Welcome you are, dear blog readers, to the latest From The North bloggerisationisms update. And we kick-off with some, for a change, actual proper good news. Trust me, dear blog reader, Keith Telly Topping was every single bit as surprised as you, undoubtedly, are at this happenstance. Anyway, the Digital Spy website has reported that Doctor Who is 'on course to begin filming for the first time since the pandemic.' Following, unconfirmed, reports - in several spectacularly uninformed tabloids - that Doctor Who 'may' be off-air until early 2022 (fantastically imprecise word 'may' don't you think?), Digital Spy claims that it has 'learned' the BBC's popular long-running family SF drama's production team are 'still planning to begin filming this year as [originally] planned.' Should that schedule fall into place, alleged 'insiders' allegedly remain allegedly 'hopeful' that the thirteenth series will be screened in Autumn 2021. Allegedly. This latest development is, Digital Spy suggest, 'a hugely positive sign, following showrunner Chris Chibnall revealing in Doctor Who Magazine back in May that his team were hoping filming could happen later in the year.'Doctor Who will be back on screens before then, of course as Jodie, yer actual Bradley Walsh, Tosin Cole and Mandip Gill filmed a festive special, Revolution Of The Daleks before the nasty pandemic struck. 

Jodie Whittaker, meanwhile, will face 'some fraught family history' when the popular genealogy series Who Do You Think You Are? returns to BBC1 for a four-part series in October. Joining Jodie in the new series will be David Walliams, Ruth Jones and Silent Witness actress Liz Carr. So, at least two of those episodes should be well-worth avoiding like the plague. Jodie, according to the Radio Times, 'learns the poignant reality behind a family myth surrounding her great uncle's sacrifice in World War One, while unearthing some uncomfortable truths about her great-great grandfather in Yorkshire.' One of her predecessors in the TARDIS, yer actual national heartthrob David Tennant, previously appeared in Who Do You Think You Are? in 2006. John Hurt also featured in the series the following year. 
HBO Max will premiere a West Wing 'special' in aid of When We All Vote on 15 October. The production reunites most of the original cast of the greatest TV show in the history of the medium that doesn't have the words 'Doctor' and 'Who' in the title and the creative team of The West Wing for a theatrical stage presentation of the third-series episode Hartsfield's Landing - a particular favourite of this blogger. 'This staged reading is currently being filmed at the Orpheum Theatre in Los Angeles, following strict Covid safety protocols,' according to the Theatre Media website. Rob Lowe, Dulé Hill, Allison Janney, Janel Moloney, Richard Schiff, Bradley Whitford and Martin Sheen reprise their roles, with further casting to be announced (another actor will, obviously, need to take the place of the late John Spencer). 'It will feature new material written by West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin and will be staged by the show's long-time director, Thomas Schlamme.' Additionally, A West Wing Special To Benefit When We All Vote will include act breaks with guest appearances from When We All Vote co-chair Michelle Obama, former President Bill Clinton and Lin-Manuel Miranda. Composer WG Snuffy Walden will perfom his iconic West Wing theme on guitar, with The Avett Brothers closing the show with a performance. In the 2002 episode Hartsfield's Landing, President Bartlett plays a game of chess with Sam and Toby while simultaneously dealing with a foreign policy showdown with China. At the same time, Josh nervously waits the erection results in the small titular New Hampshire town's presidential primary, which is traditionallyknown for accurately predicting the state's winner.
Things we learned from television during the last fortnight. Number one: This week saw the welcome return for a new series of From The North favourite Only Connect and it was jolly gratifying to note that - despite months of lockdown and other general life-altering shenanigan-type affairs - this blogger retains his uncanny ability to get the answer to but one Only Connect question right in every episode before either of the teams do. And, as usual, it was the TV/movie-related one.
Things we learned from television during the last fortnight. Number two: Someone in the Match Of The Day graphics department seemingly doesn't know how to spell 'Newcastle'.
Things we learned from television during the last fortnight. Number three: Watching one of this week's episodes of Government Advice From A Dying Planet, fronted by the Prime Minister his very self, a thought occurred to this blogger. And, the thought was this ...
There was some further jolly good news which arrived, hotfoot, at the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House this week. Specifically, the forthcoming reissue - by those lovely people at Telos Publishing - of A Vault Of Horror: A Book Of Eighty Great (*And, Not So Great) British Horror Movies 1956-1974 - one of the few things with yer actual Keith Telly Topping's name on it that he is actually quite proud of having written. Out of print for a decade, Telos's Godlike and extremely awesome David Howe informs this blogger that a straight reprint of the 2004 book is now available for purchase once again from Telos's own website, from Amazon and, for From The North's Canadian dear blog reader, from Amazon.ca. Our American dear blog readers are, also, catered for, here. Please buy one, several or lots dear blog reader, yer actual Keith Telly Topping has a bad back, several dozen illegitimate children and a significant takeaway habit to support. Thank you for allowing Keith Telly Topping into your homes. Plug ends.  
This news also prompts a new (and, to be fair, mercifully short) From The North semi-regular feature, Unintentionally Hilarious Rock And/Or Roll Moments In British Horror Movies (1956-1974). Number one: Gordon Hessler's - genuinely superb - Scream & Scream Again (Amicus, 1970) includes, just before the epic twenty-minute sequence in which the vampire Cool Keith (Michael Gothard) leads The Fuzz on car and foot chase through greenbelt Hertfordshire, another properly magical moment. In The Busted Pot(!) discothèque, under-rated Welsh pop-rockers Amen Corner perform two songs - 'Scream and Scream Again' and 'When We Make Love'. For the UK Columbia/RCA video release of the movie in 1989 - presumably for obscure copyright reasons - these were replaced on the soundtrack by some rather ghastly, anonymous and entirely inappropriate instrumental musak which sounded like someone was playing a Hammond Organ with their feet. The inclusion of which left the astonishing sight of poor little Andy Fairweather-Lowe mouthing away on the movie but no sound emerging from his gob. The 2002 MGM DVD, thankfully, restored the correct soundtrack.
Point of interest dear blog reader - besides, Keith Telly Topping believes he's correct in saying, one of only two movies to feature Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing and Vincent Price (the only other one this blogger can think of is Pete Walker's House Of Long Shadows in 1983), Scream & Scream Again was, also, the only film, which Shel Talmy - legendary the producer of (deep breath) The Who, The Kinks, David Bowie, The Small Faces, Manfred Mann, The Easybeats, The Creation and, specific to Scream & Scream Again, Amen Corner - ever worked on as musical director. Tragically, between the time of filming (May and June 1969) and the movie's premiere in January the following year, the band - best known for 'Bend Me, Shape Me' and '(If Paradise Is) Half As Nice' - had only gone and split up, hadn't they?
Coming soon in this - as this blogger notes, mercifully very short - series, number two: Dracula AD 1972 narrowly failing to feature the movie debut of Rod Stewart.
Next, dear blog reader, the extremely welcome news that NASA has outlined plans to put the first woman on the Moon by 2024. A mere fifty five years after the first man went there. And, a mere fifty four years after Gerry Anderson did so. That certainly is one small step ...
Although, as this blogger's very excellent chum Rob Francis pointed out, when referring this blogger to a piece by some Middle Class hippy Communist of no cosequence in the Gruniad Morning Star, it is to be sincerely hoped that they have enough lady-spacesuits to go round.
Then, of course, there was the properly astonishing revelation of the possible discovery of life on Venus. Yeah, that'll be the Shanghorns, in all likelihood. So, a reminder to all astronauts; if you should ever encounter one never, under any circumstances, loan it your Perigosto Stick. Otherwise, all manner of discombobulation may occur.
So, dear blog reader, that whole 'getting ourselves back to something approaching normality vis-a-viz Covid-Nineteen' thing didn't last very long, did it? The entire North East, along with much else of the country it seems, is back into well-restricted malarkey. It's not, quite, full lockdown yet, of course it is important to stress that. As this blogger's chum Mark Wyman pointed out: 'These are unfortunate restrictions, sure, but hardly - as the lead story on the evening TV bulletin said - a "lockdown." If the authorities shut the gates to your apartment block and patrol outside, as in Wuhan when this all started, that's a lockdown. If you can still get table service and stay in pubs until 10pm, you might be restricted but you are not locked down.' Nevertheless, things aren't looking good and, being in the middle of a well-restricted area as this blogger is, it certainly feels a wee-bit 'lockdowny'.
As mentioned in a recent bloggerisationism update one of the books on the current Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House reading-list was Robert Harris's 'faction' novel Munich which was one of several volumes given to this blogger as a present by his rather superb pal, Malcolm Hunter during a recent meal in town. Well, yer actual has now finished it (the book, that is, not the meal, he finished that weeks ago) and, he is happy to report, he enjoyed it hugely. Good writer, Harris - not flowery or over-descriptive but he manages to tell a story with economy and skill. This blogger particularly enjoyed his clever usage of tenses, including the revelation of the ultimate future fates of the two central protagonists as almost throwaway lines in the middle of sentences which are set in the then-present (1938) tense. The only other novelist this blogger as seen who was able to do that sort of thing effectively was one of his literary heroines, the great Muriel Spark (she does in brilliantly half-a-dozen times in The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie - which remains this blogger's favourite novel of Twentieth Century). Anyway, Munich is highly recommended if you're looking for something to fill those long and lonely hours of our, seemingly inevitable, forthcoming second lockdown, dear blog reader.
A stray conversation with one of his dear Facebook fiends earlier this week brought to yer actual Keith Telly Topping's mind the scariest advert for a soft drink ever to be inflicted upon the unsuspecting general public. To wit, Tango's legendary 1994 effort, part of their long-running 'You Know When You've Been Tango'd' campaign. Featuring the voices of Hugh Dennis (as Ralph), the late Ray Wilkins (as Tony) and Gil Scott-Heron. And, the most terrifying little old lady you ever did see in all the live-long day. 'Tony, hold ma hand!' 
Speaking of genuinely disturbing childhood memories, dear blog reader, forty eight years ago this very week saw the beginning of London 'Bob-A-Job Week.' And, two cheeky young Boy Scout scamps got a little publicity help - and were given the opportunity to engage in an early example of upskirting - from the divine Goddess-of-cool that was (and, indeed, still is) Caroline Munro. And the disturbing part of this image is, dear blog reader, that this looks, uncannily, like a recurring dream which this blogger had just about every night for most of the 1970s ...
Facebook also, and no obvious reason, reminded this blogger of a posting he made in 2011 (not 2010, in a - somewhat more understandable - 'it was ten years ago, today'-type malarkey. But, rather, a ninth year anniversary. What the actual flip?) Still, though, happy memories; those halcyon days, dear blog reader, when a photo of a simple double entendre shop-sign could provide us all with some momentary levity from the crushing oppression of existence. Fortunately, things are very different in 2020 ...
There are simply no words, dear blog reader - no bloody words what-so-bloomin'-ever - to convey just how much this blogger hates the new Facebook layout which has been forcibly rolled-out this week. Keith Telly Topping thinks that it is ugly and bland and, far more importantly, it's not particularly user friendly. And, it seems that he's not alone in his Goddamn annoyance. The thing this blogger dislikes most about the new layout is that at least one useful aspect of the old format doesn't seem to have been included in this hateful new version. The Timeline facility does not appear to be working. There's no drop-down list to provide access to older posts. So, say for example one wishes to access ones pages from June 2010, there doesn't appear to be any way of doing so other than to scroll down though ten years worth of stuff. This blogger has mentioned this to Facebook in 'feedback' messages (several times) and, typically, got no response - not that he was particularly expecting one. It really is so effing annoying when a format which was working perfectly well is changed, without bothering to ask users whether they actually wanted it to be changed or not. For, seemingly, no other reason than some glake in a suit somewhere wants to show off his (or her) go-faster-stripes formatting skills. This blogger notes from many and various Facebook fiends whinging about it on their own pages that the new Facebook layout appears to be about as popular as Covid-Nineteen. Google Blogger have just done something similar and it, too, is harsh, ugly and about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. And it has, seemingly, similarly dispensed with a couple of useful (and, much used) shortcuts without bothering to ask users whether they wanted to lose them or not. First World Problems, obviously dear blog reader, but some plank really needs a damned good, hard fisting for coming up with his fiasco without bothering to do any proper customer research to see whether such changes as a) wanted, b) necessary or c) an improvement on what we had already.
Thankfully, dear blog reader as a small postscript to all this crap - this blogger's very excellent Facebook fiend Kate provided this useful work-around which means that, for the moment at least, the Facebook changes can be reversed. Which is nice. 

The BBC News website posed a fascinating conundrum earlier this week, dear blog reader, in an article entitled: My Neighbours Are Breaking The [Covid] Rules, What Should I Say? Interesting question. Opinion appears to be somewhat divided on the matter, it would seem. The Home Secretary, for example, wants people to snitch up the guilty to Plod right good and proper like a filthy, stinkin' Copper's Narks. And then one imagines watch, amused, as they are hauled off to The Pokey in a Black Maria whilst swearing blood-curdling vengeance on those responsible for their sorry plight. Her boss the Prime Minister, on the other hand, suggests that, instead - since he's not a filthy, stinkin' grass - one should 'confront' those doing The Naughty ourselves. And, presumably, once we've been butted, geet hard, in the mush by some twenty stone right hard skinhead who doesn't appreciate having his right to barbeque questioned by the likes of us scum, we should seek immediate medical attention. Particularly if said contact between this individual's forehead and our nose is likely to have passed on Covid-Nineteen. So, as noted, opinion is divided.
For what it's worth, dear blog reader, for once - and if only on this matter - this blogger is with Bashing Boris all the jolly way on this particular score. You know what they say, thou shalt not suffer a Copper's Nark to live. It's in The Bible. Page three hundred and sixteen. Probably. 
Anyway, dear blog reader, on to far more important matters. This blogger really deserved this shredded beef in chilli and garlic.
And, this beef and king prawn curry. Really.
Then, there was the evening that this blogger had a right proper hankerin' for watching the cricket whilst eating some curry, boiled rice and chips. Because, he really deserved it.
The From The North Headline Of The Week award for this particular bloggerisationisms update period goes to the BBC News website's Woman Who Sawed Off Own Hand Found Guilty Of Fraud. In other news, police are also said to be investigating the curious case of Oleg Stumpy McNoLeg ...
Yer actual Keith Telly Topping's passport expired in 2017 dear blog reader and he's had no reason to get a replacement since. He still hasn't, if truth be told - he's certainly not going to exotic foreign parts any time soon. But, being without a form of photo-ID can be a bit of a 'mare as this blogger has discovered to his cost on a couple of occasions when he's been asked to prove that he is Yer Actual Keith Telly Topping, Guv'nor Of The Gogglebox and has been quite unable to do so. Thus, with a bit of spare coin in hand from all the holiday pay he got on his final swag from work last month, this blogger decided to get his very self a replacement one. It must be said, the photo is a little bit more Stalag-Luft Fourteen than usual.
This blogger would definitely have preferred it if his second choice had been used instead.
Though probably not the 'Bela Lugosi's Dead' look of his third option. Cheer up, y'gloomy bugger. 
The temptation to run the actual passport photo through FaceApp (it's 'a thing' which all of the cool kids do, apparently) was, seemingly, too great for at least one of this blogger's excellent Facebook fiends. Which only goes to prove that this blogger's science-fiction twin sister is ... Diane Morgan (if she'd been on the cakes for a few months). Don't know about anyone else but, this blogger definitely would. 
Within a couple of hours of submitting the photo this blogger received an e-mail from the passport office saying that his application had been extremely accepted and they would be printing his new (blue) passport and sending it out to the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House 'in due course.' So, seemingly, they didn't take one look at the submitted photo and exclaim 'my God, we can't give him a passport, what will the rest of the world think of us?' And, sure enough, not long afterwards this blogger had acquired full legality once more. Interesting to note that the dot-gov-dot-uk website makes much of the fact that the passport office are, currently, working with a reduced staff due to The Plague and that the usually-advised six weeks for a renewal passport to be fully processed is likely, at the moment, to take somewhat longer. This one, from date of application to date of delivery, took just eighteen days. So, if you want to get a passport application in, dearblog reader, now is probably the time to do it. But, don't tell them this blogger told you this, okay?! 
Back to the current right-shite-state-of-affairs that are making life such a bloody chore and, just when you thought things couldn't, possibly, get any worse, dear blog reader, there's this.
Well sod that. No bastard strike's gonna keep this blogger from his weekly Jammie Dodger stash. And, thanks to Poundland, no bastard strike did. So, with that all nicely sorted, up the workers.
Toots Hibbert, the frontman of the legendary reggae trio Toots & The Maytals, has died at the age of seventy seven. One of Jamaica's most influential musicians, he helped popularise reggae in the 1960s with songs like 'Pressure Drop', 'Monkey Man' and 'Funky Kingston'. He even claimed to have coined the genre's name, on 1968's 'Do The Reggay'. The cause of death was not disclosed, but Toots had recently been taken to hospital with Covid-like symptoms and was placed in a medically induced coma. A charismatic and soulful performer, Hibbert scored over thirty number one singles in Jamaica. Thanks to his full-throated vocals, he was often referred to as 'The Otis Redding of Reggae.' The musician was born in May Pen, a town thirty miles West of Kingston, in December 1942. The youngest of seven children, he grew up singing gospel music in his church choir - but it was at school where he formed his ambition to become a performer. 'We had to sing before class, in the morning,' he told BBC 6Music in 2018. 'And teacher said, "Yeah, you have the best voice" and gave me good encouragement.' His mother, a midwife, died when Toots was eight, with his father dying three years later. As a teenager, he moved to Kingston, where he lived with his older brother John (who had nicknamed him 'Little Toots') and found work in a barbershop. There, he struck a friendship with singers Jerry Matthius and Raleigh Gordon, with whom he formed The Maytals. In 1962, the year Jamaica gained independence from the United Kingdom, they were discovered by Clement Coxsone Dodd, who signed them to his famed Studio One label. Over the next ten years, they released a string of hit singles including 'Fever', 'Bam Bam' and 'Sweet & Dandy'. But the group hit a roadblock in 1967, when Hibbert was arrested for possession of marijuana. He served nine months in The Slammer. On his release, they recorded '54-46 (That's My Number)' - a reference to his prison number. It became one of the first reggae songs to receive widespread popularity outside Jamaica, introducing many Europeans to the sound for the first time. At the time, however, the word reggae didn't even exist. The music, which was an evolution of ska and rocksteady, had been called 'blue-beat' or 'boogie-beat' until Hibbert intervened. 'The music was there and no-one knew what to call it,' he told 6Music. 'In Jamaica we had a slang - if we're not looking so good, if we're looking raggedy, we'd call it "streggae." That's where I took it from. I recorded this song ['Do The Reggay'] and people told me that the song let them know that our music is called Reggae. So I'm the one who coined the word!' The Maytals were part of a scene that included soon-to-be legends, such as The Wailers, Lee Scratch Perry and Jimmy Cliff and they recorded with everyone from The Skatalites to Prince Buster. 'It was competitive and friendly, a golden time,' Hibbert recently recalled in a profile for Rolling Stain. The group scored a UK hit with 'Monkey Man', and, in 1972, Hibbert appeared in the ground-breaking movie The Harder They Come. The Maytals' classic 'Pressure Drop' was featured on the soundtrack - which introduced many US fans to reggae - and it was later covered by The Clash, cementing the group's reputation in the UK. In 1980, they entered the Guinness Book Of Records after a concert in London's Hammersmith Palais was cut to vinyl and released in just twenty four hours, with Island Records boss Chris Blackwell personally delivering copies to record shops in his Mini Cooper. A year later, however, Matthias and Gordon retired from music and Hibbert continued as a solo act. He assembled a new version of The Maytals in the 1990s and toured extensively - but made a more high-profile comeback with the 2004 CD True Love. Boasting new recordings of some of his best-known songs, the record featured a host of guest stars - including Eric Clapton, Keith Richards, No Doubt, Willie Nelson, Bonnie Raitt and The Roots. It went on to win a Grammy award, rejuvenating the musician's career. He released a solo CD, Light Your Light, in 2007 and hit the road for The Maytals fiftieth anniversary in 2012. The following year, however, he was injured during a concert and was unable to perform again until 2016. 'What happened was we were doing a college show and one of the guys loved my music so much that he threw a liquor bottle onstage,' he later recalled. 'I tried to catch it but it hit my head. It was a pity that it happened. It's taken me three years to make people happy again.' The fan was arrested and Hibbert told the judge he had suffered 'extreme anxiety, memory loss, headaches, dizziness and, most sadly of all, a fear of crowds and performing.' However, he requested that the nineteen-year-old receive a light sentence. 'He is a young man and I have heard what happens to young men in jail,' he wrote in a letter to the judge. 'My own pain and suffering would be increased substantially knowing that this young man would face that prospect.' In the ensuing years, Hibbert recorded almost every day in his home studio and recently released what was to be his last CD, Got To Be Tough. It was co-produced by Zak Starkey who marvelled at the musician's longevity. 'The power in his voice is beyond anyone I've ever met,' he told Rolling Stain. 'And he has lived through all the generations of Jamaican music. He was at the forefront at the start, and he's at the forefront now. How incredible is that?' In 2012, Hibbert explained his theory of reggae in a profile for Interview magazine. He described his songs as 'a message of consolation; a message of salvation. The youth are going to the school and they have to listen to the words. The parents have to listen to the words. God has to listen to the words. So, we have to make it positive. If you sing nursery rhymes, it is nothing. You just blow up tomorrow, and the record dies at the same time. But if you give positive words, that song lives for ever.'
Ronald Bell, one of the founder members of Kool & the Gang, has died at the age of sixty eight. He started the band with his brother, Robert, in 1964. They became one of the 1970's most popular and influential soul and funk bands, with hits including 'Celebration', 'Ladies' Night' and 'Get Down On It'. Their music also featured in several films including Saturday Night Fever, for which they received a Grammy in 1978 and Pulp Fiction. Bell died at his home in the US Virgin Islands with his wife by his side, his publicist said. The cause of death was not given. A self-taught saxophonist and singer, he founded the group in New Jersey with Robert and five school friends - Dennis Thomas, Robert Mickens, Charles Smith, George Brown and Ricky West. Their career was split into two distinct halves. In the early 1970s, they scored US hits with the foot-stomping funk of songs like 'Jungle Boogie' and 'Hollywood Swinging'. Then, with the addition of vocalist JT Taylor in 1979, they morphed into a hit-making R&B band, scoring the biggest commercial success of their career as they reached their twentieth anniversary. As musical director, Bell co-wrote all of their biggest hits, including the wedding disco standard 'Celebration'. It was his favourite song from the band's extensive back catalogue, he told the Reuters news agency in 2008. 'I was clueless, thinking that that was going to be a hit. I had no idea,' he noted. 'But after all these years, there are times at the end of the show when I see all of these people singing a song and after all of an hour-and-a-half, you ask them to jump up and down and they still jump up and down. That's kind of overwhelming for me.' For what it's worth this blogger, a big fan of most of Kool & The Gang's music, is with Buffy Summers' opinion of 'Celebration' in the Buffy The Vampire Slayer episode Prom Night when it gets played at the Sunnydale High end-of-term party. 'I hate that song!' Anyway, the group received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2015 for their contribution to the world of entertainment and were inducted into the Songwriters' Hall Of Fame in 2018. Bell was born and raised in Ohio and picked up the music bug from his father, a professional boxer who was a friend of jazz legends Thelonious Monk and Miles Davis. Unable to afford drums, Bell and his brother taught themselves to play on makeshift instruments. 'I used to beat paint cans like bongos and depending on how much paint was inside, this would determine the tone of the sounds we made,' he recalled. After the family moved to New Jersey in his teens, Bell's mother bought him a real set of bongos and he began to teach himself bass guitar, borrowing an instrument from the brother of his future bandmate Spike Mickens. The first incarnation of Kool & The Gang formed in 1964, but they cycled through several names - including Jazziacs, The New Dimensions, The Soul Town Band, The Jazz Birds and Kool & the Flames - before settling on their best-known moniker in 1969. Along the way, they combined their love of jazz with the gritty rhythms of street funk, creating a sound which would lead to their success in the 1970s. 'We used to play a lot of percussion in the streets in the 1960s, go to the park and start beating on drums,' Bell told Rolling Stain. 'You had a hard time trying to get us to play R&B,' he added. 'We were die-hard jazz musicians. We're not stooping to that.' As The Jazz Birds, they won the Apollo Theatre's famed Amateur Night and landed a record deal with a small independent label, De-Lite Records. Three singles from their self-titled debut LP hit the pop charts, with the instrumental track 'Kool & The Gang' showcasing their raucous, horn-driven sound. Their mainstream breakthrough came with 1973's Wild & Peaceful. Lead single 'Funky Stuff' became their first top forty hit in the US, followed by 'Jungle Boogie' and 'Hollywood Swinging', which both reached the top ten. The former went on to become one of their signature songs - memorably used in Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction and sampled in Madonna's 'Erotica'. It was only written after the band's record label, in search of a hit single, pressured Kool & The Gang to record a cover of 'Soul Makossa' by Manu Dibango. 'It would have been a hit,' Bell later recalled. 'But we decided we were not going to record 'Soul Makossa' - we'll come up with our own "jungle music", not to be derogatory. We made the song up in the rehearsal, went in and recorded it that night. 'Jungle Boogie' is one take.' As disco rose to prominence, the band struggled to replicate their early success - although they did win a Grammy for 'Open Sesame', their contribution to the multi-million-selling Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. Things changed with the addition of Taylor, a former nightclub singer and producer Eumir Deodato, which led to a cleaner, pop-driven sound and the crossover single 'Ladies' Night'. The decision was prompted when the band found themselves on tour with The Jacksons and were told by the promoter that they needed a frontman. Taylor, chosen for his deep baritone 'like Nat King Cole', was the only singer they auditioned. Unlike many of the funk bands of the 1970s, Kool & The Gang thrived in the 1980s, scoring huge hits with sentimental ballads like 'Joanna' and 'Cherish', as well as the party anthems 'Steppin' Out' and 'Get Down On It'. Possibly their most enduring hit was 'Celebration', which was inspired by Bell's Islamic faith. 'I was reading the scripture about where God called the angels together and made an announcement that he was going to create this being,' he told Songwriter Universe. 'He gathered the angels together and they said, "We don't know nothin', but we just celebrate you, God - we celebrate and praise you." And I thought, I'm going to write a song about that, [with the line] "Everyone around the world ... Come on!" That's the intent. It was actually written for mankind.' The group found a new generation of fans in the 1980s and 90s as their music was sampled in a raft of pop and hip-hop songs. 'Jungle Boogie's horn riff appears in Luniz's 'I Got Five On It'; 'Summer Madness' formed the basis of 'Summertime' by DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince and the syncopated rhythms of 'Jungle Jazz' appear on dozens of songs, from M/A/R/RS's 'Pump Up The Volume' to Jade's 'Don't Walk Away'. When Public Enemy sampled three Kool & The Gang songs for Fear Of A Black Planet, Bell voiced his approval. 'After Public Enemy, I was all in [with hip-hop],' he told Rolling Stain in 2015. 'The music was all new to me. I sat and listened to Fear Of A Black Planet and was thrilled. I thought that was amazing. You can practically hear [drummer] George [Brown] playing that break-beat. You can hear our music in the background. You know it was compound and compact, but you can hear Kool & the Gang music in all that hip-hop.' The rise of hip-hop and the departure of Taylor in 1989 effectively ended Kool & The Gang's presence on the charts, but Bell continued to record and tour with the group as a legacy act. At the time of his death, he was working on a solo CD called Kool Baby Brotha Band, as well as a series of animations about the band's childhood and career. In an interview with Billboard last year, he said that he felt 'grateful' to have had a career in music. 'And, for it to be this long,' he added. 'For me, I'm most grateful for that, to still be relevant since [we were] nineteen.' The musician is survived by his wife, Tia Sinclair Bell and ten children as well as his brother, Robert and three other siblings.
