cher Lloyds performance from Simon Cowell suggested that he has picked his winner. However, I believe that Satin’s geometric haired smug monkey was more pleased with the fact that Cher will toe the line than with anything relating to her stretched vocals.

A warning to those who found this review by googling something relating to the X-Factor I am now going to talk about a documentary shown on BBC4. If you are one of the aforementioned go on find BBC4 on your telly you might learn something… Mark Gatiss (of league of Gentlemen fame) has produced what can only be described as a wonderful three part documentary series in which he looks at the three golden ages of Horror cinema (Fuck off Eli Roth you’re not invited). All his enthusiasm for the subject comes across without him going all Louis Theroux with the interviews. If you are quick you can still catch it on iplayer along with a few of the films discussed in full. I wouldn’t usually advise such unwholesome viewing but watch the documentary first and it all the guts and gore seems somewhat justified.

Here’s one to watch. The Trip is a sit-com starring Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon. Playing themselves the pair go on a road trip together to review a restaurants in ‘The North.’ Just one episode into the series and I am withholding judgement until I have seen some more. I advise you tune in just in case you are missing something special, so far it could go either way.