Reviews

I loved this show, and so was hoping they would get a good send off. This has been the best British sitcom in decades. The main premise of this episode was just fine, but the way they handled the ending just ruined it.

Ending it with the Mum reconciling that she has to let go would have been fine. Suddenly having them leave the mansion entirely because the Ghosts don't want to get in the way didn't make any sense, especially after it had been established at the end of season 5 they didn't want to leave because they loved it so much.

I suspect the cast just wanted to close the door on the show (as I'm sure is their right), and this was a way to do so without leaving it open for any future specials or seasons.

Watching the new Netflix documentary, which does briefly cover this one also, made me think about this. When I first watched it, it was the year 2000. I watched it with a friend and both of us were of an age were we'd grown up watching "Jim'll Fix It!" and of course we had dreamed of one day being featured on the show.

The initial excitement of watching some lucky reporter spend a few days with someone we idolized slowly gave way to first confusion, then we just got more and more disturbed as the documentary progressed. Of course, at the time we had no idea of Savile's true depravity. We both concluded he was hiding something truly awful, and I never looked at him in the same way again.

Watching it now in context, it was clearly obvious the man had some very dark secrets that were barely concealed under the surface. I would recommend watching this then the Netflix documentary.

The documentary was interesting, but it really only scratched the surface of what the man did whilst mostly being bogged down in his life story (particularly in the first half) and focusing too much on several episodes of his antics on camera. The actual allegations and interviews with his victims are relegated to the final act of the second episode, this should have been in the forefront of the documentary.

Sitting watching this documentary with my American wife I frequently found myself having to explain the context of what we were watching, I think it didn't really address how much of a "national treasure" he was considered during his lifetime and how much the rumors were only whispered and rarely, if ever, brought up in the UK media. I would also have liked to see them talk more about the infamous Louis Theroux documentary, this was only very briefly touched upon.

Still, it does a good job of presenting this awful episode in British history to a wider audience so I recommend it.

I have to hand it to the Koreans, the two things I've seen from there both had very similar dark themes - the other being "I Saw the Devil". Both of which are truly disturbing pieces of art, but you can't help but keep watching to see what the conclusion may be.

The show raises some interesting questions about human nature and what drives us to do the awful things we do to one another, and you can't help but wonder if such a shadowy society producing a game like this for wealthy clients really does exist somewhere. Either way, it's a very clever concept and masterfully done.

I do hear that the subtitles to English are not always accurate but I don't speak Korean so cannot comment on that. Even if they're not, I was able to follow along and I'm hoping I didn't miss too much of the plot.

I'm originally from Boston, England. It was an nice nostalgia trip seeing all the filming locations in and around Boston - there's a brief clip of my old street which made me smile. They did a good job of showcasing the pretty Lincolnshire countryside and at least made an effort at showing some of the grimmer parts of Boston, a town that's been in a sad decline the last few decades.

Anyway, to the show. It's a typical procedural drama but with a "fish out of water twist and they tried to make it a comedy drama. It could have worked quite well... anyone remember Heartbeat? That show was amazing. Instead they went with silly stereotypes and overused cliches about ignorant Americans. Never mind. The plots themselves are predictable and boring, and there's little in the way of character development.

One other complaint I must address. All of the so called "locals" speak with Yorkshire accents. The Lincolnshire accent is quite distinct and it just shows the producers didn't care to do their research.

This episode suddenly takes us out of the mediaeval fantasy world of the rest of the show and places us squarely in some kind of strange Steampunk other dimension world. It just doesn't fit with the rest of the series at all and seems weird and out of place. Yes, the Futurama references were fun to spot, but it seems so gratuitous. Then, we're slung back into regular Dreamland world and left wondering what the point was.

I truly hope this is just a one off, it will ruin the rest of the show otherwise.

The filmmakers did an amazing job of restoring all the old footage and audio, and I liked the simple animations to explain some of the technical concepts to an audience that may not be 100% familiar with exactly what's going on. Some of the footage were things I've never seen before, and this is coming from a huge spaceflight nerd. This should be required viewing for any history class on the Apollo era.

I've only got one complaint. The music. Don't get me wrong, I loved the music, it was well made and sounded great. The only problem was it was played over the top of all the major sequences and was so loud it overwhelmed the sounds behind it. I wanted to hear the sounds of the Saturn V launch, I wanted to hear the radio chatter. Instead I had loud music ruining the experience.

So, visually this movie was gorgeous. It was well acted (Morgan Freeman!) and the score was wonderful. The plot, in summary:

Bad guy is corrupt. Morgan Freeman tries to kill him for being corrupt. He fails. Morgan Freeman sacrifices himself for honour. Bad guy gets more corrupt and goes crazy thinking Morgan Freeman's followers are going to kill him so builds a big palace financed by bribes. All of Morgan Freeman's followers plot in silence. Emperor says "Hey bad guy, you get a promotion and I'm outlawing bribes so you can't be corrupt any more". Bad guy gets killed, so do half of Freeman's followers in the ensuing chaos. That's it. Things go back to normal, more or less. Movie ends. Commander of bad guys meets fate in a Soprano's-esque ending leaving you go "Well what happened?"

So, yeah, if you like ambiguous allegories about honour and high fantasy you might enjoy this. If you like plots that make sense please look elsewhere as you're going to leave frustrated.

The first Spongebob movie left me cheering for more, and a rare 10/10 vote on IMDb I might add. The series, particularly the first few seasons, is some of the best animated comedy of its generation.

So, we go onto the sequel and the plot is similar to the first and sticks to the tried and tested formula - Plankton is trying to steal the Krabby Patty formula again. Only this time, forces unknown steal it just before he gets the chance so he must te-am, or is it team? up with Spongebob to find out who.

This outgoing has funny parts and the animation is definitely more polished, but somehow the jokes just don't quite flow as well and the plot seems like it's taking a back burner to set pieces. I felt many of the scenes just tailed off as the writers ran out of ideas and moved onto the next set piece. There were some funny parts, don't get me wrong it just didn't seem to work all of the time.

In all, it was an entertaining movie and I enjoyed it but somehow it's not the same. Very similar to the newer Spongebob seasons it just seems like the magic is fading. Hopefully this isn't the end yet, I for one will be sad when Spongebob finally hangs up his spatula.