Simeon Coxe, co-founder and vocalist of the 1960s experimental electronic band Silver Apples, has died aged eighty two. The musician was known for fusing traditional rock structures with electronically generated melodies, using synthesizers he built at home. Although Silver Apples' career was relatively short-lived, they influenced the likes of Hawkwind and, later, Beck, Beastie Boys and Portishead. Coxe died at home in Alabama, having suffered with the progressive lung condition pulmonary fibrosis. In a statement, his manager Jack Trevillion said that the condition had made it hard for the musician to breathe without oxygen, but that he had died peacefully. 'Silver Apples leaves a lasting legacy and contribution to electronic music with their ground-breaking sound that has stood the test of time and influenced many artists over the years, right up to the present day,' Trevillion added. Prior to forming Silver Apples, Coxe and percussionist Danny Taylor played in a more traditional 1960s rock group, The Overland Stage Electric Band. But the band's destiny changed after a friend introduced Coxe to an oscillator that had been built in the 1940s. Intrigued, Coxe started experimenting with the machine, layering eerie, atonal sounds over his band's music. 'They hated it,' he told some Middle Class hippy Communist of no consequence at the Gruniad Morning Star last year. All of the band except Taylor quit and the duo began making music as Silver Apples in New York in 1967. Coxe added more and more oscillators (or, in his own words, 'a home‑made pile of electric junk'), eventually building an instrument he called The Thing. According to sleeve notes on the band's debut LP, The Thing consisted of 'nine audio oscillators and eighty six manual controls. The lead and rhythm oscillators are played with the hands, elbows and knees and the bass oscillators are played with the feet.' The instrument - which the press dubbed 'The Simeon' - allowed for some unusual experiments. On stage, Coxe would ask the audience to shout out the name of their favourite radio station - and he would then tune into it live, adding random snatches of speech and music to the song 'Program'. The band won several famous fans, including John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix (with whom they jammed on a version of 'The Star-Spangled Banner' prior to the guitarist's legendary Woodstock appearance in 1969). But they remained a cult item, with low sales for their self-titled debut LP and its follow-up Contact. The artwork for the latter showed Coxe and Taylor sitting in the cockpit of a Pan Am jet - a stunt that had been arranged in return for the band including the airline's logo in the artwork. However, when the LP was released with a picture of a plane crash on the back cover, Pan Am sued. The record was pulled from the shelves and the band's instruments were confiscated. 'They actually came to a club where we were playing and confiscated Danny's drums,' Coxe told Sound On Sound. 'Fortunately, my stuff wasn't there. That photograph led to the lawsuit that broke the band up. No record label would touch us from that point on. That was the end of Silver Apples.' Coxe went on to work as a graphic designer, TV reporter and ice-cream salesman, while Taylor worked for a telephone company. Two decades later, a German record label printed bootleg copies of Silver Apples' two LPs, leading to a surge in interest in their music. In 1997, Coxe revived the band with a show at New York's Knitting Factory, attended by Johnny Depp, Kate Moss, The Beastie Boys and Sean Lennon. At the time, he hadn't been able to locate Taylor - but after mentioning his name in interviews, the pair reconnected and went on to release four new CDs including 1998's The Garden - completing the record they'd been working on when Pan Am ended their career. However, tragedy struck late the same year when their tour bus was forced off the road while driving home from a Hallow'een show in New York. Coxe suffered a broken neck, an injured spine and partial paralysis. Fans including Alan Vega and Martin Rev from Suicide and members of Sonic Youth, played a benefit concert to help pay his medical expenses. After 'years of physical therapy,' the musician felt well enough to resume his career, but by that time Taylor was in poor health, having been diagnosed with a degenerative muscle disease. When the drummer died in 2005 of a heart attack, Coxe kept his bandmate's spirit alive by sampling studio recordings into live performances, rather than replacing him with another musician. Coxe's injuries still caused complications, however. 'I still stumble a lot just walking around,' he told Electronic Sound magazine in 2012. 'If I pick something up that's hot, it'll burn me before I realise I shouldn't be picking it up. But when it came to playing, I discovered it didn't matter that I couldn't feel with my hands. As long as I could see the dials on the oscillators, I could play them.' His last CD, Clinging To A Dream, was released in 2016 and he said he never lost the desire to perform. 'Every day I wake up trying to figure out how to unravel something new,' he told Huck magazine. Coxe is survived by his long-term companion and creative collaborator Lydia Winn Levert, his brother David Coxe, sister-in-law Foster and his nephew, Aaron.
Pamela Hutchinson, a member of the Grammy-winning R&B group The Emotions, has died at the age of sixty one. She was the youngest sister of the band's core members Sheila, Wanda and Jeanette Hutchinson and sang on their biggest hit single 'The Best Of My Love'. News of her death was confirmed on The Emotions'Facebook page. 'In loving memory, we are saddened to announce the passing of our sister, Pamela Rose Hutchinson, on Friday18 September,' a statement read. 'Pam succumbed to health challenges that she'd been battling for several years. Now our beautiful sister will sing amongst the angels in heaven in perfect peace. Thank you and as always, You Got The Best of Our Love.' The band emerged from Chicago in the 1960s, where the sisters had been gospel singers as children. After achieving local success, they signed with Stax, working with the likes of Isaac Hayes and David Porter. When Stax folded, the group were taken under the wing of Maurice White from Earth, Wind & Fire, who produced two of their LPs and co-wrote 'The Best Of My Love'. The Emotions returned the favour by lending their harmonies to Earth, Wind & Fire's disco anthem 'Boogie Wonderland' in 1979. Pamela joined her sisters just in time for their crossover pop success - although she only appeared on one LP, before becoming a permanent member in the early 2000s. That incarnation of the band collaborated with Snoop Dogg on 'Life', from the 2006 CD Tha Blue Carpet Treatment. In their statement, The Emotions added: 'We appreciate all kind words, photos, and videos you may want to post for our beloved Pamela and of course your loving prayers. A life so beautifully lived deserves to be beautifully remembered.'
Anglo-French actor Michael Lonsdale, who played the villain opposite Roger Moore's James Bond in Moonraker, has died at the age of eighty nine. In the film, he played Hugo Drax, an industrialist planning to poison all humans on Earth then repopulate the planet from his space station. And he got all the best lines, particularly - to one of his minions - 'look after Mister Bond. See that some harm comes to him!' It was one of more than two hundred roles he played in both English and French cinema over a career that spanned six decades. Bond producers Michael G Wilson and Barbara Broccoli called Lonsdale 'an extraordinarily talented actor and a very dear friend.' The official Twitter account for the late Sir Roger Moore described his character as 'a smooth-tongued and cultured adversary to 007.' In an interview with Mi6 HQ in 2012, Lonsdale was asked whether he had been concerned that playing a Bond villain might have a negative impact on his career. 'On the contrary!' he replied. 'Because, I made so many films that were not really very popular or didn't make much money and I only made poor films, so I thought I might like to be in a rich film.' In the same interview, he said: 'My teacher, when I was at school for the theatre, told me that "One day you will have to play someone very nasty." But really, he is such a terrible character, a sort of Nazi. I mean, Drax is like Hitler. He wanted to destroy everybody and rain down a new order of very athletic, young people. He was mad, completely.' Lonsdale had a varied career on film, TV, radio and stage. Before becoming a Bond villain, he played the Deputy Commissioner Claude Lebel in 1973 political thriller The Day Of The Jackal. He later appeared as Jean-Pierre in 1998 US action movie Ronin, alongside Robert De Niro and Jean Reno and as Papa in Steven Spielberg's 2005 historical thriller Munich. He won a César for his role in Des Hommes Et Des Dieux (Of Gods & Men, 2010), as one of a group of Trappist monks living in rural Algeria. 'I'd vowed never to accept another role as a priest,' Lonsdale said. 'But, I couldn't resist playing this wonderful, generous character.' It was Orson Welles who first cast Lonsdale as a priest, in The Trial (1962). 'We only shot for one night, but he must have done twenty takes for my scene. Welles was incredibly nice and every few minutes, he would keep asking me: "Are you happy, Mister Lonsdale?" Of course, I was thrilled.' But Lonsdale's real breakthrough came in 1968 in two François Truffaut films. In La Mariée Etait En Noir (The Bride Wore Black), he was a pompous politician, one of five men on whom Jeanne Moreau wreaks revenge for killing her husband on the church steps after their wedding. In Baisers Volés (Stolen Kisses), Lonsdale was the obnoxious owner of a shoe shop who hires a detective (Jean-Pierre Léaud) to work in his store to find out why his employees hate him. Lonsdale's dry delivery and his ability to get to the core of a character almost immediately suited the stylised characterisations and deconstructed narratives of Marguerite Duras. He first appeared under her direction in Détruire Dit-Elle (Destroy, She Said, 1969) as an enigmatic German Jew, one of the few guests at a hotel in a forest. Later, Lonsdale was cast in Duras'India Song (1975) as the lugubrious French vice-consul in the India of the 1930s who turns a blind eye to the numerous affairs engaged in by his pampered wife (Delphine Seyrig). 'It's my favourite role,' Lonsdale said. He also performed in and directed plays by Duras on the Paris stage and, among many others, by Samuel Beckett, another favourite writer. In contrast, he gained wide international exposure in Fred Zinnemann's The Day Of The Jackal (1973), as the cool master policeman in charge of tracking down the lone would-be assassin (Edward Fox) and, of course, in Moonraker where his dry and laconic delivery of some fabulous lines won him an entirely new audience. Lonsdale was born in Paris, to an English father, Edward Lonsdale-Crouch, an army officer and a French-Irish mother, Simone Béraud and spent much of his childhood in London and the Channel Islands. When Michael was eight, his family relocated to Casablanca, where his father planned to set up a business. 'Then the war broke out and we were stuck in North Africa,' Lonsdale recalled. 'It was there that my love for the cinema was born, thanks to the American soldiers who arrived in 1942. My parents became friends with the officers and they brought me along to see all the great movies by John Ford, George Cukor, Howard Hawks. I even saw Casablancain Casablanca. It was amusing to see Hollywood's idea of Morocco.' In 1947, Lonsdale went to Paris to study painting, but soon decided to switch to acting to 'overcome my shyness.' He took classes with Tania Balachova at the Vieux Colombier theatre, whose classes followed some of the Stanislavskian methods used by the Actors Studio in New York. Among his fellow students there were Seyrig, Laurent Terzieff, Stéphane Audran and Jean-Louis Trintignant. In his 2016 memoir Le Dictionnaire De Ma Vie, Lonsdale said he had fallen in love with Seyrig: 'It was her or nothing and that's why at eighty five I'm still unmarried.' Around that time, he changed his first name to Michel: 'Because the French had trouble pronouncing Michael' and converted to Catholicism. After a number of bits in commercial French films, he started to get bigger parts in the early 1960s, mainly thanks to Jean-Pierre Mocky, who cast him in five features as an archetypal bourgeois, bringing out Lonsdale's deadpan humour. The first, and most widely distributed abroad, was Snobs! (1962), an iconoclastic comedy in which Lonsdale played one of four unscrupulous directors of a milk co-operative vying to fill the post of president, after the incumbent is drowned in a vat of milk. During the 1970s, arguably the most fruitful decade of Lonsdale's career, he was fortunate to work for some of the best directors around in a range of small but striking roles: he was a possibly paedophile priest in Louis Malle's Le Souffle Au Coeur (Murmurs Of The Heart, 1971), a lustful theatre director in Jacques Rivette's Out 1 (1974), a world-weary doctor in Alain Resnais'Stavisky (1974) and, in Luis Buñuel's Le Fantôme De La Liberté (1974), a 'respectable' man who invites four monks to witness his being whipped. Lonsdale was also seen in what could be called avant-garde erotica, playing a judge investigating a girl's murder in Alain Robbe-Grillet's Glissements Progressifs Du Plaisir (Successive Slidings Of Pleasure, 1974) and as a man who tells his friends a story about his early days as a Peeping Tom in Jean Eustache's Une Sale Histoire (A Dirty Story, 1977). 'I like to be where no one expects me to be,' Lonsdale explained. He also made three films with Joseph Losey: Galileo (1975), based on the Brecht play, in which he played the intellectual Cardinal Barberini, who gradually discards his liberal views as he takes on the robes to become Pope Urban VIII, The Romantic Englishwoman (also 1975), in which he appeared as a smooth gangster and Mister Klein (1976), in which he was rather creepy as a cuckolded lawyer. Lonsdale continued to appear in diverse films, including a few Hollywood movies, such as John Frankenheimer's The Holcroft Covenant (1985), as the softly spoken Swiss accountant dealing with Michael Caine's tainted inheritance and Jean-Jacques Annaud's The Name Of The Rose (1986), where he was the quizzical abbot who believes The Devil is at work in his monastery. Although the quantity of films he made was not reduced, the quality was. Among the exceptions were The Tribulations Of Balthazar Kober (1988), the final film by the Polish director Wojciech Has, in which Lonsdale played a wise philosopher and two James Ivory films, The Remains Of The Day (1993), as a French statesman with blisters on his feet and Jefferson In Paris (1995), as Louis XVI. He was back to priestly robes as the Inquisitor General in Miloš Forman's period drama Goya's Ghosts (2006) and in Nicolas Klotz's Heartbeat Detector (2007) he was the chief executive of a large company who locks himself away in his office for hours on end and sits alone listening to Schubert in the back seat of his parked car. In the latter part of his career, the grey-bearded Lonsdale loaned gravitas to whatever part he played, including Theon, the head of the library in Alexandria, in Agora (2009), directed by Alejandro Amenábar, the leader of a mosque in occupied Paris in Ismaël Ferroukhi's Free Men (2011) and the title role of Manoel de Oliveira's O Gebo E A Sombra (2012).
Some cricketers made more runs, some had better averages but no Australian player of his time created more excitement or won more devotion than Dean Jones, who has died of a heart attack this week, aged just fifty nine. A transformative and captivating batsman, especially in the one-day format where he led the world in his pomp during the late 1980s and early 1990s, Deano earned iconic status for his sparkling footwork, effervescent strokeplay, bold running between wickets, and the strip of zinc cream always pasted on his bottom lip. A generation of Australian children, from his hometown of Melbourne to every corner of the continent, were compelled to watch him. They wanted to be him. Jones served as the gateway into a lifetime love of cricket played aggressively to the last. In the years after his career ended, his influence was clear on the Twenty20 revolution that followed, one he embraced as a coach, broadcaster and columnist. Born in the Melbourne suburb of Coburg, Jones followed in his father Barney's steps to the Carlton Cricket Club, where he was a teenage prodigy. He graduated to state ranks in 1982, one year later falling one run short of turning his maiden century for Victoria into a double. From the hard school of the Sheffield Shield, at the age of twenty two he was picked for his first Australian tour in 1984 - the toughest assignment in the game at the time, visiting the Caribbean. It was Jones's debut innings for his country in Trinidad that he looked back on with most pride - not a day when he raised his bat, but when he made forty eight against the fearsome West Indies pace attack on their own patch. It would be more than two years before he got his next chance at test cricket, but what followed was one of the most celebrated innings ever played. In the intense heat and humidity of Madras, he finished on two hundred and ten after more than five hundred minutes in the middle, so dehydrated that he struggled to control bodily functions, partially lost his memory of the innings and ended up in hospital on a drip. This would go on to become only the second tied test match. Underpinned by Jones's bravery, it heralded not only the beginning of his own era but the start of a new one for Australian cricket. A year later, in 1987, back in India and against all expectations, they held won the World Cup for the first time, with Jones at number three instrumental in their success. In 1989, when Allan Border's men reclaimed the Ashes in England for the first time since 1934, it was Jones who struck two centuries, earning acclaim as one of Wisden's five cricketers of the year. Twin centuries against Pakistan the following home summer, along with a torrent of runs in Australia's fluorescent one-day yellow strip, showed the man at his most prolific. The pin-up of a cricket-mad nation, Jones dominated the one-day game like no Australian before him. Skipping down the track at fast bowlers and spinners alike, he attacked, come what may. His one hundred and forty five at The Gabba against the touring English in 1990 was an innings before its time - an unbridled and ostentatious joy, blasting balls over the rope before it was routine to do so. By now there was no doubt: Deano was the best white-ball batsman on the planet. 'Sometimes I die by the sword,' he would later say of his approach, 'but, by gee, I had a few kills along the way.' He certainly did, reflected too in his whole-body boundary fielding or his sprints for each run, like an Olympian athlete rather than a cricketer. He was always in a pair of sunglasses, as significant to the Jones portrait as the lump of gum he chewed whenever at the crease with a County or Kookaburra blade, batting bare-headed or with a cap or in his broad-brimmed floppy hat. This all-or-nothing attitude was on show in early 1993 when Jones made the ill-considered decision to demand Curtly Ambrose remove the sweatbands from his wrists during a limited-overs final. Not for the first or last time, he pulled the wrong rein that night, inspiring a match-winning spell from his annoyed adversary. In part, it was an act of defiance at the end of a summer during which he had lost his test spot despite having clocked an unbeaten century two matches earlier. He would not add to his fifty two test caps, with selectors seeing fit to dispense with his eleven centuries and average of over forty six. Jones never truly got over this, nor did his disciples. In his return to the fifty-over team in the following home summer, it was a matter of faith that he had been slighted; the wrong would be righted. But when he fell two runs short of a hundred against South Africa in the heat of Brisbane - this time with an ice collar around his neck below the signature wide-brimmed hat - it signalled a last hurrah rather than an early-thirties rebirth. Within months he was jettisoned again, this time prompting an impetuous retirement from international cricket. Sure enough, there were twists. 'If they keep saying I'm one of the best one-day players in the world, then why am I not there?' Jones declared when piling on runs in his majestic summer of 1994-95 with Victoria, including an unbeaten triple-century on his beloved MCG. But, although he was available for selection before the 1996 World Cup, the call never came. Bruised by this, Jones made his point the best way he knew how. When Australia returned home as beaten finalists from that tournament, Melbourne's favourite son turned out for a World XI playing against his former teammates. He duly saluted, bringing up his century with a six into the Southern Stand. His supporters bellowed his name that day just as they defended his every frustrated public utterance. A decade in the canary yellow produced ovr six thousand runs at an average of forty five, including fifty three scores beyond fifty, as well as signs reading 'BRING BACK DEANO' for a decade more. Domestic cricket had to fill an initial gap, first in England, helping Durham to establish themselves as a first class county and then leading Derbyshire to their best finish in six decades in 1996, then for Victoria until 1998 to complete his career with twelve thousand six hundred and sixty eight runs across formats, at the time the record for that state. Another chapter of his life began beyond the boundary. While his thoughtful words in print were valued at home, it was in Asia that he was revered as a coach, ultimately leading to success at the helm of Islamabad United in the Pakistan Super League in 2016 and 2018. In 2017, when the trailblazing Afghanistan men's team was in need of a coach at short notice, it was Deano who stepped in to do the job. It was inevitable that Jones would court controversy as a broadcaster - he was remorseful to the end about a discriminatory remark he made in 2006 that insulted the South African Muslim batsman Hashim Amla. His years on the airwaves offered endless enterprising theories on the twenty-over game, which he coached so well and would have been so suited to playing. He died the night after commentating on an Indian Premier League fixture. Jones was appointed a member of the Order of Australia in 2006 for services not just to cricket but to cancer fundraising. A year ago he was inducted into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame. But there remained a lingering resentment at feeling insufficiently respected by decision-makers at home, resulting in him revoking his life membership with Cricket Victoria after being overlooked for two T20 coaching jobs. Antipathy was part of Jones, but it never defined him. Instead, he will be remembered as a player first and foremost, for work on the field that lives on with those who saw it. It spoke volumes that he kept putting on the whites for his club well into his fortis in the city where he was adored, in a game that was blessed by his lifetime contribution. Jones is survived by his wife, Jane and their two daughters, Isabella and Phoebe.
On Saturday morning, dear blog reader, this blogger had a leisurely limp down to the local medical centre to get his annual influenza jab. And needless to say, he felt a small prick. As usual. Though, at least he remembered this time, at the very last moment, to get it in the arm that he doesn't sleep on.
And then, Keith Telly Topping went into town to pick up his - government allowed - essential supplies. Yes, if you're wondering, Fry's Turkish Delight is essential to this blogger's mental and physical well-being. Trust me, dear blog reader, you wouldn't like to see this blogger if he hasn't had his daily snort of Delight.  
Well, that's two hours and twenty eight quid this blogger will never get back. The buses were back to being 'look, we've got staff issues, all right?' (entirely understandably, let it be noted). This blogger' back was proper knackin'and town was full of people many of whom were not wearing masks and breathing, menacingly, in this blogger's direction. This blogger doubts whether he will be leaving the safety of the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House again until Doomsday comes. (Or, until he runs out of bread and milk, whichever occurs first ...)
And finally, dear blog reader, further proof that nothing - but nothing - improves a blog's potential audience than a catastrophic worldwide pandemic and everyone being locked in their drum desperately seeking entertainment to take their mind of the fragile nature of mortality. If so, dear blog reader, sorry you came to the wrong gaff!

The BBC has released two new images from the upcoming Doctor Who episode Revolution Of The Daleks. The festive special will see the return of one of The Doctor's most long-standing and, you know, hardest foes. The story begins where the previous series ended: With The Doctor banged-up in an intergalactic high-security Slammer. Isolated, alone, with no hope of escape and, generally, not very happy with her lot. Albeit, armed with some chalk.
Far away on Earth, meanwhile, her friends, Yaz, Ryan and Graham have to try to pick up the pieces of their lives without her. But it's not an easy task. Old habits die hard, especially when they discover a disturbing plan being formed. A plan which involves ... a Dalek (the title sort of gave that away, really, didn't it?) How can you fight a Dalek, without The Doctor? Poke it's eye out? No, sorry, that's 'How do you make a Venetian blind.' Always get those two mixed up.
Though it ended in 2006, The West Wing - the greatest TV show in the history of the medium ... that doesn't have the words 'Doctor' and 'Who' in the title - never really ended in many people's hearts. Fans of the US political drama have longed for some form of revival almost from the day that the final episoide was broadcast (the fact that the entire Barack Obama presidency was, effectively, The West Wing series eight notwithstanding). This remains true of this blogger who once, a lifetime ago, wrote a couple of books about the drama. It was with considerable anticipation from the masses, therefore, that in August 2020, it was announced Martin Sheen, Rob Lowe, Dulé Hill, Allison Janney, Richard Schiff, Bradley Whitford and Janel Moloney (plus, many of the supporting cast) would reprise their roles. For a stage version of the acclaimed 2001 episode Hartsfield's Landing, intended to raise awareness and support for When We All Vote, a non-profit organisation founded to increase participation in US elections. 'We've gotten the band back together,' as Brad Whitford said at the beginning of the broadcast. Production took place Los Angeles' Orpheum Theatre, the episode was shown on 15 October on HBO Max and this blogger finally got a copy sent over from the US this week. The role of Leo McGarry was played by Sterling Brown, the late John Spencer having, of course, sadly died in 2005. Emily Procter read the stage directions and Marlee Matlin and Elisabeth Moss also made appearances. The production included additional material written by creator Aaron Sorkin and Eli Attie and was directed by Thomas Schlamme and act-breaks featured guest appearances from When We All Vote co-founders Michelle Obama and Lin-Manuel Miranda, plus former president Bill Clinton and Samuel L Jackson. Music was performed by West Wing composer Snuffy Walden and The Avett Brothers.
Perceptions that this might have been a case of 'preaching to the converted' - again, as Whitford said in the introduction, 'arrogant actors telling you what to do' - the reception for the production was hugely positive from both critics and viewers alike. CNN's Brian Lowry characterising the special to 'approximate the experience of watching a stage play, only with a best-seat-in-the-house view,' including 'shooting the performers from behind and revealing the rows and rows of empty seats,' what Lowry considered 'a poignant reminder of what's been lost on the theatrical front since the pandemic began.' Patrick Gomez of The AV Clubwrote'the special always stays on the right side of being a Very Special Episode.' Ben Travers from IndieWireconsidered'[as] a reimagining of a strong television episode, the new version of Hartsfield's Landing plays out beautifully.' Daniel Fienberg of The Hollywood Reporteradded it was '[a] solid recreation of a solid episode for a solid cause.'Deadlinesaid that the episode was A Sobering Reminder Of When Presidents Were Presidential, At Least On TV. From this blogger's viewpoint, watching this was both a welcome and a sad experience. Welcome, obviously, because this is The West Wing and it was, frankly, stunning - indeed, the only way it could, possibly, have been any better would've been if Josh and Donna had got their kit(s) off and done The Sex right there on the stage for all to see. (That may, admittedly, be the 'shipper-fan lurking within this blogger having, briefly, taken over this review.) This blogger virtually chanted his way through the episode like he was at a rock gig knowing, as he does, that particular script backwards. 'You're a good father, you don't have to act like it. You're the President, you don't have to act like it. You're a good man, you don't have to act like it. You're not a regular guy. You're not "just folks", you're not plain-spoken ... Do not, do not, do not act like it!'
But it was also sad because it was an, at times, awkward and uncomfortable reminder of an era - not that long ago either - when television made this kind of challenging, thoughtful, sincere, outspoken drama effortlessly. And now ... it doesn't very much - if at all. The world has become a colder, harsher, more nasty and far less inclusive place, dear blog reader (and this was before Coronavirus came along and made the situation a hundred times worse). And - this is the real tragedy - we are all of us, to a greater or lesser degree, responsible for the critical and commercial conditions in which such a lack of ambition, empathy and, frankly, decency exists.
It's worth considering this, dear blog reader; when Hartsfield's Landing was first broadcast, America's president at the time was George W Bush and pretty much everyone who hadn't voted for him in the US (and everyone outside America) considered that he was, without any shadow of a doubt, the worst president that had ever, or would ever, be (even worse than Nixon fer Christ's sake). There couldn't possibly be anyone worse than Dubbya out there, that wasn't even open to question. Almost two decades on and A West Wing Special To Benefit When We All Vote was a useful, necessary, reminder of a truism which the original series included as a specific plot point on more than one occasion: Be very careful what you wish for, dear blog reader. Because it might just come true.
This blogger first saw the band The Go-Go's supporting Madness and The Specials at a club in Sunderland in April 1980, dear blog reader. In front of an audience composed almost entirely of mods and skinheads (who, even though they both liked the two headliners hated each other and, at various points between sets enjoyed kicking the shit out of anyone within easy reach; thus acting out, with surreal accuracy, the opening verse of The Specials' song 'Do The Dog'), a five-piece female group from Los Angeles went down, predictably, like a sack a diarrhoea with the majority of those in the gaff. This blogger thought they were adorable; nothing particularly special musically at that stage in their development but he particularly enjoyed a moment when one of the numbskulls in the crowd shouted 'Get yer tits out.''We're nice girls, we don't do that,' replied Belinda Carlisle. 'Yeah,' added Jane Wiedlin. 'So, go fuck yourself!' The place promptly erupted in a hail of beer bottles, hockle and incandescent fury. How could one not fall, instantly, in love with that?
Alison Ellwood's superb documentary about the band which this blogger watched on Sky this week was a timely reminder that women in rock and/or roll face some massive disadvantages. Due to their lack of a collective penis, mainly. A story of triumph against all the depressingly sexist odds - including coke binges, heroin addiction, playing Saturday Night Live drunk, heart surgery, bi-polarity, break-ups, reunions, more break-ups and so on - The Go Go's mixed contemporary interviews with Carlisle, Wiedlin, Charlotte Caffey, Kathy Valentine and Gina Schock, plus management, former members and friends (including Lee Thompson and Lynval Golding) with much, impressive, archive footage. They gave Rolling Stain magazine a, long-overdue, kicking for their outrageous 1982 cover-shoot of the group in their vests and panties although the constant whinging about the fact that they haven't been nominated for the Rock and/or Roll Hall of Fame yet quickly grew tiresome. You're in a very select group, ladies - neither have The Specials or Madness. Or The Jam or The Smiths. Or Kraftwerk for that matter! They bitched about each other with considerable glee but, as Schock perceptively noted, sisters fight with each other all the time. And, at the climax, they recorded their first new song in nearly two decades, a sharp little jangly rocker 'Club Zero'. Ellwood - as with her previous documentaries about The Eagles and the Laurel Canyon scene - drew together the various strands of the story with wit, economy and knowing exactly which bits to leave on the cutting rom floor (Schock and Valentine suing their bandmates over royalties being the most obvious example of something, perhaps wisely, left with their lips being, as it were, sealed). What we were left with was, actually, genuinely heart-warming and a bloody good excuse to pull out ones well-worn copy of Beauty & The Beat. And, not for nothing, but they remain - all of them - fine-lookin' ladies (especially Kathy who is still effortlessly packing that 'slightly surly West Coast rock-chick thing' she always had going for her). It seems the love affair which began for this blogger in Sunderland in 1980 hasn't ended yet.
Production on two From The North comedy favourites, Qi and Would I Lie To You?, has been badly affected by the same Coronavirus malarkey which has conspired to fek-up so much else this year - on TV and elsewhere. In the case of Qi, the show was nine episodes into production on its R series when lockdown occurred in March. Two further episodes were then filmed without a studio audience and proved to be, sadly, disastrously disappointing (the fact that one of them featured both the extremely annoying Holly Walsh and scowly-faced misery-guts Bridget Christie didn't help matters, admittedly). It was something which few of us had previously considered but, in truth the audience makesQi work (another long-running BBC comedy panel show, Have I Got News For You, had a similarly awkward transition from a studio production to being filmed using Zoom in people's kitchens during March and April. That didn't come out very well as an audience spectacle either). According to a report in August, further series RQi episodes were planned to be recorded with a 'virtual audience' via Zoom. Whether (or when) that will happen has yet to be confirmed. At least the first seven episodes were, mostly, up to the usual high standard and, in particular, this blogger was delighted to see the Goddamn righteous Benjamin Zephaniah making his Qi debut. Would I Lie To You? got the last few episodes of its thirteenth series out of the way early in the year before The Plague hit town (the one featuring Richard Osman and Steph McGovern being a particularly good example of the show at its best) but, thereafter there was silence regarding when it would return. Finally, last week, came some welcome news - via Reddit. Another batch of episodes has been filmed - importantly with audiences - earlier this month, though there has no announcement as yet when they will be broadcast. And yes, before you ask dear blog reader, series regular, From The North favourite and genuine twenty four carat national treasure Bob Mortimer is featured in one episodes (as is another much-loved contributor, Miles Jupp). Thankfully, Dave's virtual wall-to-wall repeats of both shows have kept audience's entertained as they contemplated the inherent ludicrous nature of existence for the past few months. What would we do without Dave?
On a somewhat related theme, given that lockdown is, effectively, upon us all once more this blogger has just started compiling this year's From The North'best and worst TV of the year' awards. It'll be a good six weeks before it's finished, obviously (the annual award bloggerisationism usually tend to get posted on this blog around the end of November or the start of December). But at least writing it will keep this blogger off the streets for a while. Which is, sort of, the point, I guess. As noted previously, each year when Keith Telly Topping posts these awards, he usually gets a handful of e-mails saying something along the lines of '... but, you missed off [insert own favourite here].' Since answering such comments is always a right flaming pain in the dong, it's worth stating once again that these awards represent what this blogger has been watching and enjoying (or, in the case of anything featuring Bloody Jack Bloody Whitehall, really disliking) during the last year. If a programme is not mentioned, it is either because Keith Telly Topping didn't see it or did, but didn't consider it worthy of inclusion, thereupon. If, when it's published, you disagree with anything therein (or, not therein) dear blog reader, please feel free to start your own blog and do your own best and worst awards.
It was proper fantastic to see the legend that is Mitch Benn as a contestant on Only Connect a couple of weeks ago. Second best thing about that episode, in fact, after The Divine Victoria's joke about a salmon.
And now, dear blog reader, a new From The North semi-regular feature, Great Moments in Rock and/or Roll History. Number Thirty Two: The day Thelma Barlow got top billing over two members of The Be-Atles (a popular beat combo of the 1960s, you might've heard of them).
WANTED: Drummer for four-piece two guitar/bass popular beat combo with recording contract and some chart potential. Must have excellent hair. No time wasters, please.
For reasons which are far too complicated to go into at this time, for the past few months this blogger has been unable to play any of the - not inconsiderable number of - non-Region 2 DVDs which he has picked up over the years. Fortunately, with a bit of fiddling to the leads on one of Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House's several DVD players (the oldest one Keith Telly Topping has, as it happens) which is multi-region, this blogger managed to connect it to Stately Telly Topping Manor's massive flat-screen telly. And, therefore, he is delighted to report that this is, once again, a multi-region Plague House in all its forty two-inch widescreen mega-glory. Which is nice.
Now, a few items which caught (and, briefly, retained) this blogger's attention on the BBC News website. Firstly, Fleetwood Fishmonger Saves 'One In Thirty Million' Orange Canadian Lobster. A lovely, genuinely heart-warming story. Though, this blogger is still willing to bet that the lobster in question would've tasted great if garnished with lemon drizzle and served on a plate of chips and/or rice. Just saying.
Another heart-warming story, Billionaires See Fortunes Rise By Twenty Seven Per Cent During The Pandemic. Because, let's face it, we were all so worried about how those guys were doing during these dark and desperately troubled times.
Also, there was Durex Condom Sales Jump After Virus Rules Relaxed. No shit? Well, what a surprise ...
Of course, it's worth pointing out that lockdown led many people to discover all manner on new forms of in-home entertainment.
To sum up the gist of this story, those taking part in last month's 'Hell No, We Don't Wanna Wear A Mask' rally in London appear to have consisted of an unholy alliance between conspiracy theorists, Covid-deniers, extreme right-wing troublemakers, extreme left-wing troublemakers and people who just fancied a right good punch up with Plod. God bless this virus, therefore, for bringing together this wide - and highly disparate - group of individuals. So, we all know whom to avoid in future (if we weren't avoiding them already). Listen, you stupid, selfish bastards, it's very simple - you may not have any concern about your own safety and that's entirely fine. But, every time you breathe on any of us that do wish to, you know, stay alive, you're not merely risking your own health. Please, this blogger says the following with all necessary respect, grow the fek up, will you. And do what you're told just like the rest of us. It's The Law. This particularly applies to students in Nottingham who are now working out how to pay their fines.
Sometimes, of course, BBC News provides some extremely wise words for us all to consider and reflect upon.
However, the worst piece news lately - by a considerable distance - came from the Gruniad Morning Star. Haven't we Northern folk suffered enough already without having him (and, presumably, his lute) inflicted upon us?
There is an Interweb meme which has been doing the rounds lately that you may be aware of, dear blog reader. It, or variants of it, have been seen all over the Twitter and Facebook pages of lots of people (who, seemingly, think they're being terrifically original when they post it). This blogger would like to assure all of you that his grandmother, Elizabeth MacKay Elliott Lamb, born in 1895, did precisely none of these things. Just so we're clear about that. He's less-certain about what Granny Telly Topping got up to, admittedly. 
Meanwhile, dear blog reader, with the arrival of autumn at the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House, there have been a number of days where it's been more than a bit nippy in the gaff.
And thus, it did come to pass, dear blog reader, that yer actual Keith Telly Topping had spent one particular day virtually on the starve and, by 5.30pm he was, like, Pure Dead Hank Marvin, so he was. Thence, it further came to pass that he picked up the dog-and-bone and rang one of his local takeaways and sayeth unto Linda: 'Yer actual Keith Telly Topping realises it be-eth a Goddamn filthy night out tonight, but could you possibly deliver unto the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House at your earliest convenience a dozen of your finest salt and chilli prawns (with a side order of boiled rice) so that he may scoff these in his righteous hunger (with some freshly-cooked garlic bread). Because, yer actual really deserveth this happenstance in the area.' And lo, he saw that it was good. And this pleaseth yer actual Keith Telly Topping who sayeth unto the multitude 'I am satisfied.' Amen.
This blogger last did his - government sanctioned - weekly shop in town at M&S, Boots, Poundland, Greggs and Morrisons at the weekend. See below for proof of purchases. Yes, dear blog reader, this is a really bad photo, caused by Keith Telly Topping trying to do about eight things at once. He was going to take another one but, actually, he quite likes the 'action blur' on this; it makes it look as though the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House's comestibles are all in a state of perpetual motion. Which they aren't, incidentally, but it would be pure-dead-cool if they were. Anyway, it was a decent trip - a nice warm sunny early autumn day. And everyone this blogger encountered was really pleasant - he made sure, as he always tries to do, when having paid for his goods and/or services, to thank the checkout operator and/or bus driver, wish them a good day and add 'stay safe.' Bit of a cliché, this blogger is aware, but you'd be surprised at how few others one hears saying anything similar. And, to a man/woman, all of them replied 'thanks very much and the same to you.' Keith Telly Topping was, therefore, in a really smashing mood when he got to the bus stop outside Morrisons to come back to the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House, put his feet up and rest his still troublesome bad back. And, at that precise moment, this blogger had his good mood shattered into a million tiny fragments when some spotty, lanky, skinny twentysomething twonk who wasn't wearing a mask sneezed all over this blogger from about two feet away. This blogger, thankfully, was wearing his mask but there's no telling what infections may have sneaked past the protection. So if, in about ten days time, Keith Telly Topping is in the Royal Victoria Infirmary on a ventilator, being pumped full of steroids (which, actually, sounds quite nice) and/or bleach and is at death's door, you'll know whom to blame.
Opening up his e-mail the following morning, this blogger found one which had the header Suffering from erectile dysfunction? Keith Telly Topping immediately responded to this with a reply headed Who have you been talking to?
And still, dear blog reader, From, The North's daily traffic continues to hover around an average of six thousand hits per day.
... From, it should be noted, a bewildering variety of dear blog readers around the globe. See if you can spot yourself.
A bit more politics, dear blog reader. And, the news that Mark Hamill now owns the Interweb. Not before time, either.
Frank Windsor, who has died aged ninety two was, as Detective Sergeant John Watt, one of the longest-serving coppers on TV - in Z Cars and several BBC sequels and spin-offs from 1962 through to 1978. At that point, Windsor returned to the theatre to play a dotty doctor in Tom Stoppard's Every Good Boy Deserves Favour at The Mermaid Theatre – with music by André Previn and directed by Trevor Nunn - revealing another side to his talent, that of an incisive and hilarious comic actor; he'd given us a taste of that when he took over briefly from Patrick Stewart as an absurdly barnstorming Lenin in Stoppard's Travesties at The Aldwych in 1974. But it proved impossible for him to shake off the long arm of the law enforcer entirely. Z Cars was one of the great dramas of its time and few dramatic double acts on the small screen - asie from Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise - matched that of Stratford Johns as the truculent Detective Inspector Charlie Barlow and Windsor's stern, if infinitely more sympathetic, Watt as they chased down the criminals in Newtown, a fictional version of Kirkby in Merseyside.
Z Cars highlighted the issues of control in public and private arenas into the new postwar realities of the welfare state; unemployment, domestic violence, gang rivalry and cultural fragmentation. Week-in, week-out, brilliantly acted and produced, it was compelling viewing. It dealt with the realities of policing a large city; in tone it was a million miles away from the BBC's other popular crime drama of the era, Dixon Of Dock Green and made stars of many of its regular cast - including Brian Blessed, James Ellis, Jeremy Kemp and Colin Welland. After three years, in 1966, Barlow and Watt were detached, promoted - to Chief Superintendent and Chief Inspector, respectively - and relocated in a new series, Softly Softly, to the fictional region of Wyvern, somewhere near Bristol. They moved again, in 1969, to Thamesford constabulary's CID, the series renamed Softly Softly: Task Force. When Johns peeled off into his own series, Barlow At Large, Windsor as Watt battled on for another few years with a variety of different partners on Softly crime watch. But the pair were reunited in two mini-series within the franchise, the first, in 1973, reopening the case files on Jack The Ripper, the next - Second Verdict - re-examining other, more recent real-life murder cases.
Windsor, who was born Frank W Higgins, in Walsall - his father was an accountant in local government - was educated at Queen Mary's grammar school and trained for the stage in London at the Central School of Speech and Drama, still situated in the early 1950s at the Royal Albert Hall. He toured in Britain and India with the Elizabethan Theatre Company of Thane Parker, who also ran The Oxford Playhouse, where Parker appointed Peter Hall as artistic director in 1954. The actors alongside Windsor in that first Oxford season included Billie Whitelaw, Maggie Smith, Tony Church and a very young Ronnie Barker and Windsor soon moved into television playing the Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria in a BBC Sunday Night Theatre play of 1955 and, two years later, the Duke of Norfolk in an adaptation of Robert Bolt's A Man For All Seasons. Windsor's experience in Shakespeare with Parker made him well qualified to play the Earl of Warwick and Sir Walter Blunt, among other characters, in the landmark BBC series of Shakespeare histories, An Age Of Kings (1960). He played a dentist in Lindsay Anderson's new-wave classic This Sporting Life (1963), with Richard Harris, Rachel Roberts and William Hartnell, but his movie career - small parts in Peter Hammond's Spring & Port Wine (1970) with James Mason and John Schlesinger's Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971) with Glenda Jackson and Peter Finch aside - never really took off thanks to his regular police duties.
When he did break out, into the Stoppard stage roles, he underlined his rich vocal authority and commanding presence in another dimension. He followed up with a West End thriller, Mister Fothergill's Murder (1982) by Modesty Blaise author Peter O'Donnell at The Duke of York's, with Rula Lenska and David Horovitch and joined the cast of Hugh Whitemore's spies-in-suburbia drama Pack Of Lies at The Lyric in 1984. And, then there was a twelve-week national tour of Holmes & The Ripper. Television fame did not translate into theatrical stardom, perhaps unjustly and he spent the last twenty years of his active career appearing in such long-running series as Lovejoy, EastEnders (as Major Charlie Grace), Midsomer Murders, Peak Practice, Casualty and, in 2002, as Sir James Valentine, in Judge John Deed. He also appeared in The Avengers - 1968's Whoever Shot Poor George Oblique Stroke XR40?, the first episode of Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased), Headmaster, Middlemen, The Goodies (a gorgeously funny over-the-top turn as The Scoutfinder General in 1977's Scoutrageous), the 1979 version of Eric Sykes's The Plank, Play For Today, Thirty Minute Theatre, Into The Labyrinth, Chancer and September Song. He featured in Doctor Who twice. In 1983 he played the kindly Crusade-era nobleman Ranulf Fitzwilliam in the Peter Davison story The King's Demons. In 1989 he returned opposite Sylvester McCoy's Doctor playing, unsurprisingly, a police officer, Inspector Mackenzie, in Ghost Light.
He could never, quite, shake off John Watt - he even played versions of his most famous character in comedy series like The Detectives and Paul Merton's Life Of Comedy. He came close, though, as Gridley, 'the man from Shropshire,' in the BBC's second of their three versions of Dickens's Bleak House (1985, starring Diana Rigg and Denholm Elliott), making an excellent fist of the ruined old Chancery suitor with a combative look and a chafing, dissatisfied manner. In later years appeared in a number of television commercials advertising life-assurance policies for people over fifty, a role he was happy to parody in a sketch on Harry Hill's TV Burp. Windsor is survived by his wife, Mary Corbett, a former dancer and their daughter, Amanda. A son, David, died in a tragic car accident in 1997.
American singer-songwriter Johnny Nash, best known for the 1972 hit 'I Can See Clearly Now', has died aged eighty. Nash, whose health had been in decline for some time, died at his home of natural causes, his son told US media. The musician began singing as a child and made his major label debut with the 1957 song 'A Teenager Sings The Blues'. Nash, born in Houston, was one of the first non-Jamaican singers to record reggae music in Kingston. His single 'I Can See Clearly Now' sold more than a million copies and reached the top of the Billboard chart in 1972, where it remained for four weeks. He also had a number one hit in the UK in 1975 with 'Tears On My Pillow'. Nash also, famously, helped reggae legend Bob Marley sign a recording contract. Nash's covers of songs like 'Stir It Up' helped to bring Marley's music to a broader audience and the pair later collaborated on 'You Poured Sugar On Me'. In an interview with Zoo World magazine in 1973, Nash told Cameron Crowe that he hoped his music had wide appeal. 'I feel that music is universal. Music is for the ears and not the age. Everybody likes music, from eight to eighty. There are some people who say that they hate music,' he added. 'I've run into a few, but I'm not sure I believe them. Maybe they have never been without music.' Besides his son, John, Nash is survived by his wife, Carli.
Spencer Davis, one of the key figures of the 1960s beat scene, has died at the age of eighty one. The Welsh guitarist was the driving force behind The Spencer Davis Group, who scored transatlantic hits with 'Keep On Running', 'Somebody Help Me', 'Gimme Some Lovin' and 'I'm A Man'. The band, which also featured the teenage Stevie Winwood, toured with The Who and The Rolling Stones. Davis died in hospital on Monday, while being treated for pneumonia, his agent told the BBC. 'He was a very good friend,' said Bob Birk, who had worked with the musician for more than thirty years. 'He was a highly ethical, very talented, good-hearted, extremely intelligent, generous man. He will be missed.'
The son of a paratrooper, Davis was born in Swansea in 1939 and first started learning harmonica and the accordion at the age of six. He moved to London to work for the civil service at the age of sixteen, but later relocated to Birmingham, where he taught German by day and played in local clubs at night. Inspired by blues and skiffle, he formed a band called The Saints which, initially, included a pre-Rolling Stones Bill Wyman and also performed folk music with a young Christine Perfect. But it was with his eponymous rock group that he struck gold. Formed in 1963, The Spencer Davis Group featured Davis on guitar, sixteen year old Stevie Winwood on keyboard and vocals, his brother Muff on bass and Peter York on drums. Originally called The Rhythm & Blues Quartette, they changed their name in 1964 when Muff pointed out that Davis was the only one who enjoyed doing interviews - the logic being that the rest of the band could slope off to the pub while he handled the press. Their breakout hit, 'Keep On Running', was a cover of a song by West Indian performer Jackie Edwards. When it topped the UK charts in January 1966, it knocked The Be-Atles 'Day Tripper' from the top slot - and Davis received a telegram from the band congratulating him on the achievement.
The follow-up was delayed when Davis bashed his head on a car windscreen after braking to avoid a dog - but 'Somebody Help Me', another Jackie Edwards cover, gave the quartet a second number one in March. The band went on to prove they had songwriting chops of their own, with hit singles like the furious 'I'm A Man' and 'Gimme Some Lovin' both of which made the UK top ten. The Spencer Davis Group also recorded the famous theme song for the long-running children's TV show Magpie, under the pseudonym The Murgatroyd Band - a reference to the show's mascot, a fat cartoon magpie. The band starred in their own film, an (admittedly rather slight) musical comedy called The Ghost Goes Gear (1966), which found the band stranded in a haunted manor. Davis also made a cameo in The Be-Atles' TV movie Magical Mystery Tour, as one of the passengers. Hits followed in the US - including their gorgeous cover of 'Every Little Bit Hurts', although the band never toured there; while Davis's ability with languages (he was fluent in German, French and Spanish) helped the band further their career in Europe. Those linguistic capabilities even led to Davis recording a German version of 'The Age Of Aquarius' ('Aquarius Der Wassermann') in 1968 and earned him a lasting nickname: 'The Professor'.
However, the Spencer Davis Group came to an untimely end in 1967 when, at the height of their fame, when Winwood quit to form Traffic, leaving Davis without his dynamic frontman. The band recorded a few more minor hits, but broke up soon after, with Davis moving to California, where he embarked on a short-lived solo career. At the time, he later claimed, he was near to bankruptcy, thanks to a punitive contract with Island Records. 'I didn't realise what had been going on. I'd sold millions of records and hadn't seen a penny from them,' he told Music Mart magazine in 2005. 'In 1970, I was considering declaring bankruptcy, but I'd written a track with Eddie Hardin, called 'Don't Want You No More', which The Allman Brothers put on their Beginnings album. The damned thing sold six million copies. Suddenly a cheque for five thousand pounds arrived through the door and I'd never seen so much money in my life. I saw more money from that one song than I [received] from all the stuff that had been an Island production.' After confronting Island's owner, Chris Blackwell, over the issue, he was given a job in artist development at the label in the mid-1970s. There, he helped to promote newcomers like The Wailers, Robert Palmer and Eddie & The Hot Rods, as well as working alongside Winwood, who was now establishing himself as a solo artist. Davis returned to songwriting with 1984's Crossfire, which featured contributions from Dusty Springfield and Booker T Jones. He made numerous guest appearances with such headliners as The Grateful Dead and Hall & Oates, then formed The Classic Rock All Stars in 1993.
In 1996 he upgraded this to The World Classic Rockers, which included Randy Meisner from The Eagles, Carmine Appice from Vanilla Fudge and the former Paul McCartney sideman Denny Laine. In 2001, he began touring with a rebuilt Spencer Davis Group - albeit without the Winwood brothers. In 2006 he released the LP So Far, on which he looked back at his Welsh roots with songs such as 'The Swansea Shuffle' and 'Uncle Herman's Mandolin'. In 2017 The Spencer Davis Group played its last dates, utilising two different line-ups (both featuring Davis) for dates in Europe and the US. Birmingham International Jazz Festival founder Jim Simpson, who was told about Davis' passing by drummer Pete York, said: 'Spencer was a lovely man - always very courteous and a purist about music. The Spencer Davis Group stuck more to the blues and never became a fully-fledged rock band. Spencer was scholarly and well educated, very gentle and kind and his tastes in music were spot on.' The musician is survived by his long-time partner June Datne, three children - Lisa, Sarah and Gareth - and five grandchildren..
Margaret Nolan, the actress best known for appearing in the title sequence for Goldfinger and for a string of appearances in TV shows in the 1960s and 70s, has died aged seventy six. Film-maker Edgar Wright, who directed Nolan in her final film role, in the forthcoming Last Night In Soho, reported the news on social media. Nolan, who was born in 1943 in Somerset, first appeared on film under the name Vicky Kennedy in 'glamour' (for which read 'softcore') shorts by the notorious George Harrison Marks, appearing in his naturist film It's a Bare, Bare World.
She soon graduated to more mainstream films, with a noticeable role in Dick Lester's A Hard Day's Night (as the girl accompanying Wilfrid Brambell in a casino) and Goldfinger, as the masseuse Dink.
Nolan also appeared in Robert Brownjohn's celebrated title sequence for the same movie, wearing a gold bikini and with images projected on her skin - though in the film itself it was Shirley Eaton who played Jill Masterson, the girl who gets smothered to death by gold paint.
Margaret Ann Nolan was born in Norton Radstock, Somerset in 1943. Her father was serving in the Army and her mother took her to neutral Ireland for the duration of the Second World War. She was training to be a teacher when she met her husband Tom Kempinski, who was an actor with The National Theatre. Nolan and her twin sister, Geraldine, had staged their own plays when they were children and Kempinski encouraged her to consider acting as a career. Nolan quickly outgrew her glamour-model beginnings and forged a reputation as a performer of great likability, with small roles in films as varied as Michael Reeves'Matthew Hopkins: Witchfinder General, The Great St Trinian's Train Robbery, the Marcel Carné drama Three Rooms In Manhattan and in a deleted scene in Hitchcock's Frenzy.
She also began a long association with the Carry On movie series, beginning in 1965 with a role as a secretary in Carry On Cowboy. She would go on to appear in five more, finishing in 1974 with Carry On Dick. At the same time, Nolan developed a prolific career in TV, with guest roles in a wide variety of programmes, including The Saint, Adam Adamant Lives!, Spike Milligan's The World Of Beachcomber and Q6, Budgie, Steptoe & Son, The Persuaders!, The Sweeney, Fox and Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads? After the mid-1970s Nolan stepped back from acting, but did appear as the dancehall girl Effie in the celebrated TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited in 1981.
Nolan went on to develop an interest in visual arts and her piece My Divided Self - a cut-up collage of her own publicity stills - was included in the feminist exhibition Equals in 2013 in Manchester's Blankspace gallery. In an interview in 2007, Nolan described her artworks as 'the idea that I was there as this passive woman, being looked at, but behind it all, behind my eyes, of course I knew what was going on.' Nolan also became involved in politically-inflected theatre in the early 1970s, influenced, she said, by Kempinski's experience of the 1968 évènements in Paris. She and Kempinski divorced in 1972. He later enjoyed success as the writer of the play Duet For One. Margaret is survived by her two sons, Oscar and Luke.
And finally, dear blog reader, yer actual Keith Telly Topping went into a pub one lunchtime and asked them if he could get toad-in-the-hole. He did. And he really didn't deserve that.

Health, dear blog reader. It can be a jolly amusing thing at times. 'My heart was really pounding and I felt a funny tingling all over,' Woody Allen said in one of his earlier, funnier movies. 'I was either in love or I had smallpox.' (He also said 'I walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Actually, make that "I run through the valley of the shadow of death' - in order to get out of the valley of the shadow of death more quickly' so, you know, he clearly knew what he was talking about.)
This blogger's health continues to be a matter which baffles medical science the mostest, baby. He's got a bad back, a dodgy knee and ankle, a nasty case of RSI on his mouse-hand, several extremely unwelcome problems with his naughty bits (which you really don't want to hear any further details about, trust this blogger) and, to top it all, he believes he's got a cold coming on. And yet, last week, this blogger attended his bi-annual Type Two Diabetes check-up thingy with the lovely Nurse Janice and, once again, it was mostly good news. This blogger's weight has shot up since the last check-up six months ago, which was disappointing as he'd worked so hard to get it down last time. Then again, judging from media reports, he's hardly alone in that regard and his medical professionals didn't seem at all worried about it.
Elsewhere, however, it was all largely positive. Blood glucose level was slightly down (forty six last time, forty five this), bloody pressure was, similarly, in the borderline low-risk range. As was this blogger's cholesterol level (slightly up on the last check up but nothing at all concerning). Kidney, eye and feet tests were also fine. Yer actual Keith Telly Topping will be having a telephone chat with Doctor Chris next week but, the general consensus seems to be, once again, 'whatever it is you're doing, keep doing it.'
Meanwhile, on a marginally-related note, this blogger managed to break one of his teeth a couple of weeks ago - not even biting on anything particularly hard, either. Only Keith Telly Topping can manage such malarkey, dear blog reader. Here was what was left of the filling after said soft-biting incident.
Nasty, eh? Anyway, he rang his dentist, explained that he was not in any pain and, therefore, he realised that he was not an emergency case but he thought he'd better let them know about the situation. This blogger was pleasantly surprised by the response - they are running a limited service at the moment but, obviously, they're prioritising certain cases over others so the receptionist told me that a dentist would ring me back in a few days and arrange a convenient time for me to pop in and get it sorted. God bless the National Health Service (dental division). Indeed, that happened and, last Friday, this blogger rocked-up for his appointment with the drill. The broken molar was capped and well-filled and the Novocaine eventually wore off (coming down was not, especially, unpleasant, let it be noted). The appointment was supposed to be at 3pm but they rang the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House that morning and asked if this blogger could come in a bit earlier? '2.30,' the reception asked. 'Not particularly, but it's a bit awkward trying to eat everything on the other side of my mouth' this blogger replied. True story.
As noted in the last bloggerisationisms update, this blogger is currently busy compiling the From The North'best and worst TV of the year' awards. And, it's going quite well thus far even if this blogger does say so himself. There will be, approximately seventy or thereabouts TV shows featuring in the various award lists and Keith Telly Topping has already managed to research and write up the entries for about a third of them. Usually, this highlight of the From The North calendar is written in one long coffee-fuelled writing session around late November and takes this blogger about a week to ten days of non-stop work to pull together. But this year, having had to previously amend his modus operendi in 2019 due to work commitments, this blogger has again taken to writing it in smaller, more manageable chunks over the course of a couple of months. It's rather therapeutic as it happens, albeit, this blogger is mainly doing the 'best of' entries at the moment; by the time he gets down to the twenty five or so programmes that he really didn't like, one imagines his state of temporal grace will have worn somewhat thin. As with previous years, Keith Telly Topping Presents ... The From The North TV Awards (2020) will be published for all the world to see on this blog in a few weeks time. Book your seats early, dear blog reader, it's going to be large.
This blogger was rather startled to wake up on Tuesday and be confronted by the following sight from the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House front room window. It was looking like there might be a bit of rain later in the day. Either that of The Apocalypse was a-cometh. Which, hey, given the current state of the planet might not, necessarily, be an entirely bad thing.
Yer actual Keith Telly Topping decided it was more likely to be the former, however and grabbed an umbrella for his forthcoming trip down the shops. All the sensible kiddies do it, they reckon.
Earlier this week, this blogger received an e-mail from someone asking if Keith Telly Topping's IMDB page is, indeed, his. Odd question, you may think. This blogger told the enquiree that no, it actually belongs to that professor from Dundee University who also shares Keith Telly Topping's Amazon page. As for whomsoever the chap is that's featured on Wikipedia your guess, dear blog reader, is every bit as good as this blogger's.
And now, a public service announcement. With guitars. And, you know, pom-poms ...
Mad as toast. From that, dear blog reader, to the semi-regular From The North favourite 'a few items which caught (and, briefly, retained) this blogger's attention on the BBC News website.' Starting with 'Murder Hornet': First Nest Found In US Eradicated With Vacuum Hose. Cos, it's the only language these Murder Hornet understand, clearly.
Next, Lily Allen: 'Women Masturbating In A Relationship Isn't Wrong' in which Lil opines: 'If you're hungry, you don't wait until your partner gets home to have a slice of toast.' Can't argue with that. In fact, this blogger rather fancies a slice right now. 
Then, there's Sunderland Bar Burglar Found Asleep Beside Cheesecake. Because, let's face it, whom amongst us could honesty resist such a yummy delight whilst mid-burgle?
Covid: Don't Let North Get 'Left Behind' Tory MPs Warn PM was also fascinating. If only because the Conservatives have always been such big supporters of The North, haven't they?
On a related-note, there's Some Blackburn Families 'Ignoring Guidelines'. Which may be true but it's hardly unique to Blackburn.
Frank Bough who died earlier this week was one of the highest-profile and highest-paid presenters on BBC Television. In a career spanning over three decades, he won a reputation for his relaxed and unflappable style on camera. He presented the BBC's flagship sports programme, Grandstand, and launched the corporation's Breakfast Time TV programme in 1983. But his career abruptly ended after lurid tabloid revelations.
Francis Joseph Bough was born in a two-up, two-down terrace house in the Fenton area of Stoke-on-Trent in January 1933. His father, who worked as an upholsterer, lost his job and the family moved to Oswestry in Shropshire, where Bough attended the local grammar school. He was a keen sportsman and also enjoyed acting, taking parts in a number of school Shakespeare productions. Although not particularly academic he won a scholarship to Merton College, Oxford, in the days when, as he later put it, 'Oxford valued a good all-rounder.' He was a talented footballer, winning a Blue, although his side were beaten by Cambridge in the Varsity match at Wembley. Bough did his National Service in the Royal Tank Regiment before getting a job as a graduate trainee with ICI in Billingham. He continued to play amateur football in the North East but became increasingly unhappy with his job, finally deciding he wanted to be a broadcaster. He pestered the BBC for two years and, in 1962, the corporation relented and gave him a three-month contract reporting on football matches in the Newcastle and Sunderland region. Other programmes followed on radio and television, mainly on sport, interviewing people like the golfer Peter Alliss, the runner Chris Brasher and the cricketer Cyril Washbrook, but also presenting the regional news programme Home At Six, later to become Look North. With his love of and knowledge of sport, he became the presenter of Sportsview in 1964, taking over from Peter Dimmock. The programme went out midweek and featured football as well as a number of pre-recorded items. He also presented and commentated on some of the early Match Of The Day's when regular commentators Ken Woolstenholme and David Coleman were otherwise occupied. He also began an eighteen-year stint hosting the BBC's Sports Review Of The Year, which later became Sports Personality Of The Year. Bough was part of the BBC's World Cup commentating team in 1966, notably covering one of the great upsets in the tournament's history when North Korea beat Italy at Ayresome Park. His stint on Sportsview ended in 1968 when David Coleman took the reins and the programme was renamed Sportsnight. However, it marked Bough's move to Grandstand, the BBC's flagship Saturday afternoon TV sports programme. In the days before sport sold its rights to the highest bidder, Grandstand covered a host of sports every week, including high-profile events such as the Olympic Games, FA Cup finals and the Grand National. These were mixed, depending on the season, with regular horse races, motor sport, athletics, cricket and rugby league.
It was on Grandstand, with its multitude of live feeds providing the potential for things to go wrong, that Bough's bomb-proof presenting style came into its own. Here he gained his reputation for remaining an oasis of calm no matter what technical hitches were occurring. His style prompted Michael Parkinson's remark that 'if my life depended on the smooth handling of a TV show he'd be the one I'd want in charge.' Bough, when once asked the secret of this ability to keep his head when all about him were losing theirs, said simply: 'I have a very long fuse.' He was a perfectionist, however. He said: 'We're not in the business of just getting by on this programme.' In 1972 he began presenting Nationwide, the BBC's magazine programme that went out after the early evening news. It was usually a fairly light-hearted programme, with opt-outs for BBC regions to focus on local news. However, he recalled some resistance from managers in BBC current affairs who were aghast that a man from the Sports Department was to present one of their programmes. In the same year, Bough had the harrowing experience of anchoring the BBC coverage of the Munich Olympics during which eleven members of the Israeli team were murdered by members of the Palestinian Black September terrorists. 'It was a bizarre situation,' he later said. 'The athletics continued while people were getting killed.' As one of television's best-known faces he appeared on the 1977 Morecambe & Wise Christmas Show. Together with a number of other presenters (like Parkinson and Michael Aspel) and newsreaders, including the rugby league commentator Eddie Waring, he donned a sailor suit to perform the legendary 'There Is Nothing Like A Dame' routine with Eric and Ernie.
By now Bough was beginning to tire of Grandstand. He still loved fronting the big sporting events but, as he later remarked: 'I began to feel I was play-acting when it was Widnes versus Batley on a wet November afternoon.' Hearing that the BBC was about to launch a new breakfast TV service in 1983, Bough approached the editor Ron Neil. Few presenters at the time had experience of presenting long and largely unscripted programmes and his stint at Grandstand got him the job. He proved a natural when the BBC launched Breakfast Time in January 1983, his laidback and comfortable style becoming an immediate hit with his early morning audience. His fellow presenter, Nick Ross, later recalled that Bough brought a much needed 'sense of serenity and composure' to the programme. In 1987, fed up with early mornings, Bough quit Breakfast Time to present the Holiday programme. It was to be a short stint. In 1988 he was sacked by the BBC after a newspaper carried lurid revelations that he had indulged in cocaine parties with prostitutes. The story came as a particular shock, given Bough's hitherto clean-cut family-man image. After being sacked by the BBC, Bough went into therapy to address his drug habit and picked up work with the London commercial radio station LBC, with LWT, presenting its Six O'Clock Live show and with Sky TV and there was a return to sports broadcasting for ITV's initial rugby World Cup coverage, but his renaissance was short-lived. In 1992 he was photographed leaving a sadomasochistic prostitute's flat that, according to newspaper reports, featured a cage and school canes. Bough felt he was being got at, complaining to the Evening Standard: 'It is a horrendous experience. You are followed day and night. One paper fully admits that they have dogged my footsteps for seven years, waiting for me to trip up. They catch you, they strip you bare and ravish you and then they move on to other people. Everybody in this country has a sex life. Surely they have a right to enjoy that? I have been weak and I have been silly: what can I say?' There was a brief return to the airwaves on an independent local radio station but, by 1996, Bough had disappeared from public view. In the following years he remained out of sight, turning down a chance to return to the screen when Breakfast celebrated its twenty fifth anniversary in 2006. However, in 2014 it was announced that he would step back into the public arena and contribute to a BBC documentary looking at thirty years of Breakfast TV in the UK. Frank Bough was one of Britain's most consummate broadcasters, who won a legion of fans for his calm and friendly manner. He was always worried that he would be remembered only for the tabloid headlines rather than for his many successful years in front of a camera. 'It was a brief but appalling period in my life,' Bough said. 'Don't condemn my entire career for a brief episode I regret.' In retirement, Bough joined a local choir near his home in Berkshire and largely refused to give interviews. He tended his garden and listened to music. In 2001 he underwent a liver transplant following the discovery of a tumour. Bough is survived by Nesta, whom he married in 1959 and their three sons, David, Stephen and Andrew.
Bobby Ball, one half of the comedy double act Cannon and Ball, has died at the age of eventy six after testing positive for coronavirus. His manager, Phil Dale, said in a statement: 'It is with great personal sadness that on behalf of Yvonne Ball and the family and Tommy Cannon, I announce that Bobby Ball passed away at Blackpool Victoria hospital on 28 October 2020. Bobby had been taken to the hospital for tests as he started with breathing problems. At first it was thought to be a chest infection but a test proved positive for Covid-19. His wife, Yvonne, said the hospital and staff could not have been more wonderful, as they were outstanding in their care of duty and they did everything possible for him and she cannot praise them enough. She said that the family and Tommy would like to express their sincere thanks to the many, many people who have been fans of Bobby and they know that they will all share in part the great loss and total sadness that Yvonne, the family and Tommy all feel.' Ball was born Robert Harper in January 1944. A keen amateur singer, he found fame on the comedy circuit and later with The Cannon & Ball Show alongside his lifelong friend Tommy Cannon.
The pair, who met in Oldham, where they worked at a welding factory, began their careers playing pubs and clubs before their first forays into television on Opportunity Knocks in 1969 and on Granada TV's The Wheeltappers & Shunters Social Club in 1974. The Cannon & Ball Show was first broadcast on ITV in 1979 and it continued until 1988, garnering huge audiences. Although somewhat 'old school' in terms to format, there was a certain surreal anarchy about the duo - in particular Ball's aggressive joke-telling and physical comedy - which drew several of the new wave of British comedians to them as guest stars (Rik Mayall, for instance). In 1982, the duo made a film The Boys In Blue although it was a - not entirely undeserved - flop at the box office. Bobby also created the BBC children's cartoon series Juniper Jungle, which was broadcast in 1992. Though their popularity on TV waned as tastes changed, the pair continued to perform in theatre and panto together through the 1990s and into the following decade. Ball also appeared in TV series as diverse as Last Of The Summer Wine, Heartbeat, Mount Pleasant, Benidorm, The Cockfields and won a whole new audience playing Lee Mack's reprobate father in the popular sitcom Not Going Out.
With Cannon, he took part in I'm A Z-List Former Celebrity Desperate To Get My Boat-Race Back On TV ... Please Vote For Me To Stay Here As Long As Possible (I'll Even Eat Worms If You Want) in 2005. In an interview in 2014, Ball recalled falling out with Cannon for three years in the 1980s. 'We started on the shop floor as welders, we went through eighteen years in the clubs and then we got big. We were surrounded by all these people who were gossiping. They wanted to divide and conquer and instead of sitting down and saying "what's wrong?", we stopped speaking,' he said. The pair later reconciled and both became devout Christians, eschewing the hedonistic lifestyle they had enjoyed at the height of their fame. In 2015 it was reported that Ball had begun giving comedy lessons to vicars so they could liven up their sermons. In a statement quoting Ball's catchphrase 'Rock on, Tommy,' Cannon said: 'Rock on, my good friend, I can't believe this, I'm devastated.' Bobby is survived by Yvonne, to whom he was married for forty six years and their children Robert, Darren and Joanne.
This week the BBC have announced new social media guidance for staff. Perhaps fortunately, yer actual Keith Telly Topping finished freelancing for his beloved Beeb a few years ago otherwise, in all likelihood From The North might be subject to more scrutiny than is entirely healthy from The Sixth Floor. That said, of course, this blogger will defend his own right to free speech to the end and, will also note, that at least in regard to political balance this blog has always been entirely even-handed there, treating all politicians with the same level of utter contempt that they so richly deserve.
A case in point; this week's news that Comrade Corbyn has been extremely suspended from The Labour Party for his naughty (alleged) anti-Semitic ways (or, let's be charitable, his apparent laissez-faire attitude towards some properly horrible, wicked elements within the party that he was, until recently, responsible for the conduct of) led to a predictably rabid response from his more loony supporters. This blogger particularly enjoyed reading the crass frothing-at-the-mouth ranting of that Bitter Old Red Len McCluskey. McCluskey - whose union is one of Labour's biggest donors, giving around seven million knicker since the start of last year - warned that any failure to reinstate Comrade Corbyn, like, instantly, would leave 'a split party doomed to defeat' at the next general erection. Because, of course, under the great and wholly benevolent leadership of Comrade Corbyn they had such a fantastic result in the last one, didn't they? Revolutionary socialists, dear blog reader. They haven't got a bloody clue ...
And finally, dear blog reader, the winner of the latest From The North headline of the week award. Leeks Mistaken For Machete Spark Aberdeen Police Probe. Err ... right. 

For many punters Sean Connery, who died on Saturday aged ninety, was the definitive James Bond. Suave and yet a cold-hearted ruthless killer, his 007 was every inch the Cold War warrior of Ian Fleming's novels. He strode across screen, licensed to kill, shaken but never stirred. He moved - in the words of his producer - 'like a panther,' hungry and in search of prey. But whereas Fleming's hero went to Eton, Connery's own background was noticeably short of fast cars, beautiful women, casinos and vodka Martinis.
Thomas Sean Connery was born in the Fountainbridge area of Edinburgh in August 1930, the son of a Catholic factory worker and a Protestant domestic cleaner. His father's family had emigrated from Ireland in the Nineteenth Century potato famine; his mother traced her line back to Gaelic speakers from the Isle of Skye. The area he grew up in had been in decline for years. Young Tommy Connery was brought up in one room of a tenement with a shared toilet and no hot water. He left school at thirteen with no qualifications and delivered milk, polished coffins and laid bricks, before joining the Royal Navy. Three years later, he was invalided out of the service with stomach ulcers. His arms by now had tattoos which proclaimed his twin passions: 'Scotland forever' and 'Mum & Dad.'
Connery was a keen footballer, having played for Bonnyrigg Rose in his younger days. He was offered a trial with East Fife. Later, while on tour with South Pacific, Connery played in a match against a local team that Matt Busby, manager of Manchester United, happened to be scouting. According to legend, Busby was impressed enough with Sean's physical prowess to offer Connery a contract worth twenty five quid a week immediately after the game. Connery admitted that he was tempted, but he recalled: 'I realised that a top-class footballer could be over-the-hill by the age of thirty and I was already twenty three. I decided to become an actor and it turned out to be one of my more intelligent moves.'
In Edinburgh, he gained a reputation as hard man when six gang members tried to steal from his coat. When he stopped them, he was followed. Connery launched a one-man assault on the ruffians which the future Bond won hands down. He scraped a living any way he could. He drove trucks, worked as a lifeguard and posed as a model at the Edinburgh College of Art. He spent his spare time body-building. The artist Richard Demarco, who as a student often painted Connery, described him as 'too beautiful for words, a virtual Adonis.' But, bitten by the acting bug when odd-jobbing at a local theatre, he opted to pursue his luck on the stage. In 2009, Connery recalled: 'When I took a taxi during a recent Edinburgh Film Festival, the driver was amazed that I could put a name to every street we passed. "How come?" he asked. "As a boy I used to deliver milk round here," I said. "So what do you do now?"That was rather harder to answer.'
In 1953, he was in London competing in the Mister Universe competition. He heard that there were parts going in the chorus of a production of the musical South Pacific during which he first met another young jobbing actor, Michael Caine, who became a lifelong friend. By the following year, he was playing the role of Lieutenant Buzz Adams, made famous on Broadway by Larry Hagman. American actor Robert Henderson befriended Connery and encouraged him to educate himself. Henderson loaned him works by Ibsen, Shakespeare and Bernard Shaw and persuaded Connery to take elocution lessons. Connery made the first of many appearances as a film extra in the 1954 movie Lilacs In The Spring and, later, had a more substantial part in the 1957 noir classic Hell Drivers (with a cast that also included Stanley Baker, Patrick McGoohan, William Hartnell and David McCallum).
There were minor roles on television too, including a gangster in an episode of Dixon Of Dock Green.  Connery, however, was struggling to make ends meet and was forced to accept a part-time job as a babysitter for the journalist Peter Noble and his actress wife, Marianne, which earned him ten shillings a night. He met the Hollywood actress Shelley Winters at Noble's house, who described Connery as 'one of the tallest and most charming and masculine Scotsmen' she'd ever seen. Around this time Connery was residing at TV presenter Llew Gardner's house. Robert Henderson landed Connery a role in a six pounds a week Q Theatre production of Agatha Christie's Witness For The Prosecution, during which he met the fellow-Scot Ian Bannen forming another lasting friendship. This was followed by Point Of Departure and A Witch In Time at Kew, Pentheus opposite Yvonne Mitchell in The Bacchae at the Oxford Playhouse and a role opposite Jill Bennett in Eugene O'Neill's production of Anna Christie.
In 1957, he got his first leading role in Blood Money, a BBC reworking of the acclaimed TV play Requiem For A Heavyweight, in which he portrayed a boxer whose career is in decline. It had been made famous in America by Hollywood legend Jack Palance. When Palance refused to travel to London, the director Alvin Rakoff's wife - the actress Jacqueline Hill - suggested Sean with whom she had previously worked. 'The ladies will like him,' she said.
A year later, he was cast alongside Lana Turner in Another Time, Another Place. Her boyfriend, the mobster Johnny Stompanato, reacted badly to rumours of a romance. He stormed on set and pulled out a gun. Connery grabbed it from his hand and overpowered him, before others stepped in and kicked him out. Two Scotland Yard detectives then 'advised Stompanato to leave' and escorted him to the airport, where he scuttled off back to the US. Connery later recounted that he had to 'lie low for a while' after receiving threats and menaces from men linked to Stompanato's mob boss, Mickey Cohen.
In 1959 Connery landed a leading role in Robert Stevenson's Disney film Darby O'Gill & The Little People alongside Albert Sharpe, Janet Munro and Jimmy O'Dea. The film was a tale about a wily Irishman and his battle of wits with leprechauns. The New York Times reviewer praised the cast, except for Connery whom he described as 'merely tall, dark, and handsome.' Sean also had prominent television roles in Rudolph Cartier's 1961 BBC productions of Adventure Story and Anna Karenina, in the latter of which he co-starred with Claire Bloom. His star was rising; he played Harry Percy in the An Age Of Kings, the title role in a major TV production of Macbeth and, on the big screen, appeared - along with just about every other actor in the world - in Darryl Zanuck's production of The Longest Day. And then came Bond.
Producers Cubby Broccoli and Harry Saltzman had acquired the rights to Fleming's novels and were looking for an actor to portray 007. Richard Burton, Cary Grant, David Niven and Rex Harrison were all considered. So were Lord Lucan and the BBC's Peter Snow. It was Broccoli's wife, Dana, who persuaded her husband that Connery had the magnetism and sexual chemistry for the part. That view was not originally shared by Bond's creator. 'I'm looking for Commander Bond and not an overgrown stunt-man,' Fleming allegedly said. But Broccoli was right and Fleming, as he later happily admitted, was wrong. The author quickly changed his mind when he saw Connery on screen. He even wrote a half-Scottish history for the character in some of his later works.
The director Terence Young took Connery under his wing, taking him to expensive restaurants and casinos, introducing him to his tailor and teaching him how to carry himself, so the slightly gauche Scot would pass as a suave and sophisticated assassin. Connery made the character his own, blending ruthlessness with sardonic wit. Many critics didn't like it and some of the initial reviews for Dr No were scathing when it was released in October 1962. But the public did not agree. The action scenes, sex and exotic locations were a winning formula. Dr No, made a pile of money at the box office. Even abroad it was hugely successful; President Kennedy requesting a private screening at the White House.
More Bondian outings swiftly followed; From Russia With Love (1963), Goldfinger (1964), Thunderball (1965), and You Only Live Twice (made in 1966, released the following year). It was exhausting and occasionally dangerous. At one point during the filming of Thunderball, he was thrown into a pool full of sharks with only a flexi-glass screen for protection. When one of the creatures got through, Connery beat the hastiest of retreats. On that occasion he was, most definitely, shaken and stirred.
There was other widely-praised work during this period, including a fine starring role in Alfred Hitchcock's, Marnie and The Hill, a tough and much admired Sidney Lumet drama about a wartime British Army prison in North Africa.
But, by the time You Only Live Twice was completed, Connery was tiring of Bond and feared being typecast. He turned down On Her Majesty's Secret Service and made Edward Dmytryk's western Shalako opposite Brigitte Bardot instead. Saltzman and Broccoli lured him back for Diamonds Are Forever in 1971, meeting the actor's demand for a then record 1.25 million dollars fee. Connery used it to set up the Scottish International Education Trust, supporting the careers of up-and-coming Scottish artists. As part of the deal, he also got to make Lumet's The Offence (starring opposite his old friend Ian Bannen), a sensationally raw and visceral police drama about as far removed from Bond as it was possible to get.
There were attempts to get him to stay as 007. Diamonds Are Forever's author Tom Mankiewicz recalled taking Connery to dinner and explaining what he was planning for Live & Let Die. Connery was intrigued but politely declined. 'I only ever wanted two things in life,' Sean reportedly told Tom. 'My own golf course and my own bank. I've got the first and I'm working on the second!' Instead, he made John Boorman's mad as toast SF movie Zardoz. Ridiculed at the time it has, subsequently gained a cult following.
Connery starred in John Huston's long-cherished Rudyard Kipling adaptation, The Man Who Would Be King, alongside his friend Michael Caine - a particular favourite of this blogger - but most of the next decade was spent in supporting roles, such as in Terry Gilliam's Time Bandits or as part of an ensemble cast in films like Murder On The Orient Express and A Bridge Too Far.
He was terrific as an aged Robin Hood in Dick Lester's Robin & Marion (1976, opposite Audrey Hepburn and Robert Shaw) and also in Michael Crichton's The First Great Train Robbery (1979, with Donald Sutherland and Lesley-Anne Down). Having lost a lot of money in a Spanish land deal, he accepted a lucrative offer to play Bond again, in Never Say Never Again in 1984. This time 007 was an ageing hero; older, wiser and self-deprecating but ultimately still as hard as nails. The title was allegedly suggested by Connery's wife, Diana Cilento, who reminded her husband he had vowed 'never to play Bond again.'
He continued to play other memorable parts, winning a BAFTA for his performance as William of Baskerville, in Umberto Eco's The Name Of The Rose. And he gained a whole new, younger audience as the flamboyant immortal Juan Sánchez Villa-Lobos Ramírez - the world's first Scottish-Egyptian-Spaniard(!) in Russell Mulcahy's Highlander in the same year, 1986. (Just pretend that all of the sequels - one of which Connery was persuaded to appear in despite his character having been, you know, beheaded in the first movie, never happened.)
A year later, his performance as a world-weary Irish cop - albeit with a definite Scottish accent - in Brian DePalma's The Untouchables, won him an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. In Indiana Jones & The Last Crusade, he was truly outstanding as Harrison Ford's archaeologist father, despite being only twelve years older than his co-star. Steven Spielberg memorably recalled casting Connery with the words 'who on Earth could possibly play Indy's dad other than James Bond?!'
There was a further knowing nod towards Bond, alongside Nicholas Cage in The Rock, where he was a British secret agent kept imprisoned for decades. Connery had box office success in The Hunt For Red October (as the world's first Scottish-Russian!), The Russia House and Entrapment; although First Knight, The Avengers and The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen were less highly regarded - even though Connery, as always, was very watchable in all three.
He turned down the role of Gandalf in The Lord Of The Rings in 2006, declaring himself tired of acting and sick of the 'idiots now making films in Hollywood.' After a difficult experience making The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen, during which he reportedly clashed with the director Stephen Norrington, Connery 'retired' from acting in 2003 and refused an offer to join the cast of the fourth Indiana Jones film three years later, claiming 'retirement is just too damned much fun.' However, he did complete one more film, voicing the title role in the Scottish-made animation Sir Billi (2012). He was briefly considered for the role of the gamekeeper in the 2012 Bond movie, Skyfall, but the director, Sam Mendes, wisely felt it would be distracting to have a previous 007 appear with Daniel Craig and cast Albert Finney instead.
Sean Connery began life in an Edinburgh tenement and ended it with a villa in Greece, sharing a helicopter pad with the King of the Netherlands. Always hating the Hollywood lifestyle, he preferred to play golf at his homes in Spain, Portugal and the Caribbean, with his second wife, Micheline Roqubrune, an artist he had met in Morocco. His previous marriage, to the Australian actress, Diane Cilento, had ended in 1975 amid allegations he had been violent towards her and had a string of affairs. They had a son, the actor Jason Connery. At various times, Connery had well-documented affairs with Jill St John, Lana Wood, Carole Mallory, Magda Konopka and the singer/songwriter Lynsey de Paul.
Despite his exile (he hated being called a tax exile and once released all of his financial documents to prove that he paid what he considered to be his fair share), he retained a full-throated passion for Scotland, despite once misguidedly endorsing a Japanese blend of whisky which went down like a sack of shite North of the border. In the run-up to the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, Connery's brother Neil claimed that Connery would not come to Scotland to rally independence supporters, since his tax exile status greatly limited the number of days he could spend in the country.
He attributed his notoriously short temper and his reputation for 'moodiness' to his Celtic genes. 'My view is that to get anywhere in life you have to be anti-social,' he once said. 'Otherwise you'll end up being devoured.' A long overdue knighthood, finally awarded in 2000, was reportedly held up by Donald Dewer because of his support for Scottish independence. In truth, his Bond is now something of a museum piece; the portrayal of women in those early films seems impossibly dated. The action scenes are still properly thrilling, but the sex too-often bordered on the non-consensual. Thankfully, it's been a while since 007 slapped a woman on the bottom and forced a kiss from her. But Connery's performance was of its time, enjoyed by millions of both sexes and gave the silver screen a genuine twenty four carat Twentieth Century icon. He leaves behind him a body of work that any actor would be proud of and, not least, a vacancy for the title The Greatest Living Scot.

With his mournful, more-in-sadness-than-anger facial expression and deliciously lugubrious vocal delivery, Geoffrey Palmer was one of the best-known actors of his generation on British TV. He cut his teeth on the stage before launching a career as a character actor in a variety of roles in film and television. He was perhaps most famous for a series of massively popular sitcoms including Butterflies, The Fall & Rise Of Reginald Perrin and As Time Goes By. A reserved man who valued his privacy, he usually remained out of the public gaze when not appearing on stage or screen and rarely gave interviews.
Geoffrey Dyson Palmer was born in London in June 1927, the son of a chartered accountant. After attending Highgate School he did his National Service in the Royal Marines, where he became an instructor, taking recruits through field training and the intricacies of using small arms. He qualified as an accountant, but he'd always had a hankering for trading the boards and his then girlfriend persuaded him to sign up with a local amateur dramatic society. There was a job as assistant stage manager at The Grand Theatre in Croydon, before he set out on the traditional actor's apprenticeship, touring in rep. In 1958 he moved into television with a role in ITV's The Army Game, a sitcom based on the lives of National Service soldiers which launched the careers of a number of famous actors and led to the first Carry On film. There followed a variety of TV character parts in episodes of series like The Avengers (four separate roles), The Saint, Gideon's Way and The Baron. He appeared three times in Doctor Who - as Edward Masters in Doctor Who & The Silurians (1970), The Administrator in The Mutants (1972) and Captain Hardaker in the 2007 Christmas episode, Voyage Of The Damned.
He also appeared as a property agent in Ken Loach's groundbreaking BBC Wednesday Play, Cathy Come Home. His world-weary demeanour made him instantly recognisable although it did not reflect his real character. 'I'm not grumpy,' he once claimed in a rare interview. 'I just look this way.' Despite an increasing amount of TV and film work, he continued to perform in the theatre, where he received critical acclaim for his role in John Osborne's West Of Suez, appearing alongside Ralph Richardson. He went on to work with Paul Scofield and Laurence Olivier before being directed by John Gielgud in a production of Noël Coward's Private Lives and with Alison Steadman and Roger Lloyd Pack in Alan Bennett's Kafka's Dick.
He came to the attention of a wider audience as Jimmy Anderson, the clueless militaristic buffoon of a brother-in law of Leonard Rossiter in The Fall & Rise of Reginald Perrin, which started in 1976 (who could ever forget his proto-Trumpian 'forces of anarchy' speech?) He followed that triumph with the part of the reserved, conservative dentist Ben in Carla Lane's bittersweet comedy, Butterflies. Palmer's character would sit gloomily at the end of the family dinner table, unable to comprehend his adolescent sons or his wife's midlife crisis. His world-weary take on events acted as his defence mechanism against the mayhem surrounding him. He was still much in demand as a character actor. His film appearances included O Lucky Man!, A Fish Called Wanda,The Madness Of King George and Clockwise. On the small screen he played Doctor Price in the Fawlty Towers episode The Kipper & The Corpse (getting one of the best comedy lines in TV history, angrily telling Manuel: 'I'm a doctor and I want my sausages!') and he appeared in The Professionals, The Goodies and Whoops Apocalypse. He was the lead in the Channel Four comedy Fairly Secret Army (1984). Though not a specific spin-off from The Fall & Rise Of Reginald Perrin, his character, Major Truscott, was very similar to Geoffrey's portrayal of Jimmy in that series and the scripts were written by Perrin's creator David Nobbs.
He also made a memorable appearance as Field Marshal Haig in Blackadder Goes Forth, casually sweeping model soldiers off a plan of the battlefield with a dustpan and brush. In 1992 he began a role in As Time Goes By, alongside his close friend, Judi Dench. It followed the progress of former lovers who rekindled their relationship after a thirty-year gap. It became one of the BBC's most popular comedies and was still being shown twenty five years later. Palmer also appeared with Dench in the James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies and as Sir Henry Ponsonby in Mrs Brown. With a voice as distinctive as his appearance, Geoffrey was much in demand as a narrator. He was heard on the BBC series Grumpy Old Men and he recorded a number of audio books including a version of A Christmas Carol for Penguin. He also voiced some notable adverts, urging people to 'slam in the lamb' in a commercial for the Meat & Livestock Commission and he introduced a British audience to 'Vorsprung durch Technik' in adverts for Audi. His CV also included appearances in The Killing Stones, Murder Bag, St Ives, The Strange World Of Gurney Slade, The Odd Man, Family Solicitor, Garry Halliday, The Edgar Wallace Mysteries, The Human Jungle, Suspense, Thirty Minute Theatre, Pardon The Expression, Sergeant Cork, Public Eye, The Rat Catchers, Emergency Ward Ten, The Troubleshooters, Coronation Street, Z Cars, Paul Temple, The Expert, Shadow Of The Tower, Out Of The Unknown, Doomwatch, Colditz, Menace, The Liver Birds, Edward VII, Play For Today, Bill Brand, Angels, Van Der Valk, The Sweeney, Bless Me Father, PD James Mysteries, The Kenny Everett Television Show, Oxbridge Blues, Executive Stress, Hotel Metal, Inspector Morse, Look At The State We're In!, He Knew He Was Right, Ashes To Ashes, Rev, Poirot and dozens more.
Away from acting, Geoffrey was a keen fly fisherman, once appearing in a DVD series, The Compleat Angler, in which he retraced Izaak Walton's classic Seventeenth-Century book. In 2011 he joined the campaign to try to halt plans for the HS2 railway line, the proposed route of which ran close to his home in Buckinghamshire. In 2000 the British Film Institute polled industry professionals to compile a list of what they felt were the greatest British TV programmes ever screened. Palmer was the only actor to have appeared in all of the top three - Fawlty Towers, Cathy Come Home and Doctor Who. A stalwart of the Garrick Club, he was made OBE in 2004 for his services to entertainment. Geoffrey Palmer had no formal training as an actor but his innate skills kept him in almost continuous work for more than six decades. His policy was never to turn down a part. 'I love working,' he once said 'and, if I'm not working, I'm not earning.' Amongst his final productions was to play the head geographer in the first Paddington movie in 2014 before reverting to dignified outspokenness as the Lord Chief Justice in Richard Eyre's The Hollow Crown. He is due to appear in the forthcoming Roald Dahl movie An Unquiet Life, as Dahl's Repton headmaster (and the later Archbishop of Canterbury) Geoffrey Fisher. He married Sally Green, a health visitor, in 1963 and is survived by her and their two children, Charles - a TV director - and Harriet and his daughter-in-law, the actress Claire Skinner.
The comedian, impressionist and actor John Sessions, who died of a heart attack aged sixty seven, claimed that he had trouble being John Sessions. 'The hardest part you'll ever play, honey, is yourself,' he told an interviewer in 1994. Instead, he transformed himself, brilliantly, into other people. His breakthrough 1987 one-man West End stage show The Life Of Napoleon, for instance, was described by a critic thus: 'In the course of a few sentences Sessions is liable to change voices from Olivier to Lofty of EastEnders, include a pun and a simile, refer to Picasso and Faulkner and move from the battle of Jena to a golf course. It is exhausting, exhilarating and mostly very funny.' Sessions made his name on TV on Channel Four's Whose Line Is It Anyway? (1988 to 1991), in which contestants (other regulars included Stephen Fry, Tony Slattery and Josie Lawrence) would improvise sketches suggested by the studio audience. He was in his element, imagining how James Joyce would spend a day at the beach, or how Hemingway might behave at the dentist. When the contestants were asked to impersonate the person they would least like to be trapped with in a lift, Paul Merton memorably said: 'Hello, my name's John Sessions!' John took it on the chin: 'A lot of people found me infuriating - they thought I was a smart-aleck, but I did try not to be.' And yet, on that show - and others including From The North favourite Qi on which he appeared frequently - he never wore his intelligence lightly, outsmarting the erudite Fry in the first episode of Qi (2003) by knowing Michelangelo's dates of birth and death. Whilst his impression of Alan Rickman in a later episode was one of the greatest two minutes of telly you've ever seen.
Unlike many of his peers, John had not been to Oxbridge and he had failed to complete his PhD thesis on the poet John Cowper Powys. Had he become Doctor Sessions, wrote one armchair analyst, 'perhaps he would not feel compelled to display his erudition; but then he would have been lost to the stage, which would have been a pity.' The smart-aleck image stuck, so much so that when Spitting Image produced a puppet of Sessions in 1989, he was represented disappearing up his own Gary Glitter. Sessions was singular in having served on the show both as impressionist (his forty-voice repertoire included Prince Edward, Laurence Oliver, Norman Tebbit and Keith Richards) and a target. His appearance as a rubberised member of Kenneth Branagh's 'Brit Pack' discombobulated Sessions: 'Suddenly on the telly I saw this brilliant puppet with this funny tie and baggy cheeks and it was me going up my ass. That was quite scary. I thought, "Am I going up my ass?"'
Such self-doubt was somewhat typical. Sessions was prone to depression, said that he reportedly loathed his appearance and was given in interviews to self-laceration. In 1999 he told The Sunday Times: 'Some nights, I can't get to sleep and lie there looking back on my life and eventually nod off thinking, "I'm completely useless and hopeless, talentless and should fuck off."' He was not mollified when the interviewer told him no one else had ever had that thought about him. He was born in Largs, Ayrshire. His father, John Marshall, was a peripatetic gas engineer and a Protestant; his mother, Esmé, was a Glaswegian Catholic ostracised by her family when she married. He had a twin sister, Maggie and an older brother, Bill, who was twelve when the twins were born. 'I remember thinking I mustn't cause my parents any trouble, because they were that much older.' He liked to be at home with his mother: 'We used to have a sort of confidentiality of humour. We'd find funny the unacknowledgedly absurd. Which I think is the type of stuff I do and which still makes me laugh.' When John was three, the family moved to England, eventually settling in St Albans, where he was educated at Verulam school. He did his first impersonation aged seven, singing Lonnie Donegan's 'Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dooley', partly to impress his father. He went to Bangor University to read English with the aim of becoming a teacher. Then his father organised a personnel job for him at the gas board. 'I told dad it was boring and the next thing he knew was that I was going off to do a PhD in Ontario.' He found Canada cold and depressing and said that his uncompleted dissertation consisted of 'two hundred pages of rubbish.'
Aged twenty six, he returned to the UK and applied to RADA. He arrived at his audition with a hangover. 'I did Benedick's "This can be no trick" from Much Ado. Hugh Cruttwell [RADA's principal] said: "That was terrible. You weren't acting, you were doing an impersonation of what an actor sounds like."' But a second performance, from Pinter's The Homecoming, won him a scholarship. Better, it led to a lifelong friendship with Branagh, a fellow student, who later directed him on-stage in The Life Of Napoleon, in the film version of Henry V (1989) and his comedy In The Bleak Midwinter (1995). Finding there was another John Marshall in Equity, he changed his name to Sessions. When he left RADA, he said, 'my plan was to try and do two careers at once - to be a comedian and an actor. For some years, I managed to juggle the two, but I never felt I joined either club.' He worked the comedy circuit in London, sometimes appearing on the same bill as French and Saunders, often doing rarefied material, such as imagining Milan Kundera's version of the TV soap Dallas. He would cement his brand as abstruse improv virtuoso with the TV shows John Sessions' Tall Tales (1991) and John Sessions' Likely Stories (1994). In 1994, in an interview promoting his performance in Kevin Elyot's AIDs drama My Night With Reg, he was asked by an interviewer if he was gay. 'I said "Yes I am, but my parents don't know and I don't want them to find out by picking up a copy of the Evening Standard." The journalist said she thought I should tell them and outed me. My mother died unexpectedly six weeks later and my father quickly developed dementia. It was never mentioned.'
Sessions explained his compunctions about telling his parents about his sexuality. 'They weren't going to go to their graves hating me or throw me out of the house, but they were born before the First World War and they might have died thinking it was their "fault."' One night at The Criterion Theatre during My Night With Reg, Sessions forgot his lines and had to leave the stage. 'It wasn't stage fright, because I'd been on for six weeks. It was because everything got too much for me. I'd been home for Christmas and found that my father, who was suffering from a mental illness after my mother died, had filled the fridge full of presents for her.' After that, he did not return to theatre for many years. 'I should have gone to the RSC or the National and done four or five plays, really worked my arse off. Some good old-fashioned graft would have done me the power of good. But I couldn't face a play again.' Only in 2013 did he return to the stage, in his friend the novelist William Boyd's play Longing. 'I thought it was going to lead to all kinds of interesting things, but I wasn't killed in the rush.' He never recaptured the fame of his first few years in TV. 'I had a twinkly couple of years, but then I ran out of steam,' he told the Gruniad Morning Star in 2014. 'As I was getting older, I wasn't getting more confident, I was getting less confident. I lost my way.' Arguably, he found it again through his talent for mimicry, when he starred in and co-wrote Stella Street, the 1997 to 2001 BBC series which imagined a street in Surbiton populated by movie and rock stars. His Keith Richards (opposite Phil Cornwell's Mick Jagger) who owned the corner shop was a sight to see.
Mimicry served him well in later triumphs on TV and in the cinema. He was superb as Geoffrey Howe in Margaret (2009), Harold Wilson in Made In Dagenham (2010), Ted Heath in The Iron Lady (2011), Norman Tebbit in The Hunt For Tony Blair (2011) and, in 2015, he was note perfect as Arthur Lowe performing Captain Mainwaring in We're Doomed! The Dad's Army Story. His later roles were mainly minor ones, but he stole the show as Doctor Prunesquallor, oleaginous royal physician to the House of Groan in the 2000 adaptation of Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast. In 2010, he played Kenny Prince in Sherlock - a huge fan of Conan Doyle, he had won the previous year's Celebrity Mastermind with the Sherlock Holmes stories as his specialist subject. Sessions appeared in the teen drama Skins in 2011 as one of two adopted fathers of Franky Fitzgerald. He also appeared as a Brummie vicar in an episode of Outnumbered. His CV also included appearances in Laugh??? I Nearly Paid My Licence Fee, Happy Families, Girls On Top, Porterhouse Blue, The New Statesman, Boswell & Johnson's Tour Of The Western Isles, In The Red, Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased), Dalziel & Pascoe, New Tricks, Lewis, Rab C Nesbitt and Doctor Who (a voice-over part on the episode Mummy On The Orient Express). Away from stage and screen, Sessions claimed to be a loner. 'I like the solitary life,' he once said. Latterly, the man of a thousand characters found consolation in playing the role of an ageing buffer drifting to the right politically. He had once proudly supported Labour but later voted for UKiP, claiming that 'the European Union is the biggest money-wasting piece of shit' and that the Scottish parliament should be scrapped. 'I'm pretty much one character really,' he reflected. 'A grumpy old fool.' Sessions died of a heart attack at his South London home on 2 November. The day after he died, his friend the broadcaster Danny Baker described him as 'terrific company and always a true talent.' The team behind Qi praised his 'incredible wit and encyclopaedic knowledge [which] played a huge part in the show's history.' He is survived by his sister and brother.
Earlier this week, dear blog reader, Keith Telly Topping received his review copies of the first four episodes of the new - third - series of Star Trek: Discovery, sent over from America. And, they were very good. As previously stated on From The North, this blogger rather liked Discovery from the start though did take a few episodes for it to work out what exactly, it wanted to be (the fact that the entire first episode was, effectively, a pilot for a series we never got notwithstanding). But, once the characters had started to establish themselves (by around the Harry Mudd episode), it was getting there and the Mirror Universe stuff was excellent. This blogger, however, adoredlast year's second series; yer actual properStar Trek, that was. Again, this year, it appears to have reformatted itself into a completely different show (for the third time in three years so, to be fair, it's consistent at least). Effectively, it is now what Voyager should've been, but wasn't! There are many things wrong with the world, dear blog reader, but at least the Star Trek franchise appears to have remembered what it did that made it's productions so all-pervasive in the first place.
Whatchama'gunnag'do in these desperate times, dear blog reader? Well, having a - really deserved - beef and prawn chow mein for Us Tea at the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House was a totally decent start ...
On a related note, on a scale of one-to-ten, with one being 'he didn't really deserve this' and ten being 'he really, really, really deserved this,' yer actual Keith Telly Topping his very self scored this here prawn and chicken with mushrooms in oyster sauce a ten. Borderline eleven.
A couple of days before Lockdown II ('it's back and this time, it's serious') this blogger ventured into town for, probably, the last time until early December to get the - government allowed - Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House supplies in. And, he took a few photos whilst doing the rounds of Poundland, Boots, M&S, Lloyds, the Halifax, the Post Office, Greggs, Morrisons and KFC(!) to remind his very self in the coming weeks of aloneness what other people actually look like. And, yes, trust Keith Telly Topping, the irony of this particular image was lost on no one in the vicinity.
Keith Telly Topping spent several days this week watching back-to-back episodes of a new soap opera - America's Choice 2020 - on CNN, dear blog reader. The characters weren't very believable - one over-the-top cartoonesque supervillain in particular - and some of the plotlines stretched credulity up to and, indeed, well-beyond breaking point. Nevertheless it was one of those programmes that, in spite of oneself, you just couldn't drag your eyes away from. The bloke who played Wolf Blitzer was terrific although, come on, what sort of name for a TV character is that? Couldn't they have called him something normal, like Ken? Defiantly modernist in its approach, the multi-part series finale - Georgia On My Mind/Philadelphia Freedom - was pitched somewhere between a revenge tragedy and a somnambulist nightmare, adroitly capped by a pseudo-realist aesthetic. This blogger thought it was great.
And, it was smashing to watch with a really deserved and well-tasty salt and chilli king prawn dish into the bargain.
Of course, it still wasn't The West Wing, obviously.
'Do not, do not, do not act like it!'
One of the lady reporters on CNN said at one point on Saturday: 'When you talk to the Biden camp, they'll tell you "it's a done deal."' That was the first time this blogger had heard that particular phrase used in relation to a presidential erection since 2000 and Dubbya's infamous (if, ultimately, accurate) comment about the Florida count ('Ma brotha Jeb says "it's a done deal"'!) It's funny how some quotes stick in your head, isn't it?!
Things This Blogger Learned From Watching CNN For Four Days Straight: Apparently, it's pronounced 'Ne-Vah-Dah' and not, as Keith Tell Topping always assumed 'Ner-Var-Dah'. Who knew?
And finally, dear blog reader, a moment of seriousness amid all this erection malarkey. Here is something which this blogger doesn't often indulge in on From The North - an, entirely personal, political opinion (and please do feel free to disagree with every word of it if you wish): Donald Rump has been a - thankfully, non-terminal - cancer on the Presidency of America for the past four years. He appears, from the evidence of his public utterances alone, to be a vile and odious piece of work without a single ounce of dignity, nuance or class about him. He is someone who makes George W Bush look supremely Presidential and the late Richard Nixon appear as a beacon of honesty and trustworthiness. Rump seems to be a deeply paranoid narcissist with an ego the size of Africa. He is, unquestionably, graceless, immature, petulant, toxic and arrogant, a bombastic bully and a proven liar. And the fact that he, seemingly, intends to staple himself to a chair in The Oval Office despite the votes of a majority of the American people should, in no way, be a surprise to anyone given his previous track record. Yet he, seemingly, appeals to many people who share his - vastly unattractive - metaphoric black-and-white view of what is, actually, a beautifully multi-coloured world. If he was simply the controversial billionaire owner of a multinational corporation, he'd be something of an abstract curiosity (albeit, one with ridiculous hair and a mush like he'd just been tango'd). If he was simply the face of a reality TV show he'd be a crass - if harmless - clown. If he was a second-term President of the United States, however, he'd be bloody dangerous. So, it appears (taking nothing for granted and any potential legal challenges notwithstanding) we may have had one Hell of a lucky escape. Congratulations and sincere thanks from the rest of the planet, therefore, to this blogger's many excellent fiends in the US - in California, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Arizona and elsewhere - for rejecting bigotry and choosing reason. For rejecting fear and choosing hope. For rejecting stupidity and choosing integrity. We now return you, dear blog reader, to From The North's normal schedule programming of really deserved takeaways and reviews of telly shows. It's been emotional.
Oh, hang on though, dear blog reader - this just in ...
Keith Telly Topping must conclude with a final thought: Every time a TV commentator noted on Saturday evening that whilst President-Elect Biden had received the highest ever vote for a Presidential candidate in an erection they then, presumably for balance, added quickly that soon-to-be-former-President Rump had got the second largest vote, this blogger was reminded of that bit in The Simpsons when Homer joined NASA and was introduced to Buzz Aldrin, 'the second man on The Moon.''Second comes right after first,' says Buzz, helpfully ... Yeah. It does. 

At the risk for starting this bloggerisationism sounding like Diamond Joe Quimby, this being World TV Day, welcome you are dear blog readers, to the twelfth annual From The North TV Awards. Celebrating, in this blogger's opinion, the best (and worst) television programmes broadcast during 2020. Just think, twelve years - you'd have probably got less than that for murder. Nevertheless, in what is rapidly becoming an annual observation, you may notice that there are about twice as many 'highs' listed here as there are 'lows'. This imbalance is not, necessarily, a reflection on the actual ratio of good telly-to-bad during the past twelve months. Rather it is because, generally speaking, we tend to remember most of the good stuff and attempt - only sometimes successfully - to forget all the distressing faeces starring Bloody Jack Bloody Whitehall.
As noted previously, each year when this blogger posts these lists, he usually gets a handful of e-mails or Facebook comments from dear blog readers saying something along the lines of 'very good, yer actual Keith Telly Topping. But, you missed [insert own favourite here].' Therefore, please note, since answering such comments is a right flamin' pain in the dong, this blogger has not missed anything. These awards represent what Keith Telly Topping has been watching and enjoying (or disliking) during the last year. If a programme is not mentioned, it is either because this blogger didn't see it (no matter how much he tries, he can't watch everything - there simply aren't enough hours in the day) or, he did but didn't consider it worthy of inclusion. If you disagree, then by all means start your own blog and create your own awards. 
Of course, 2020 was a damned queer year in most aspects of life - you may, perhaps, have noticed this, dear blog reader. Television was, by no means immune to the cascade of lockdowns, postponements, delays, 'new normals' and the like. Keith Telly Topping supposes the fact that we got any decent telly to watch this year as we cowered in our gaffs and sought anything to take our minds off the horrors the outside world was, in and of itself, a minor miracle. Thankfully, we did.
Thus, without any further ado ...

From The North's Fifty Extra-Primo-Rad Highlights Of Television In 2020:-

1. A West Wing Special To Benefit When We All Vote
'Sam, you're going to run for President one day. Don't be scared. Checkmate.' Though it came to an end in 2006, The West Wing - the greatest TV show in the history of the medium ... that doesn't have the words 'Doctor' and 'Who' in the title - never really ended in many people's hearts. Fans of the award-winning US political drama have longed for some form of revival almost from the day that the final episode was broadcast (the entire Barack Obama presidency being, effectively, The West Wing series eight notwithstanding). This remains true for this blogger who once wrote a couple of books about the show. It was with considerable anticipation from the masses, therefore, that in August, it was announced Martin Sheen, Rob Lowe, Dulé Hill, Allison Janney, Richard Schiff, Bradley Whitford and Janel Moloney (plus, many of the supporting cast) would reprise their roles, for one night only. For a stage version of the well-remembered 2001 episode Hartsfield's Landing, intended to raise awareness and support for When We All Vote, a non-profit organisation founded to increase participation in US erections. 'Yes, we've gotten the band back together!' Brad Whitford told the audience at the beginning of the broadcast. Production took place at Los Angeles' Orpheum Theatre and the episode was broadcast on 15 October on HBO Max. The role of Leo McGarry was played by Sterling Brown, John Spencer having, of course, sadly died in 2005. Emily Procter read the stage directions and Marlee Matlin and Elisabeth Moss also made appearances. The production included additional material written by creator Aaron Sorkin and Eli Attie, was directed by Thomas Schlamme and act-breaks featured guest appearances from When We All Vote co-founders Michelle Obama and Lin-Manuel Miranda, plus Bill Clinton and Samuel L Jackson. Perceptions that this might have been a case of didactic 'preaching to the converted' notwithstanding, reception was hugely positive from critics and viewers alike. CNN characterising the special as approximating 'the experience of watching a stage play, only with a best-seat-in-the-house view,' including 'shooting the performers from behind and revealing the rows of empty seats,' what they considered as 'a poignant reminder of what's been lost on the theatrical front since the pandemic began.'The AV Clubwrote it 'always stays on the right side of being a Very Special Episode.'IndieWireconsidered'[as] a reimagining of a strong television episode, the new version of Hartsfield's Landing plays out beautifully.'The Hollywood Reporteradded it was '[a] solid recreation of a solid episode for a solid cause.'Deadlinesaid in a headline that the production was A Sobering Reminder Of When Presidents Were Presidential, At Least On TV. From this blogger's viewpoint, watching this was both a welcome experience and a sad one. Welcome, obviously, because this was The West Wing and it was, frankly, stunning - indeed, the only way it could, possibly, have been any better would've been if Josh and Donna had got their kit(s) off and done The Sex right there on the stage for all to see. (That may, admittedly, be the 'shipper-fan lurking within this blogger having, briefly, taken over the review. Sorry 'bout that.) But it was also sad because it was an, at times, awkward reminder of an era - not that long ago, either - when television made this kind of challenging, thoughtful, sincere, outspoken drama effortlessly. And now it doesn't very much, if at all. The world has become a colder, harsher, more nasty and less inclusive place, dear blog reader (and this was before Coronavirus came along and made the situation many times worse). And - this is the real tragedy - we are all, to a greater or lesser degree, responsible for the critical and commercial conditions in which such a lack of ambition, empathy and, frankly, decency exists.
It's worth considering this, dear blog reader; when Hartsfield's Landing was first broadcast, America's president at the time was George W Bush and pretty much everybody who hadn't voted for him (and everyone outside America) considered that he was, without any shadow of a doubt the worst president that had ever, or would ever, be. There couldn't possibly be anyone worse than Dubbya out there, that wasn't even open to question. Almost two decades on and A West Wing Special To Benefit When We All Vote was a necessary reminder of a truism which the original series included as a specific plot point on more than one occasion: Be very careful what you wish for, it might just come true. Of course, the subsequent events of early November - recounts and vexatious lawsuits notwithstanding - made the episode even more of a 'special event' with hindsight. One wonders if the Sun will be claiming It Was The West Wing Wot Won It!? Correlation is not causation, dear blog reader, but if just one person voted in the US presidential erection who wouldn't have because they watched this production then that, alone, entirely justified its existence.
2. I Hate Suzie
'I'm a terrible mother. A terrible wife. A slightly-above-average actress ...' Rowdy Billie Piper's return to TV in this Sky Atlantic drama was lauded by critics. Billie portrayed the titular Suzie Pickles - a former child-star-turned-actress whose life and career were turned upside down by a compromising phone hack. It found Piper reunited with The Secret Diary Of A Call Girl writer Lucy Prebble. The Gruniad Morning Star gave it a rave review, describing Piper's character as 'nude, lewd and joyously off-the-rails in this scabrously [sic] funny drama. Beneath it all, Prebble holds the reins firmly in her fist and Piper keeps us - just - on the side of an endlessly charismatic but volatile, self-indulgent character.' I Hate Suzie, they continued, 'nails the arrested development and consequent issues - poor impulse control, irresponsibility and generally exhausting high-maintenance-ness - of a celebrity upon whom fame was visited so early.' The Torygraph were similarly impressed, calling the drama a 'glorious, fizzing monument to the creativity of Piper and Prebble' and a 'remarkable portrait of one woman's descent.' More than one reviewer alleged that Piper's own experience of becoming famous as a teenager would, no doubt, have 'informed' her role. Indeed, the Independentsuggested that Piper was, effectively, 'playing a thinly-disguised version of herself.' They continued: 'Much of I Hate Suzie is filmed in a frenetic, fast-cut style that reflects Suzie's descent into this contemporary nightmare. Piper has a rare gift for eliciting sympathy, even as Pickles keeps making new mistakes in her effort to disguise the old ones. What emerges is a black-comedy-horror about female friendship, modern fame and the impossibility of true privacy in a world where everyone has an online video camera.' The Evening Standarddeclared that Piper 'gives a raw, soul-baring performance ... with plenty of dry wit.'The Timessaid: 'Most people would agree that Piper is an outstanding actress, playing Suzie with excruciating honesty. It is gratifying to see Piper in a TV role where she can open her legs, show her class and use to the max her mesmerically expressive face. This was bold and intelligently acted television. And surely an instant cure for any fool who actively wants to be "a celebrity."' The NMEclaimedI Hate Suzie would become 'your new favourite TV show.''She's a nightmare,' Prebble, who co-created the drama with Piper, told the magazine about the titular character. 'We really weren't interested in making her likeable in inverted commas, or even particularly relatable, because that's something that's been pushed down our throats when creating characters for a long time, especially when it comes to women.' Ultimately, this was a case of a gifted actress reminding audiences (who, frankly, shouldn't have needed any reminding) with a pugnacious swagger just how good she is. And, just how morally bankrupt what passes for 'celebrity culture' can be. As The Times headline aptly observed: 'Billie Piper Shines In A Stupid, Soulless World.'
3. The Salisbury Poisonings
'You and your family are now at the centre of an international incident.' At the time The Salisbury Poisonings was in production, in late 2019, who would have predicted that, by the time it was broadcast on BBC1 - in June 2020 - a drama about a public health crisis would be so apocalyptically relevant. A three-part drama - created by Adam Patterson and Declan Lawn and starring Anne-Marie Duff, Rafe Spall, Darren Boyd and Annabel Scholey - it portrayed events surrounding the Novichok poisoning crisis in Salisbury. In March 2018, emergency services attended to Sergei and Yulia Skripal who have been found unconscious on a park bench in Salisbury. A national emergency was soon precipitated when it was discovered that Skripal was a former Russian military intelligence officer who'd been an agent for MI6 during the 1990s. And, that he and his daughter had been poisoned with a potent nerve agent which was smeared on the door handle of their home. The drama also dealt with the incidental exposure of several others, including a police officer and a couple who had found a perfume bottle containing the nerve agent. The drama focused on the Director of Public Health in Wiltshire, Tracy Daszkiewicz and the emergency services as they attempted to locate the source and prevent further casualties. The Gruniad praised the script and direction as being 'admirably restrained' and compared the calm actions of its characters facing a 'new normal' to the reactions of the general public during the on-going pandemic. 'It's an extraordinary story, which Salisbury is still recovering from,'notedBBC News's Steven McIntosh. 'But the dramatisation isn't some kind of James Bond-style spy thriller. The Skripals are only seen briefly at the beginning of the first episode and the Russian suspects are not shown at all. Instead, it focuses on the response of the local community and health officials.' Of course, not everyone liked it. Despite the real-life infected police officer, Nick Bailey, being an advisor on the production and helping Rafe Spall with his performance, Bailey's parents had a ruddy good whinge in a letter to a local newspaper that the series was 'inappropriately premature.' Which was immediately picked up and used as a stick to beat the BBC with by some jack-booted louse at the Daily Scum Mail. Who, clearly, didn't have any sick agenda smeared, an inch thick, across their disgusting faces. Oh no, very hot water. The fact that real-world events gave The Salisbury Poisonings a currency it would not, otherwise, have had makes the claim that it was 'inappropriately premature' even more ludicrous than it was in the first place. As a drama, the series worked 'as a narrative on a number of different levels,' noted its director, Saul Dibb. 'It's partly a domestic drama, partly a thriller and partly a very prescient virus horror, of this invisible enemy that can kill lots of people.' Maybe the latter aspect was why audiences of between nine and ten million watched the three episodes - broadcast on successive nights - and were kept on tenterhooks by its relevance to their own, current, lives. Either that or, due to lockdown, they couldn't go down the pub instead. Is it so wrong this blogger choses to believe it was the former? It's a much-used truism, dear blog reader, but it bears repeating - in good times and in bad the viewing public usually gets the television programmes they need. Whether they want, or even deserve, them or not.
4. Normal People
'What's Marianne like in her natural habitat?' An Irish drama by Element Pictures for the BBC and Hulu and based on the novel by Sally Rooney, the series followed the relationship between Marianne (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and Connell (Paul Mescal), as they navigated the journey to adulthood from school to undergraduate years at Trinity College. Normal People received praise for the performances and writing, being nominated for four EMMYs. Initially released on iPlayer, Normal People reportedly gave the BBC its best-ever week on the streaming site (26 April to 3 May), receiving over sixteen million programme requests across the twelve episodes beating the previous record for the first series of Killing Eve. Linda Holmes of NPRdescribedNormal People as 'a lovely series, not just to binge, but perhaps to dole out to yourself a couple of episodes at a time,' whilst CNNadded it was 'perfectly [understanding of] the desires we place on communication technologies and the ways they nearly always come up short' and 'irresistible in abnormal times.' Caroline Framke of Varietywrote: 'With its trifecta of elegant writing, directing and acting, Normal People is just as bleak and uncompromising as Rooney's novel - a feat and one that takes several episodes to fully absorb ... As Marianne and Connell's relationship grows deeper, Normal People becomes as immersive as the book that inspired it, making you both crave and dread knowing - or perhaps more accurately, experiencing - what happens next.' The production received particular praise for its realistic portrayal of intimate content though - perhaps inevitably - the nudity sparked a debate on Irish radio, with callers to Joe Duffy's Livelineclaiming it was 'inappropriate.' Once again providing ample evidence that some people are just scum. Their Love Will Tear You Apartsaid the New York Times headline. 'Achingly powerful,'added the Globe & Mail. One would expect the Gruniad to get down on all-fours and drool over the drama's bits, of course - and, unsurprisingly, it did; 'a small-screen triumph' - but the fact that the Daily Scum Mail was also, broadly positive was somewhat less expected. Although, they still couldn't resist counting the sex scenes. 'It clearly struck an emotional chord with viewers of all ages,'wrote the Torygraph. Perhaps the most apt review of this wonderful piece of work came from the Hindu Times's Navmi Krishna who calledNormal People'A masterclass in understanding the different facets of intimacy.'That about covers it.
5. I May Destroy You
'Is there any reason you haven't told him about the assault?''He's an Italian drug-lord.' The formidably talented Michaela Coel, who won two BAFTAs for her autobiographical sitcom Chewing Gum, miraculously turned her own rape trauma into this genre-defying triumph. Exploring issues of sexual consent from multiple viewpoints, you might expect I May Destroy You to be grim but it was, actually, anything but. It's not often that a series comes along which is so utterly idiosyncratic that it defies both categorisation and any obvious reference points. But, such was the case with this extraordinarily raw and intimate drama. It told the story of Arabella, a successful writer working on a follow-up to her zeitgeist-y millennial bestseller, whose life was changed when her drink was spiked whilst on a night out. As a study in the effects of sexual assault, it was astonishing - but it would also be an injustice to categorise this as a one-issue drama. Rather it explored the intersections of race, class and gender in metropolitan society with both freewheeling energy and assurance, while also, more generally, nailing the vertigo-inducing Dionysian experience of being a young adult with exhilarating authenticity. 'It's a vibrant comedy-drama about friendship and family, social media and messy millennial angst, driven along by dark humour and exhilarating energy,'according to the Torygraph. 'Astonishingly bold and assured, it deserves to be an award-garlanded phenomenon.''Moving and, despite the subject matter, at times very funny,'wroteIndieWire. 'It's tricky to call an actor mesmerising, for fear of making her power seem magical rather than the result of craft. But Coel here is magnetic and memorable and you won't be able to take your eyes off her,'added NPR. The Detroit Newsreview said the series was 'fascinating... taking a dark subject and turning it every which way. It can be shocking, it can be fun (which is also somewhat shocking), it can hurt and maybe even heal. No matter what, it's an unsettling revelation.'I May Destroy You'isn't just powerful television,'wrote the Boston Globe. 'It's a groundbreaking model of how to honour the complexities of sexual trauma on TV without succumbing to lecture or exploitation.''Could this be the best drama of the year?'asked the Gruniad. One of them, certainly.
6. Doctor Who
'Everything you think you know is a lie.' Containing half-a-dozen genuinely superb episodes - like Spyfall in which Lenny Henry provided the most plausible justification for his existence since around 1983 and Nikola Tesla's Night Of Terror which proved what this blogger had always believed, that AC/DC were much better than Scorpions - Chibnall and Jodie's second series of Doctor Who was more patchy than their first. But the highs were infinitely higher. Of course, some people - the usual suspects, basically - hated it and everything it stood for with a passion and weren't shy of telling anyone that wished to listen (and, indeed, anyone that didn't). This blogger thought it was great, dear blog reader. Quality guest casts (Stephen Fry, Robert Glenister, Jo Martin and Sacha Dhawan as the latest - bat-shit crazy - incarnation of The Master), surprise returns (Barrowman in Fugitive Of The Judoon) and Maxine Alderton's stunning recreation of the maddest Mad Hatter's Tea Party of all time, the Shelleys and Byron at Lake Geneva (The Haunting Of Villa Diodati). And, then there was the two-part finale which made The Cybermen terrifying again and sent fandom into a collective cardiac arrest and sailed them right up a creek only to, in both cases, neglect to supply any paddles. It was manic, it was outré, it was challenging, it was the Doctor Who equivalent of Lou Reed following Transformer with Metal Machine Music - brave and perhaps wilfully foolhardy, but thrilling to watch all the same. Jodie, Mandip Gill, Tosin Cole and Bradley Walsh will return at Christmas (as will The Daleks) for an episode which was, thankfully, completed before the world started its own adaptation of The Invisible Enemy. Production on the next series did, eventually, commence in October. Whether a few - overly hysterical - tabloid stories that the series wouldn't be shown until 2022 were accurate was always less certain although it has been confirmed there will be fewer episodes than usual due to Covid-restrictions. The avuncular Bradley and Tosin are scheduled to leave in the forthcoming festival special so, when series fourteen does, eventually, rock up The Doctor and Yaz will have some new TARDIS fam to find.
7. The Go-Go's
'People used to cross the street when they saw me. I felt powerful for the first time!' This blogger saw The Go-Go's supporting Madness and The Specials at a club in Sunderland in April 1980. In front of an audience composed almost entirely of Mods and Skinheads (who, even though they both liked the two headliners hated each other and, at various points between sets, enjoyed punching anyone within easy reach), a female five-piece from Los Angeles went down, predictably, like a sack of diarrhoea. This blogger thought they were adorable; nothing particularly special musically at that stage in their development but he particularly enjoyed a moment when one of the numbskulls in the crowd shouted 'Get yer tits out.''We're nice girls, we don't do that,' replied Belinda Carlisle. 'Yeah,' added Jane Wiedlin. 'So, go fuck yourself!' The place promptly erupted in an avalanche of beer bottles, hockle and incandescent fury. God, it was great! Alison Ellwood's superb documentary about the band - 'candid and absorbing'according toForbes - was a timely reminder that women in the rock and/or roll business face massive disadvantages. Due to their lack of a collective penis, mainly. A story of triumph against some disappointingly sexist odds - including coke binges, heroin addiction, performing drunk on Saturday Night Live, heart surgery, bipolarity, break-ups, reunions, more break-ups - The Go-Go's mixed interviews with Carlisle, Wiedlin, Charlotte Caffey, Kathy Valentine and Gina Schock, plus management, former members and friends (including Lee Thompson and Lynval Golding) with archive footage. They gave Rolling Stain magazine a, long-overdue, fisting for their outrageous 1982 cover-shoot of the group in their vests and panties although the constant whinging about the fact that they haven't been nominated for the Rock and/or Roll Hall of Fame yet quickly wore tiresome. You're in a very select group, ladies - neither have The Specials or Madness. Or The Jam or The Smiths. Or Kraftwerk for that matter. They bitched about each other with glee but, as Schock perceptively noted at one point, sisters fight with each other all the time. And, at the climax, they recorded their first new song in nearly two decades, a sharp little jangly rocker 'Club Zero'. Ellwood - as with her previous documentaries about The Eagles and the Laurel Canyon scene - drew together the various strands of the story with wit, economy and knowing exactly which bits to leave on the cutting room floor. Schock and Valentine suing their bandmates over royalties being the most obvious example of something, perhaps wisely, left with their lips being, as it were, sealed. What we ended up with was genuinely touching and a good excuse to dig out ones well-worn copy of Beauty & The Beat. And, not for nothing, but they're still - all of them - fine-lookin' ladies. It seems the love affair which began for this blogger in Sunderland in 1980 hasn't ended yet.
8. Kermode & Mayo's Home Entertainment Service
The timing of BBC4's Kermode & Mayo's Home Entertainment Service simply could not have been better. Or, more welcome. The duo of film critic Mark Kermode and DJ Simon Mayo have been broadcasting regularly on Radio 5Live for years and have spun-off their movie review slots onto TV on various occasions (as segments of The Culture Show, for example, as well as Kermode's Uncut vlog and his acclaimed documentary on his favourite movie, The Exorcist, The Fear Of God). In April, BBC4 hastily commissioned a six-part series to cover film and television available to stream during the pandemic as Kermode and Mayo helped viewers navigate the 'wonderful, yet confusing,' world of Twenty First Century home entertainment. In doing so it became, during those first few terrifying weeks of lockdown, essential viewing as their audience sought ways to watch new movies with all of the cinemas now closed. Affable, as always, Mark and Simon gently guided viewers into the bewildering world of live steaming, obscure TV channels (something of a revelation for Kermode whose TV viewing had, previously, extended to Doctor Who, UFO and not much else) and box-set bingeing via iPlayer. It managed to conduct a series of interviews with filmmakers via Zoom despite the two hosts never being, physically, in the same location. And, in both cases, giving us a close-up of the - intriguing - contents of their bookcases. Which, quickly, set a - much parodied - trend of virtually everyone being interviewed on British TV from their own gaffs, on any subject, managing to strategically place their laptop so as to highlight their own delusions of literacy. A piece in GQ celebrated the programme as 'comforting the nation' during lockdown. A Yorkshire Postarticle on the importance of BBC4 highlighted Kermode & Mayo's Home Entertainment Service as an example of the kind of conceit which was 'a feast for the senses.' A similar view was held by the Express & Star which included the show in its list of favourite BBC4 productions. Episodes of the series quickly started showing up on You Tube increasing the audience; particularly useful in the case of the opening episode in which Kermode's review of Life On Mars and his perceptive highlighting of the fantasy drama's similarities to Powell and Pressburger's A Matter Of Life & Death (1946) might, just, be the five best minutes of TV produced by anyone this year. The Sofa Correspondents segment got viewers to send in videos of what they had been watching. It was everything that the BBC, in theory, aims to be - entertaining, informative and educational. And importantly, inclusive, opinionated and rich in witty humour. Mark and Simon in a nutshell, in fact.
9. Staged
'You have nothing of culinary value.''I have two carrots!' A six-part comedy filmed using video-conferencing technology, Staged starred Michael Sheen and David Tennant playing over-the-top fictionalised versions of themselves trying to rehearse Luigi Pirandello's Six Characters In Search Of An Author, during lockdown. Like Kermode & Mayo's Home Entertainment Service here was a format which was not only created because of Coronavirus, but also one which probably couldn't have existed (or, if it had, wouldn't have worked) without the world being shut in its own homes. In a glowing review the Independent described Staged as 'a welcome distraction, an eminently watchable portrait of two artists as petulant, egotistical children.' It was, but it was more than that; it was an exaggerated, yet often subtly underplayed, reflection of public fears and the public's need for distraction. It was on such apparent contradictions that Staged triumphed. Anna Leszkiewicz, in New Statesman, said it was 'charming: absurdly silly in a quiet, understated way.' The i, described it as 'compelling "lockdown" television' and compared it, favourably, with the recent Steve Coogan/Rob Brydon vehicle The Trip. Metro enjoyed Sheen and Tennant sharing 'a warmth and willingness to take the mickey out of each other that felt entirely unforced.'The Stageadded: 'Tennant and Sheen are excellent, perennially, even when performing as themselves to their own laptops. Here, joined by [Simon] Evans and by their real-life spouses - Georgia Tennant and Anna Lundberg - they are on top form, crackling with snide chemistry.' Featuring guest appearances by Samuel L Jackson and Judi Dench, Staged was a little diamond - two of this blogger's favourite actors taking the piss out of not only themselves but, also, out of a world on the verge of a nervous breakdown. 'It's all a bit meta, but that's the joy of it,'opined some glake at the Gruniad having, seemingly, only just realised that was the point. 'It depends on you knowing that Tennant and Sheen are friends in real life, so that you can fully enjoy the (one presumes) unscripted banter between them.' A second series has, recently, been commissioned and, given that it doesn't look like Covid is going anywhere fast, let us reflect again that, even out of bad there must come some good.
10. I'll Be Gone In The Dark
'The great tragedy, to me, of this case is that it's not better know.' A six-part documentary revolving around the late author and blogger Michelle McNamara as she wrote a book about The Golden State Killer. But, this account of McNamara's investigation of the serial rapist and murderer was much more than a mere true-crime series. Yes, it detailed the string of heinous acts committed in the 1970s and 1980s across California by a man who evaded detection for decades. But it also chronicled McNamara's obsession with the case while forcing viewers to consider the roots of our own fixations on the notion of true-crime. Under director Liz Garbus, there were moments in I'll Be Gone In The Dark of shiver-inducing, almost Lynchian horror. But, just as McNamara did, the series always treated the victims as multidimensional humans deserving sensitivity and respect. The story of The Golden State Killer was a daunting one. Over the course of more than a decade, an unnamed monster raped many women and killed at least thirteen. The series dissected McNamara's investigative work and, then, her untimely passing. With her book two-thirds completed, McNamara died in 2016 at the age of forty six due to an accidental prescription drug overdose in conjunction with atherosclerosis. Crime writer Paul Haynes, journalist Billy Jensen and McNamara's husband, the comedian Patton Oswalt, helped to complete the book following her death. In April 2018 - after the book had become a best-seller and HBO had purchased the rights - Sacramento Sheriff's Department announced the arrest of a suspect in case: seventy two-year-old Joseph DeAngelo, a former police officer. The department credited McNamara's dedication for raising public awareness of the case, though it added that her work had not, directly, generated any specific information which led to DeAngelo's arrest. 'The show bringing sensitivity to true-crime TV,'claimed the Gruniad. 'This is both a satisfying story of justice restored and a moving tribute to one woman's refusal to give up on forgotten victims,'wroteNew Statesman. 'A compelling, flawed story of obsession - and its flaws are part of what make it so intriguing,'added the Arizona Republic. 'Sensitive, unusual, uplifting, revelatory and deeply moving,'said Den Of Geek. 'This isn't just another true-crime docu-series. It's a game-changer,'gushed the SlashFilm website. I'll Be Gone In The Dark in fact worked on several levels; in one way it was as a fairly straight documentary about a notorious serial killer - not at all dissimilar to Conversations With A Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes which made 2019's From The North'Best Of' list. But it was about much more. And, in the story of McNamara's determination to bring a case which had, perhaps, slipped from the public conscience (in a way that Bundy's atrocities never did), it painted a picture of a woman who simply couldn't believe someone was going to get away with such appalling wickedness. This blogger is an agnostic and has no fixed views on whether there is any form of an afterlife, dear blog reader. Probably not. But he is sure that, just for a moment, we can all imagine a scenario where McNamara, on some level of existence, was aware of DeAngelo's arrest and subsequent conviction.
11. Roadkill
'It's not the lie, it's the cover-up.' Huge Laurie starring in an urbane David Hare political thriller - reason enough to watch Roadkill even without the many other things it had going for it. The four-parter, directed by Line Of Duty's Michael Keillor, starred Huge as a minister in a cast which also included Saskia Reeves, Iain De Caestecker and the terrific-as-always Helen McCrory. Critics warmly reviewed the series which saw Laurie's character, Peter Laurence, battling to stop both his public and private lives falling apart against a backdrop of plotting and intrigue. The Torygraphdescribed Laurie as 'great, just as he was in The Night Manager. It's a charismatic performance and he gets under the skin of Laurence.' The Daily Scum Mail lavished praise on both the performances and Hare's writing. 'With any actor less likeable than Hugh, this story would be unbearably cynical. Sir David expertly shows us the man's charming façade as well as his cold, hard core.' They added: 'Helen McCrory is at her best playing PM Dawn Ellison as part-Margaret Thatcher, part-Peaky Blinder.' The Gruniad noted the thriller's universal appeal at a time of real-life political turmoil amidst a pandemic and with Brexit looming. 'It is good to be reminded of the enduring truths - that power corrupts, that charisma tells us nothing of a man (or woman), that political ambition is rarely purely a craving to serve the public. In a good light, on a good day, it makes their multiple manifestations look more manageable,' they wrote. 'It is too mannered and expositional to be realistic (in this way it reminded me of Bodyguard), but it is welcome immersive escapism and not nearly as earnest and improbable as Hare's last big TV offering, Collateral, which was like being subjected to weekly political sermons via water cannon,'addedThe Times. 'This was mostly down to the excellent Hugh Laurie as a "man of the people Tory", especially when he was in scenes with the equally splendid McCrory.' Meanwhile, some disgraceful wipe alleging to be 'a journalist' at the Daily Scum Express actually got paid for writing a piece entitled Is Roadkill Based On A True Story? She then proceeded to write ten paragraphs on this subject where one word - 'no' - would've done. 'The BBC calls the series a "fictional thriller" which indicates it was not inspired by a real-life event or character,' concluded Katie Palmer, breathlessly. So, again, that'd be a 'no' then? 

12. Chris Packham: Forever Punk
'I can't tell you my life was saved by punk rock, we'll never know ... But, I would say that there's a very good chance that's the case.'From The North favourite Chris Packham, environmentalist, author and broadcaster revealed how, as a teenager with undiagnosed Asperger's Syndrome, loud, abrasive pop music may have saved his sanity. By giving him a purpose and a philosophy, he was able to harness his creativity, which led to him becoming a photographer, then a TV presenter with a determination to champion wildlife. More than forty years on, as Chris went to Buckingham Palace to receive a CBE for his services to the environment, he asked himself if he has, over the years, turned into the type of 'establishment' figure that his seventeen-year-old self would have probably spat at. In this highly personal BBC film, Chris set out to question both himself and other former punks who, like him, rocked against racism, fought for gay rights and clashed (ahem) with their parents causing untold grief, to discover if the values they all believed in still hold today. Along the way, Chris met some at the heart of the movement, including Jordan Mooney, the artist Jamie Reid, The Clash's first drummer Terry Chimes - now a chiropractor, the Reverend Richard Coles and Tom Robinson. He also met Joe Talbot, the singer of indie band Idles at the 100 Club and even hooked up with his own garageband, The Titanic Survivors, whom he left in 1978. They have since reformed and are still playing some of the songs that Chris wrote in Southampton pubs. Chris concluded that the spirit of punk lives on, not just in music but in the rebellious spirit of the current teenage generation and is still at the heart of many modern-day protest movements. Forever Punk was properly touching and, for a certain generation - including this blogger - an at times uncomfortable reminder of our own naïve-but-cherished teenage years. Keith Telly Topping is a couple of years younger than Chris but his own punk epiphany - watching The Jam playing 'All Around The World' on Marc Bolan's ITV show - affected everything that came afterwards up to and including this blog. 'You were the most beautiful punk rocker,'remembered Jenny Packham, who at the time loathed the din of Never Mind The Bollocks emanating from her brother's bedroom. 'There's a moment in Chris Packham's new BBC documentary in which he squeezes into his badge-studded and battered 1970s leather jacket and looks truly, deeply content,'noted the NME, approvingly. The Gruniad called it 'uplifting.' In an interview with The Big Issue to publicise the documentary, Chris claimed that 'Punk is coming back to save the planet.' Do you know what, dear blog reader, under normal circumstances this blogger may have considered such a statement to be laughably faux naïf. But, if anything can save humanity from the metaphorical fetid swamp we face in these conflicted, frightening times, a bit of righteous punk outrage might be just what we all need. No future? Not if Chris Packham CBE's got anything to do with it. 

13. Dracula
'I'm undead, I'm not unreasonable!' Back in January, what seems now like a lifetime ago when Coronavirus was still item number eight on the Six O'Clock News - something which was happening far away in China and the world hadn't, yet, begun its real-life adaptation of Survivors - Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss's adaptation of Dracula hit the screens. Development on Dracula began as far back as 2017 and the series was commissioned by the BBC - in a co-production with Netflix - the following year with Danish actor Claes Bang cast as the title character. According to the writers Dracula himself, in their version, was 'the hero of his own story' - the central focus of the narrative and main character, rather than a shadowy villain for more traditional heroes to hack to pieces at the climax. As with their previous Sherlock (and, even more specifically, Moffat's 2007 series Jekyll), they aimed to make their version both faithful and faithless to the source text at the same time, taking details from the original novel, adding 'a lot of new stuff' and ignoring passages which didn't fit their narrative. Aided by the delicious sparring of the foppish, Byronesque Bang and Dolly Wells's Van Helsing, the series - broadcast over three consecutive nights from New Year's Day - was both a critical and a decent-sized commercial success (UK audiences were in the six million viewers range). It was, simultaneously, both Gothically authentic and terrifyingly disrespectful to various sacred cows. The Gruniad called it'a diabolic luxury' and 'a joyous belter' while the Sunfound the occasional comic one-liners loaned 'fun to the grisly scenes' and described it as 'triumphant.''Camp and bonkers,'added the Torygraph. 'However untethered the ending, this was a bold, witty retelling that took risks and bubbled with ideas, something not to be taken for granted,' was Den Of Geek's view. Of course, plenty of the purists were righteously irked by this 'doing things differently' malarkey and weren't shy of saying so. Loudly. Which goes to prove, dear blog reader, that vampires are not the only things which suck.
14. The Great
'It must be an enormous responsibility and honour to lead a country of such importance.''It's actually not that hard!' This satirical comedy-drama was loosely - extremely loosely - based on the rise and rise of Catherine the Great, Empress of All The Russias. You know, liked horses. Allegedly. Played by Helen Mirren in another, far less funny, production. Anyway, the series starred the delightful Elle Fanning as Catherine and Nicholas Hoult as her mad-as-a-raddish husband, Peter II. Hulu described The Great as an 'anti-historical.' According to the LA Times' Robert Lloyd, the creator, Tony McNamara had 'jotted down some names, relationships and a few historical bullet points, torn up the paper and [then] started writing.' Principal photography for the pilot commenced in November 2018 in York, with other filming locations including Leicestershire, Lincoln and Hever Castle in Kent along with Caserta in Italy. 'Gorgeous, if gratuitous, The Great can't quite live up to its namesake, but delicious performances from Fanning and Hoult and a wicked sense of humour make it a pretty good watch,' was the Rotten Tomatoesoverview. 'Reality is rarely as funny as this sparkling period satire, set ... amid a sneaky coup d'état that plays out like a Scooby Gang caper (with wigs),'added the Boston Globe. Other reviewers were equally impressed including Allison Shoemaker ('it's the emotional honesty of The Great that allows the comedy to land so viciously'), Newsday ('an engaging historical satire'), Reason Online ('Historically bonkers, but so witty it will make your brain melt') and The Sunday Times ('Despite the modern twist, this wasn't history dumbed down - it was too vicious, too interested in cracking jokes about Descartes for that'). 'Gleeful [and] garish,'wrote the Gruniad in a mealy-mouthed and not particularly impressed review which made those sound like bad things. As it happens, they were anything but.
15. Killing Eve
'You have to know we are different from these people.' It was, perhaps, inevitable given the horribly obvious nature of the British media's 'arse-lick-'em-up-and-then-slap-'em-down-hard' attitude to any form of success that the third series of Killing Eve was going to see the first bunch of negative critique the acclaimed drama had received thus far. One Anita Singh of the Torygraphclaimed that 'the novelty has worn off' and that it Killing Eve was 'no longer TV's must-watch.' That fact that some arrogant smear of no consequence considers liking any TV show to be 'a novelty' tells you everything that you need to know about Anita Singh of the Torygraph, dear blog reader. There were other whinging arsewipes giving it some serious 'oh, the disappointment,' too, particularly one cheb delighting in the name Cumming at the Independent. 'Once fresh and thrilling, Killing Eve has grown stale and predictable,' he sneered. He was wrong, of course - and with a name like that, you'd think he'd avoid, at all costs, any appearance of being an utter wanker. According to the Mirra's Sara Wallis, however, the new series was 'fresh, funny and as fashion-conscious as ever.' And she was entirely correct in this assertion. Under new head-writer Suzanne Heathcote, Wallis continued, the show contained 'plenty of shocking deaths, new characters and jaw-dropping, creative murders.' Six months after the events of series two, Villanelle has settled in Spain and is about to get married. Her wedding is interrupted by the arrival of Dasha, who trained Villanelle as her protégé. Dasha asks Villanelle to return to work for The Twelve with Villanelle's price for coming back being to be promoted to Keeper, which would make her more powerful than both Dasha and Konstantin. Meanwhile, Eve had left MI6 and is now working at a restaurant in New Malden as she tries to adjust to civilian life, divorce and recently acquired stab wounds. Kenny has also quit his mother's department and now works as an investigative journalist. Eve agrees to meet Kenny for a drink, but finds his office deserted. Then ... to quote South Park, 'Ohmigod ...' You know the rest. Whether this series was quite as outstanding, as beautifully textured, as thrillingly adventurous and different as its two predecessors is legitimately debatable, but that's a bit like saying Richard III might not be as good as Hamlet or King Lear. The additions of Steve Pemberton, Harriet Walter and Gemma Whelan to the already impressive cast was, certainly, a case of not resting on ones Stan Laurels. Thankfully the majority of the drama's audience in both the UK and the US ignored such self-important, snobbish tripe as Singh and Cumming's explosions of verbal diarrhoea and Killing Eve maintained its audience numbers and interest. A fourth series had, of course, been commissioned already. Sadly, as with so much else in 2020, production has been delayed by the pandemic. Where they go next from the first climax which didn't involve knives will be interesting to see.
16. Des
'Are we talking about one body or two?''Fifteen or sixteen.' A three-part drama about the notorious serial killer and necrophile Dennis Nilsen starring national heartthrob David Tennant (cast completely against type). 'There is an almost visible miasma enveloping every scene, across three nights this week. Of evil, of sadness, of bleak loss and of awful, unwanted knowledge,'opined the Gruniad. Den Of Geek said the 'nuanced' ITV series had been both 'considered' and 'responsible.' The Independentpraised David's 'skin-crawling' performance and Des became the broadcaster's largest rated drama launch of the year. In displaying the sheer mundane banality of evil in Nilsen's appalling 'killing for company', the drama managed to avoid a tradition pitfall of films and TV shows about murderers; running the risk of making the protagonist appear, in any way, sympathetic. It was Nilsen's sheer ordinariness and lack of horns (the man was a section manager at the Job Centre, after all) which allowed him to get away with his crimes for so long (over five years). With Tennant utterly outstanding and fine support from the likes of Daniel Mays, Jason Watkins and Ron Cook, Des shone a necessary spotlight on the way in which, all psychology aside, some people are just wicked fekkers. 'Shunning true-crime tropes, Des instead guides audiences through Nilsen's crimes via the lens of DCI Peter Jay, the man who led the investigation into the killings,'wrote the Radio Times. 'Played convincingly by Daniel Mays, viewers witness how even a seasoned officer was broken down not only by the ugliness of Nilsen's atrocities but how police bureaucracy failed the victims' families.' Spot on.
17. Doom Patrol
'It's every man, woman and brick for themselves now!' The winner of From The North's 2019 award for the best TV show in the world, bar none, production on Doom Patrol's second series was - as with so much else this year - a casualty of The Plague. Planned for ten episodes, shooting on the series finale had to be abandoned in April due to circumstances beyond everyone's control. At least what we did get was brilliant - including two further legendary Grant Morrison plots from the comic series that Doom Patrol is an adaptation of - the Doctor Tyme/Red Jack two-parter and Dorothy and The Candlemaker. Now, we just need them to - somehow - adapt The Brotherhood Of Dada/Painting That Ate Paris and this blogger will be a jolly happy fanboy. There were numerous superb moments (the series' habit of creating title sequences for spin-offs that don't exist but which we'd love to see being some of the best). Diane Guerrero, April Bowlby, Matt Bomer, Brendan Fraser, Joivan Wade and Timothy Dalton returned as the misfit heroes. It was naughty and subversive (the introduction of The SeX-Men, Rita's portal-opening orgasms), frequently hilarious (Rita and Vic's Avengers-style pairing, every scene involving Cliff) and often genuinely touching (Larry and Cliff's interactions with their families, Caulder's attempts to give Dorothy a 'normal' life). 'As entertaining as the first, but with more emotional depth, Doom Patrol's second season explores darker corners without sacrificing any of its wonderful weirdness,'noted Rotten Tomatoes. 'The series blends deep, introspective character drama with absurd superhero humour in a way that's unlike anything else on TV. [Series two] continues that high standard, even without the benefit of Alan Tudyk's Mister Nobody,'wroteIGN. 'The addition of Abigail Shapiro's Dorothy Spinner and delightful new villains like Doctor Tyme and Red Jack are more than enough to keep the fun going.''Doom Patrol leans into the drama while still acknowledging that it exists in a bizarre and off-kilter comic-book world,'addedVulture. 'Ultimately, Doom Patrol is all about repression and trauma as well as how to cope ... [Series two] focuses on all of that (especially the foul-mouthed Robotman) through the lens of Chief's great betrayal and the aftermath.''Doom Patrol has already proved that the stellar season one wasn't a fluke and that its deft combination of weirdness and human pathos continues to be one of the best things on TV,' was the view ofThe Mary Sue website. Ending on an - unplanned - cliffhanger, some of the best news of a year in which glad tidings were in desperately short supply arrived in September when HBO announcedDoom Patrol had been renewed for a third series. Not even a worldwide pandemic, it seems, can prevent Crazy Jane, Rita, Larry, Cliff and Vic from realising their potential with a colourful braggadocio and plenty of verve. Or, if not that then, at least, having another extended run on-stage at The Theatre Of The Absurd.
18. Derren Brown: Twenty Years Of Mind Control
'You are live on Channel Four so please swear as much as you like! I have never met them, it's live and there's A Plague, what could possibly go wrong?' A combination of documentary, clip-show, live jiggery-pokery, prestidigitation and cunning audience manipulation. This celebration of the (deliciously self-deprecating) self-styled 'national treasure' demonstrated all of the techniques which Dazzling Dezza has used since he first appeared on our screens in 2000; misdirection, cold-reading, auto-suggestion, showmanship, creating 'a health-and-safety nightmare' and effortless charm. Of course, inevitably some abject plank at the Gruniad felt compelled to have a right stroppy whinge about it. So, on general principle then, that's merely one more worthwhile reason to loveTwenty Years Of Mind Control. Given that anything the Gruniad Morning Star disapproves of must have some merit. 
19. Charlie Brooker's Antiviral Wipe
'It's like the world has reached into my head and stolen some of my nightmare fuel!' Shortly before the broadcast of this one-off, Charlie Brooker appeared on Newsnight talking to Emily Maitlis about the problem with watching too much TV news. 'It's like eating fruit, isn't it?' he suggested. 'It's good for you up to a point, but then it gives you the shits.' Brooker returned to our screens for the first time since his BAFTA-winning 2016 Wipe to take a look at life under lockdown. As well as coverage of the crisis itself, Charlie also explored - in his trademark 'You want cynical? I'll give you cynical!' manner - what the public have been watching to while away the hours. Guest contributors joining him, from a safe distance, included the ever-insightful Philomena Cunk (Diane Morgan) and Barry Shitpeas (Al Campbell). Charlie also roped in his wife, Konnie Huq, making good use of her time as a Blue Peter presenter ('She can make the most of any old shit, which is why she married me') and his children popped-up during a sequence about conference calls brilliantly parodying Professor Robert Kelly's moment of glory. 'As a one-off, Antiviral Wipe packs its most effective punch,'claimed the Gruniad. 'It feels urgent and necessary, even as it despairs. Plus, it provides some much-needed catharsis by simply allowing the absolute topsy-turvy carnage of the world be funny.' The Independentadded: 'Brooker seamlessly weaves our current woes with the corruptions and exceptionalist nonsense of the Brexit campaign, balancing poo-jokes with a simmering and necessary rage.' Meanwhile, the Torygraphdidn't like it, which was a sure sign that Charlie was hitting most of the right targets.
20. Perry Mason
'Certain matters require discretion and finesse, that's the kind of thing you're good at. Wear your best suit.' Compared, in a superb review by Mark Kermode on Kermode & Mayo's Home Entertainment Service, with Alan Parker's Angel Heart (something also picked up by a review at the Den Of Geek website) the hard-boiled reboot of Perry Mason starring Matthew Rhys appeared in June soaked in a mood of minimalist suspense. Based, very loosely, on the character created by Erle Stanley Gardner and played by Raymond Burr on TV for twenty years, the series focused on the origin story of the famed defence lawyer. In 1932, Los Angeles is prospering while the rest of the US is recovering from the grip of the Great Depression. Down-at-heal gumshoe Perry Mason is struggling with lingering trauma from The Great War and from his recent divorce. He is hired for a sensational child kidnapping trial and his investigation portends major consequences for Mason, for his client and for the city itself. In development since 2016, it was initially intended that Robert Downey Jnr would play the title character. By 2018, Downey had dropped out due to movie commitments and Rhys was cast, alongside the likes of Tatiana Maslany and John Lithgow. The most watched HBO drama for two years, IndieWiresaid that the series was 'built with confidence, patience and a voice calibrated for today's audiences,' adding: 'Perry Mason stands as an astounding visual feat for its specific framings as well as its overall world-building. There are striking images of a pitch-black profile and lavish outdoor shots of real Los Angeles locations. In some shows, intimate conversations between two people can clash with the grander scenes. Mason has the intuition (and the budget) to not just balance visual opulence with smaller, private moments, but to blend them.' He concluded that it was 'one of the most beautiful series ever made.''Intense, stunning and gruesome,'according to the Gruniad, the Independentcalled it'grim, brooding and made for grown-ups.' Well, that'll never catch-on, clearly.
21. Two Weeks To Live
'I'm not a little girl any more!' Produced for Sky and starring Maisie Williams in her first major post-Game Of Thrones role as Kim, a misfit raised in almost total isolation living off-the-grid in rural Scotland by her overprotective, survivalist mother. Venturing to a local pub, Kim is shown a fake video depicting a nuclear apocalypse and suggesting that everybody has but two weeks to live. Believing that end times are near, she sets off to experience as much of her cherished bucket-list as possible, including her understandable desire to kill the man who murdered her father. With sympathetic support from Mawaan Rizwan and grand villainously comic turns from the likes of Jason Flemyng and Sean Pertwee, Two Weeks To Live was one of the most trailed dramas in the history of British telly - for a good three weeks it was almost impossible to watch anything without seeing the trailer for it. The Gruniad considered that Williams 'excels in her fish-out-of-water role, flitting between hapless and determined, worldly and childlike.' The NMEdescribed the drama as 'genuinely funny.''Although the series is ostensibly about Kim, Fleabag star Sian Clifford steals every frame as Kim's crossbow-wielding, no-nonsense mum, Tina,'added the Radio Times. 'There's a lot of hokum and fun (some of which tries too hard) with [a] cartoon-y plot, a touch of Killing Eve and a zippy script by Gaby Hull,'noted the Irish Times. Some initial reviews were a little underwhelmed but the series quickly picked up a decent word-of-mouth buzz, as exemplified by the Sun suddenly getting excited by it. Not perfect, admittedly; Two Weeks To Live can be considered somewhat gauche beside I Hate Suzie's urbane recontextualisation of traditional comedy-drama tropes and rather anaemic compared to the sophisticated metaphors of Killing Eve. Nevertheless there was much to admire here. A second series has yet to be confirmed but, if there is any common sense knocking around at Sky - open to question, but we'll give 'em the benefit of the doubt - then it should be a given.
22. The Undoing
'It is what rich, entitled people do when threatened. They conceal the ugly truths to protect themselves.' Based on the novel You Should Have Known by Jean Hanff Korelitz, The Undoing premiered on HBO and Sky Atlantic in October. Its main selling point was its extraordinary cast - including Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant. The miniseries was written by David E Kelley and directed by Susanne Bier so, quality was pretty much assured. Grace Fraser is a successful therapist who lives in New York with her husband Jonathan, an oncologist and their son, who attends the elite Reardon School. Grace helps some of the other Reardon parents plan an auction event, where she meets the enigmatic Elena. Grace continues to encounter Elena over the next few days: once in a gym bathroom, where a naked Elena approaches Grace and remarks on her 'kindness' and, later, at the auction itself, where Grace finds Elena crying in private and consoles her. As she leaves, Elena kisses Grace in the elevator. That's not a euphemism, incidentally. The next day, Elena's bludgeoned corpse is discovered. The police question Grace and her friends and Grace attempts to reach Jonathan, who is supposedly at a medical conference in Cleveland, but finds that he has left his phone behind. Unable to trace her husband's whereabouts, Grace becomes increasingly paranoid and experiences visions of Elena's murder-scene. 'It appears to be about deceit and the way it can create serious delusions beyond our control,' said The Australian. 'Guided by Susanne Bier's taut direction, the twists keep coming and nothing is quite what it seems,'suggested the San Jose Mercury News. 'Kidman at the centre of it all delivers one of the best and most nuanced roles of her career,'addedNPR. 'The first episode really is terrific, just less so than Big Little Lies. It's worth seeing for the Kidman-Grant acting duel and Donald Sutherland as Kidman's infinitely arrogant and judgmental father,'wroteTV For Grownups' Tim Appelo. The Metro's Keith Watson saidThe Undoing had 'an uncanny knack of digging its fingers under your skin. That's because, above all, it's a show which, though you might hate yourself for it, leaves you with the nagging need to know which of these rich folks is the rottenest of them all.''The series remains a highly entertaining watch with a compelling mystery that viewers will be compelled to see through to the end,'claimed the Radio Times. Then there was the opinion of From The North's Keith Telly Topping who considered that you would have to be a brain-damaged moron (or, the victim of a cruel medical experiment) not to find something worthwhile about The Undoing; not least in the performances of Kidman, Grant, Sutherland, a grand two-episode cameo by From The North favourite Janel Moloney and the claustrophobic atmosphere. And, if that recommendation doesn't have you at the very least intrigued, dear blog reader, then maybe the Gruniad's description of the series as 'truly gripping' will do the trick? Occasionally, the Gruniad do get it right. Remember, even a broken clock is correct twice a day. 
23. What's The Matter With Tony Slattery?
'Mental illness is a highly democratic disease. It can hit anyone.' A Cambridge contemporary - and Footlights colleague - of Stephen Fry, Huge Laurie and Emma Thompson, Tony Slattery's appearances on Whose Line Is It Anyway? made him a comedy and improv star in the 1980s. But then, his life fell apart; in the mid-1990s, after leaving Whose Line, Slattery suffered what he described as 'a midlife crisis' - triggered by cocaine and alcohol addiction. Slattery claims that he does not remember how much he spent on Charlie during that period but 'would not be surprised' if media reports that it was four grand per week were accurate. As he approaches sixty, Tony has recently returned to stand-up for the first time in two decades, with a show which explored his past and his mental health issues. Diagnosed with depression, he and his partner of thirty years Mark Hutchinson have always been convinced there was more to it than that. Clare Richards' extraordinary Horizon documentary examined a diagnosis of bipolarity with specialist Professor Guy Goodwin. In the programme - which also included an appearance by Slattery's old friend and fellow bipolar sufferer Fry - Slattery met with consultant psychiatrist Professor Ciaran Mulholland who suggested that Slattery continues to suffer from the effects of the trauma of childhood abuse. Goodwin concluded that Slattery was on the bipolar spectrum, but that his main challenge is his alcohol dependence. Like so many people with complex mental health issues, Tony was never going to be easy to diagnose. Bipolar disorder is characterised by severe, disabling highs and lows over which the sufferer has little or no control. 'No-one in their right mind chooses to be depressed,' Slattery told Fry at one point. But, the programme ended positively with Slattery reducing his alcohol intake and being able to accept that he can take steps to improve his mental health. 'A moving study,'according to the Gruniad, What's The Matter With Tony Slattery?'doesn't provide any easy answers - and is all the better for it,'consideredGQ. The Evening Standardcalled it 'a sensitive portrait of comic's struggles after blinking out of the public eye.' It was 'tough to watch the brightest of stars so dimmed,'added the Torygraph. The Times' summed up the impact of the documentary saying that it was about 'how a comedian's tragedy was redeemed by love.'That was the salient point; the programme was, ultimately life-affirming and brought a flood of public empathy and praise for Slattery's bravery in making so naked a portrayal of his illness. Tony himself was reportedly moved by the public reaction saying in an interview on the Today programme that it was 'a privilege' to speak to experts about such issues which, he noted, are 'widespread, regardless of class or upbringing or money. There was denial,' he added. 'I thought, "look, some things happened a quarter of a century ago, I'm sixty now, [it was] when I was eight, what is the point?"' A subsequently announced publishing deal provided an elegant postscript to the story. 'In this celebrity culture people can become billionaires overnight for nothing,' Tony told the Daily Scum Express.'But in lockdown I decided to put my fat arse on my seat and actually write something. Because if people from Love Island can do it, then so can I!'
24. Qi/Would I Lie To You?
Let's face it, a year (even this year) simply wouldn't be a year without these two perennial favourites making an appearance in From The North's annual 'Best Of' list. For no other reason than the 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' principle. Although, again, production on both comedy favourites was, badly, affected by this Coronavirus malarkey. In the case of Qi, the show was nine episodes into production on its R series when lockdown occurred. Two further episodes were then filmed without a studio audience and proved to be, sadly, disastrous (the fact that one of them featured both the annoying Holly Walsh and scowly-faced misery-guts Bridget Christie didn't help matters, admittedly). It was something which few of us had previously considered but, in truth, it's always been the audience which makesQi. (Another long-running BBC comedy format, Have I Got News For You, had a similarly awkward transition from a live-in-the-studio production to being filmed using Zoom during March and April. That didn't work very well either.) According to a report in August, some further R series Qi episodes were to be recorded with a 'virtual' audience. At least the first nine episodes were, mostly, up to the usual standard and, in particular, this blogger was delighted to see the righteous Benjamin Zephaniah making his Qi debut. Would I Lie To You? got the last few episodes of its thirteenth series out of the way early in the year before The Plague hit town but, thereafter there was silence on when the show would return. Finally, came the welcome news - via Reddit - that another batch of episodes had been filmed (importantly with audiences) in October, though there has been no announcement yet when they will be broadcast. And yes, dear blog reader, series regular, From The North favourite and national treasure Bob Mortimer will feature in one episodes (as will another much-loved contributor, Miles Jupp). Thankfully, Dave's virtual wall-to-wall repeats of both shows have kept audiences entertained as they contemplated the inherently ludicrous nature of existence. 

25. Only Connect
'I gained a stone in weight during lockdown, what achievement are you most proud of?' Like Qi and Would I Lie To?, Only Connect has been a regular feature in From The North's annual 'Best Of' lists for the last decade. Because, it's bloody brilliant as well as aesthetically pleasing. According to its host, 'the show the BBC calls "a cost-effective content-provision for focused-demographic-sectors,"'Only Connect is an example of the Beeb doing its Reithian thing, informing, educating and entertaining all at the same time. A quiz show with fiendishly difficult questions to which, if you manage (as this blogger usually does) to get one correct connection before either of the teams each episode, you feel like an intellectual. And, presented by the divine Goddess Victoria Coren Mitchell, it is never smug or arrogant in its stressing that using ones intellect is not - whatever various monobrowed tabloid lice may suggest to the contrary - a bad thing. Indeed, Only Connect is a warm and inclusive conceit and, most importantly, it's great fun. And, as long as it exists, there will be a welcome place for it both on the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House tellybox and here on From The North. This year, as usual, saw the BBC continually messing around with the scheduled start time for Only Connect on Monday evenings. When Victoria had a bit of a whinge about this on Twitter, Nigella Lawson (she has he knockers) replied, apologising since it was a new series of Nigella: Cook, Eat, Repeat which had caused the change. This led to a brief, but extremely beautiful, Interweb love-in between the pair of From The North favourites. Television, dear blog reader. Is there anything it can't achieve?
26. The Third Day
'Something appalling happened here. And, it's raging inside.' Created by Felix Barrett and Dennis Kelly for HBO and Sky Atlantic, The Third Day chronicled the individual journeys of a man and woman who arrived on an isolated island at different times. The production was split into three interconnected elements. The first, Summer, directed by Marc Munden, followed Sam (Jude Law), who is drawn to a mysterious island where he encounters locals set on preserving their traditions at any cost. The second part, Autumn, was broadcast as a twelve-hour live 'event.' Described by the producers a 'major immersive theatre event,' the segment was shown in one continuous take and was intended to allow followers of The Third Day to 'inhabit the story as it happens.' The third part, Winter, directed by Philippa Lowthorpe, followed Helen (Naomie Harris), who came to the island seeking answers, but whose arrival precipitated a fractious battle to decide its fate. The impressive cast also included Katherine Waterston, Paddy Considine and Emily Watson. The Third Day'falls prey to nagging predictability just as it wows with evocative atmospherics and excellent turns from Law, Harris, Watson and Considine,'consideredIndieWire. 'The fear [was] it might pull a Lost and amount to nothing. But by the third episode it's clear that's not the case,'wrote the Detroit News. Other reviewers complained about occasional 'narrative missteps' and 'under-development' but, for all its meandering plotlines and occasional The Wicker Man riffs, as The Timesnoted, 'If nothing else, the series is an unusually intense exercise in unease.''I couldn't stop watching it,'suggested Camilla Long. 'An enthralling, mesmerising experiment between TV and theatre,'said the Observer. 'Every episode is so atmospheric and well-written that it deserves to be savoured,'addedEntertainment Voice. 'Wildly ambitious and mesmerising,'wroteThe Stage. It was, indeed, all of those things. It was also visually spellbinding, superbly acted and - proving that complexity is not crime if you can take your audience with you - a qualified commerical success for the broadcasters on both sides of the Atlantic. And that, dear blog reader, in a TV drama climate in which many executives seem to believe that if you can't provide an explosion every thirty seconds audiences will lose interest, is something worth celebrating.
27. Star Trek: Picard/Star Trek: Discovery
'I came here to find safety. But one is never safe from the past.' Keith Telly Topping wasn't sure what to expect from Picard at the start (except that it would, in all likelihood, be an epic nostalgia-fest for old Next Generation fans like this blogger; which it was, admittedly, but in a good way). What this blogger liked most about it was that it was a continuous narrative, a heroes journey and a character piece all rolled into one. But, it also included examples of explosive set-piece violence about once per episode. And, let's face it, dear blog reader, one can never have too much of that. Anchored by the incomparable Patrick Stewart with his usual bijoux timing, Picard departed from standard Starfleet protocol with a slower, serialised story - which wasn't popular with all Trekkers, indeed some were downright horrified by such shenanigans. But, like all great Star Trek (notably this blogger's beloved Deep Space Nine) it tackled timely themes with grace and made for an exciting push further into the Final Frontier.
'How much did you leave behind?''Nine hundred and thirty years.' As for Discovery, which started its third series late in the year, as previously noted this blogger liked it from the start though it did take a few episodes to work out what it wanted to be (the entire first episode being, effectively, a pilot for a series we never got, notwithstanding). This blogger adored last year's second series, however; yer actual properStar Trek, that was. The early episodes of the third series were also great but, again, it had reformatted itself into a completely different series (third time in three years so, to be fair, it's consistent at least). Effectively, this is what Voyager should've been, but wasn't. There are many things wrong with the world, dear blog reader, but at least the Star Trek franchise seems to have remembered what it did that made it's productions so all-pervasive in the first place.
28. Schitt's Creek
'I was just hugging my kids.''Why?' Given the year we've had, 'comfort TV' has never felt more essential - and, indeed, many examples of the type appear in this year's From The North'Best Of' list. It's fitting, then, that this charming Canadian sitcom - celebrated for its inclusive and 'normalised' portrayal of LGBTQ characters - made a record-breaking sweep at the EMMYs for its sixth and final series. Awards went to both the show's cast and to its writer, Daniel Levy. Gaining global appeal after landing on Netflix, the highly binge-watchable show follows the impossibly rich Rose family who discover that, after losing their wealth, they have to relocate to a small Canadian town which they once bought 'as a joke birthday present.' Former video-store chain owner Johnny (Eugene Levy), soap-star matriarch Moira (Catherine O'Hara) and their children, hipster David (Daniel Levy) and socialite Alexis (Annie Murphy) have to face humiliating hardships and figure out what it really means to be a family. Bridget Read of Voguewrote that while the series 'started off with typical fish out of water scenarios,' it has 'fully come into its own, with a whole cast of Twin Peaks-meets-Christopher-Guest-universe characters that are as equally endearing.' New York Magazine said the show 'takes a few episodes to get into its groove, but once it does, you'll never want to leave.' The series has featured on annual 'Best Of' lists published by the likes of Esquire, Glamour, The New Yorker and Variety and, in the UK, the Standard. Schitt's Creek is likely to be the funniest TV show you've never seen, dear blog reader. So, if you were looking for a single reason to buy a Netflix subscription, this is probably it.
29. Quiz
'When I'm at home I guess wrong eighty per cent of the time.' Based on James Graham's play and the book Bad Show: The Quiz, The Cough, The Millionaire Major, Quiz told the infamous story of how Charles Ingram, a former Royal Engineers officer, won the million knicker jackpot on ITV's Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? in 2001. Followed, quickly, by a criminal trial in which he and his wife - and, some bloke they knew with a nasty cough - were convicted of deception and publicly disgraced. It was directed by Stephen Frears and consisted of three episodes broadcast over successive evenings in April to huge audiences. The cast included Matthew Macfadyen, Sian Clifford, Helen McCrory and a truly extraordinary performance by Michael Sheen as Millionaire's then host, Chris Tarrant. Chris showed himself to be a good sport, reportedly enjoying the portrayal ('he's far prettier than I ever was, so I'm flattered'). His son, Toby, said the first publicity photo of Sheen as his father was 'brilliant.' He joked on Twitter: 'If there's a scene where he passes out on the sofa watching TV with a glass of whisky and mumbling to himself then it will be like I'm twelve years old all over again.''The earnestness with which this is all treated may reflect accurately what goes into the genesis of a show, but to see it played straight (Mark Bonnar's intensity as creator Paul Smith seems to have come from a different kind of drama) is deeply off-putting, even if it does make you realise why TV people are generally so hated,'sneered some waste-of-space at the Gruniad. With exactly the sort of atypical 'aren't we so clever?' full-of-their-own-importance arrogance that gives hippy Communists, in their pot-stinking bivouacs, with their multiple Mumford & Sons CDs, an - entirely deserved - bad name. Other reviewers, thankfully, were far less cocksplashesque: 'As compelling as the show that first inspired it,'saidVariety. Ocean's Eleven Meets Middle-Class WiltshireaddedRadio Times who also noted that 'beneath its hilarious exterior, ITV's series about Who Wants To Be A Millionaire's coughing scandal smuggles in some prescient lessons about fake news and press harassment.'A Brilliant, Big-Hearted Romp Through One Of The Great British Scandals Of The Centurysuggested the Independent whilst the TorygraphcritiquedQuiz as 'a belter of a drama that's almost too outlandish to be true.''Is it too late to ask for a Tarrant-centric spin-off when he travels around the country solving murders in a van?'wonderedMetro. Sheen's beautifully nuanced take on Tarrant was a major attraction, of course - albeit, to the shock of millions, an ITV continuity announcer claimed before the final episode that Martin Sheen would be playing Chris Tarrant in the forthcoming episode. We may never be able to watch Apocalypse Now again without having that image stuck in our heads, dear blog reader. Michael, of course, first carved out a career in portraying real-life people - from David Frost to Tony Blair via Brian Clough and Kenneth Williams - and his uncanny impression of Tarrant made for compelling viewing. The Gruniad's misery-guts review did, at least, contain one sliver of accuracy; TV dramas about TV shows can go in one of two ways. They can be brilliant or they can get so wrapped up in self-mythologising that they run the risk of masturbating to death on their own marvelousness whilst forgetting there are viewers who don't work in the TV industry and couldn't give a stuff what an executive producer does to justify their existence (and, their eye-watering salaries). Thankfully, this was an example of the former even if it still gave the impression that everyone in the industry views all aspects of life through TV-related eyes. As, for example, when Aisling Bea's Claudia Rosencrantz - an ITV executive at the time before she turned the Living Channel into an obscene wall-to-wall Jade Goody shrine - stated at the beginning of the last episode: 'I love an ITV court room drama.''Quiz [was] so engrossing, funny and pacy I forgot about Coronavirus for three hours,' claimed the Daily Mirra. In 2020, dear blog reader, that was as much as anyone could ask from an evening's television viewing.
30. Devs
'If you came for answers ask me what you don't know.'Ex Machina director Alex Garland made a return to cerebral SF for his first venture onto TV. FX's Devs bore all the director's usual trademarks, including striking futuristic visuals and a foreboding score and asked some Big Questions about humanity's place amid technology's limitless possibilities (albeit, with occasional examples of disappointing mumbo-jumbo dialogue). Garland regular Sonoya Mizuno starred as Lily, a software engineer at Amaya, a quantum computing firm in Silicon Valley. When her boyfriend Sergei (Karl Glusman) disappeared a day after taking up a position in the company's vacuum-sealed research division, Lily enlisted the help of cybersecurity specialist and ex-boyfriend Jamie (Jin Ha) to discover the truth about the eccentric company CEO, Forest (Parks & Recreation's Nick Offerman) whom she believes to be responsible. A hauntingly beautiful meditation on humanity, Devs' slow unfurling may have tested some viewers' patience, but fans of Garland will have found much to appreciate. Brian Tallerico described the series as 'stunningly ambitious' and stated: 'It's ultimately an unforgettable and rewarding experience' concluding it was 'one of the best new shows in a long time.' CNN added that it was 'a mind-blowing concept that doesn't entirely come together at the close, but which remains unsettling and provocative throughout.' The New York Times characterisedDevs as 'showcases what Garland does well - ideas and atmosphere - while amplifying his weaknesses in character and plot. As the techies say, it scales - for better and for worse.' The newspaper interviewed theoretical physicist Sean Carroll about the sweeping statements on humanity and determinism by the creators of both Devs and Westworld. When asked which he preferred, Carroll responded, 'I was very impressed with how [Devs' creators] were doing something very different. I thought it was a well-done show. It was slow and contemplative, but that's a perfectly good change of pace from what we ordinarily see in action movies.' Premiering in the UK on BBC2 in April, the series drew a positive reaction from the Gruniad, the Independent and the Radio Times. 'Bold and intelligent' said the latter. An apt summation of an extraordinarily different drama.
31. What We Do In The Shadows
'The problems with living with other vampires are the vampires I have chosen to stay with.' This blogger once wrote a book about British horror movies (now back in print, if you're at all interested!) In his review of Hammer's Dracula AD 1972 Keith Telly Topping wrote: 'Exploitation cinema is always at its finest when polemic and dogma meet head-on and, instead of producing the expected gestalt of social-comment, ends up with a mélange of clashing and fractious statements. Dracula AD 1972's like that. It so desperately wants to be a serious, po-faced observation on important youth culture issues. Instead, by the sheer banality of its construction, the film comes over as Carry On Biting, full of unexpected laughs at, literally, every turn.' Which is as good a place to start when discussing What We Do In The Shadows' twilight, demi-monde world as anywhere. Set in Staten Island, What We Do In The Shadows - which began in 2019 - follows the lives of 'traditional' vampires, Nandor, Laszlo and Nadja, Colin, an 'energy' vampire and Guillermo, Nandor's familiar. The series revolves around the centuries-old vampires interacting, usually disastrously, with the modern world. Featuring From The North favourite Matt Berry (as a former porn actor-turned-vampire who enjoys making topiary sculptures of vulvas), it's really funny. Seriously, if you've never seen it, dear blog reader, you need some of this in your life. 'It may well be the funniest show on TV,'consideredStarburst. 'It's like The Munsters of our time, but more subversive for a cable audience,'added the Boston Globe. On Rotten Tomatoes, the consensus was: 'What We Do In the Shadows loses no steam in a smashing second season that savvily expands its supernatural horizons while doubling down on the fast flying fun.' Once upon a time, the idea of tackling a genre with sacred cows as both sacred and bovine as the vampire story with jokes would've been ridiculous; but, as this spiritual heir to Once Bitten, The Lost Boys, Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Angel proves, there's little that is funnier to sink ones teeth into.
32. Westworld
'I was born into this world and my first memories of it are painful.' The third series of the Dystopian SF drama (subtitled The New World) premiered in March with a complete reformatting following the shattering conclusion to 2018's series. Evan Rachel Wood, Thandie Newton, Jeffrey Wright, Tessa Thompson and Ed Harris all returned whilst Aaron Paul and Vincent Cassel were added to the cast. The story took place in 2058, three months after the events of the series two, with Dolores having escaped Westworld along with a few processing cores, including Bernard's. In Los Angeles, Dolores develops a relationship with Caleb and learns how artificial beings and lower-class humans are treated in the real world. Meanwhile, Maeve finds herself in another part of the park, one based on Fascist Italy during World War II. William, who also left Westworld, is now haunted by visions of his daughter, Emily. And of Dolores. Initially receiving very positive reviews, reception became more mixed during the second half of the series. Reviewers praised the performances, visuals and change in tone but whinged about the complexities of the story and the somewhat meandering pacing, as well as a perceived lack of thematic depth. CNN wrote that 'the show has become increasingly incomprehensible, at least for anyone not willing to put in the work trying to remember all the assorted connections, further complicated by the fact that dying in Westworld is often not a permanent state of affairs, amid the questions about who's truly human and who actually isn't.'Entertainment Weekly said: 'After spending three seasons struggling through maddeningly complicated time-loops, it's time the writers let Dolores, Maeve and Bernard control-alt-delete themselves' while another review added that the series had 'lost its way.' Reviewing the finale IndieWire considered that the series had 'made a point of stripping away the rest of Westworld's building blocks: The park? Left behind. The maze? Gone. But the moral questions meant to keep you invested in the characters largely disappear, too. Season three doesn't bother developing its characters because it refuses to let them question the nature of their own reality.'
Other critics were somewhat kinder - 'this is a zanier, sillier Westworld and much more entertaining for it,'saidThe Atlantic. 'A fun, engaging thrill ride across a rich, dystopian landscape that should bring some former fans back into the fold,'added the NME. 'It's a thrilling, chilling notion that speaks to our contemporary fears about data-mining by huge corporations,'wrote the Herald. 'Part of me finds its unwavering pretentiousness just a little more ridiculous than I suspect it is intended to be,'suggested the Gruniad. 'But even at its most pompous and silly, Westworld remains a thrill-a-second and ironically, given that it loves a Big Question, it's best enjoyed when not thinking too deeply about the answer.' And, believe Keith Telly Topping, dear blog reader, if there is anyone that knows all about being 'pompous and silly,' it's the Gruniad. For what it's worth, this blogger loved it - as he noted at the time, the production already had Keith Telly Topping's attention long before Evan Rachel Wood straddled a motorbike in the opening episode whilst wearing the shortest skirt in TV history. Plus, the tool-stiffeningly violent gunfight at the end of the episode was worth the entry fee on its own. This blogger is a simple man, dear blog reader, with simple tastes. And, there are times where that's not a bad thing. 

33. Code 404
'Jesus!''No. But we both came back from the dead!' A crime comedy-drama produced by Kudos, Code 404 premiered in April on Sky One and starred Stephen Graham and Daniel Mays with Anna Maxwell Martin, Rosie Cavaliero and Tracy Ann Oberman. Detective John Major (Mays) is killed after a failed sting operation, but the Met brings him back as part of an experimental artificial intelligence project. Major immediately goes on the hunt for his killer, dragging his still-shocked partner, Roy Carver along for the ride. 'This comedy only just about works,'claimed some twonk at the Independent. Thankfully, the reviewer at the Evening Standardgot the joke, writing: 'This silly mix of Hot Fuzz and Robocop is a comedy that doesn't need decoding.' Precisely. 'The script, by Daniel Peak - Horrible Histories and Not Going Out - was wacky and in these troubled times it pressed all the right buttons.' The sight of some of this country's leading dramatic actors - notably Graham - cheerfully camping it up in a comedy was a sight to see, dear blog reader. 'The boffins have created a Six Million Dollar Dickhead,'noted the Chortle website. 'As the rebooted John Major, Daniel Mays is a brash, cocky alpha-male, rushing into one stupid or foolhardy action after another. "Monitor him for abnormal behaviour," officers are told of their new work-in-progress colleague. That might be tough.'The Art Desk was also highly positive. So was the Torygraph. This blogger thought it was a right good laugh, dear blog reader. In a year where such things have been in, sadly, short supply.
34. The Vow
A documentary revolving around the NXIVM cult and its leader, Keith Raniere, the series premiered in August on HBO and two months later on Sky. The Vow follows members who joined the 'self-improvement group' - whose leader, Raniere, was subsequently convicted of sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy, among other crimes - and reveals the emotional toll on the victims. Former members Sarah Edmondson, Mark Vicente, Bonnie Piesse, Nippy Ames, Barbara Bouchey, Susan Dones and Toni Natalie appear prominently in the series, alongside the journalist Frank Parlato who did initial reporting on the criminal activities of NXIVM and the New York Times reporter Barry Meier. Catherine Oxenberg also appears as she attempts to rescue her daughter, India, from membership of the cult. A recently commissioned second series will focus on Raniere's trial and a continued look inside his inner circle - including the former Smallville actress Allison Mack, currently awaiting sentencing for her own (possibly lengthy) spell in The Slammer. Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer did not, initially, set out to make a documentary about the cult, but after Noujaim took a NXIVM course after being recruited by the Seagrams heiress Sara Bronfman, they began to hear rumours of abuse within the organisation. Production initially focused on Edmondson, Vicente, Piesse, Ames and Oxenberg as a way to document their escapes from NXIVM as they were fearful of being sued by the notoriously litigeous leaders. Rotten Tomatoes' consensus was: 'Though The Vow's scope at times exceeds its reach, its empathetic approach to unpacking NXIVM's manipulations and the consequences therein make for necessary, difficult viewing.' A number of reviews praised The Vow's intimate exploration, measured pace and extensive footage, though some criticised its occasionally abstract storytelling. The Gruniad wrote that 'as a portrait of manipulation and, in particular, the masking of female abuse through self-effacement, the series is darkly compelling, unnerving in a way that's hard to shake,' but he conceded '[it] deceptively muddies the timeline of the group's development.'Varietysaid that 'The Vow pushes back against its slack pace to become television that compels - both for the access it has and for what it does with that access.'Vanity Fair was more critical: 'The Vow meanders through the downward arc of a cult's fall, but gives us little sense of its history.'The AV Clubattributed the 'wasted nine hours' and 'selective content' to the filmmakers' desire to 'get ahead of the curve with their own narrative' and compared The Vow unfavourably with another documentary on the same subject, Seduced: Inside The NXIVM Cult, by Cecilia Peck and Inbal Lessner. Maureen Ryan of the New York Times, in an otherwise positive review described The Vow as 'only scratch[ing] the surface.''What makes The Vow addictive is the filmmakers' obvious depiction of an all-too-common vulnerability in the modern age, which is a lack of satisfaction, a starvation for community and a profound need to lead a life of purpose and meaning,'saidSalon.Com. 'The Vow does a service to its subjects by humanising their plight-and to its audience by helping us understand,'addedTime. The extent of the group's abuse, as detailed in court, in the New York Times exposé and several memoirs was, indeed, nauseating. But the most horrifying details overshadowed a far more deceptive road-to-ruin for many of those involved. Hence, the value of The Vow in taking its time to tell the full, scarcely believable story.
35. The Nest
'It's an extraordinary ask, isn't it? To bear a child for someone.' A drama starring Peaky Blinders' Sophie Rundle and Line Of Duty's Martin Compston as a married couple unable to conceive with Mirren Mack as the eighteen-year-old who offers to be their surrogate. Broadcast began in March and, over the following five Sunday nights picked up audiences in the seven-to-eight million range for BBC1. 'For quite a lot of the first episode I wasn't wholly sure whether I was watching a thriller at all, or whether it was all supposed to be more about Middle-Class hypocrisy, or underclass desperation, or parenthood, or fertility, or what,'sneered some ring-piece at The Times who wouldn't know quality if it gave them a haircut. Other reviews were kinder. 'Nicole Taylor is the writer behind the BAFTA success Three Girls and it shows: in this, she's given us not just a twisty, whose-motive-is-it-anyway thriller but also, so far, a pointed exploration of the rights and wrongs of surrogacy,'said the Observer. 'There is plenty going on in this sophisticated melodrama and its complexity is delicious,' added the What She Said website. 'Some of the show's plotlines and future reveals are obvious right from the get-go, but perhaps that's the point - we're watching a desperate couple walking into what appears to be a trap of their own making,'opinedRadio Times. 'It all makes for a gripping exploration of a highly charged subject, the plot bubbling with danger as clues are dropped,'wroteMetro. The writing and the acting were first class, of course - one would expect nothing else from Taylor, Rundle and Compston - whilst the intensity of Mack's performance was compelling to watch, skirting the sometimes shifting border country between earnest and unhinged. The plot was complex, the relationships deeper than normal for this type of drama and it included a thoroughly sharp moral critique of the consequences of economic inequality. All this, plus some spectacular Scottish locations (filmed mostly around Glasgow and East Kilbride). The Scotsmanconsidered that it deserves a second series. There is yet to be any official confirmation as to whether The Nestwill return though Taylor is reported to be keen on a continuation.
36. Save Me Too
'This is not the end of it.' Written by and starring The Walking Dead and Line Of Duty's Lennie James, Sky Atlantic's Save Me was one of 2018's best shows. The crime drama, set in South London with a cast including Suranne Jones, Jason Flemyng, Susan Lynch and Stephen Graham, was such a critical success, that a second series commission arrived hot on the finale's heels. Lesley Manville and Ade Edmondson joined the cast this time around (the latter in his best performances in anything in two decades at least). The subject matter was, of course, distressing but seldom, if ever, gratuitous. The focus remained on parents grieving for a lost daughter and what to do with that grief when the news cycle and the police have moved on to other things. Save Me Too delved deeper and took even those viewers familiar with series one on a journey they probably didn't expect. 'A gripping thriller with emotional heft,'said the Gruniad. And, again, this is one of those occasions where the broken clock was correct.
37. Alan Bennett's Talking Heads
'Nobody normally gets killed round here.' This remake of Alan Bennett's acclaimed monologue series featured an all-new cast and two fresh monologues - An Ordinary Woman and The Shrine. Originally broadcast in 1988 and 1998 and featuring a host of talent including Thora Hird, Maggie Smith and Patricia Routledge, the new Talking Heads starred Jodie Comer, Maxine Peake, Martin Freeman, Lesley Manville, Kristen Scott Thomas, Sarah Lancashire and many more. Standout episodes included Comer as the aspiring actress Lesley in Her Big Chance (previously played by Julie Walters) and Tamsin Greig as Rosemary in Nights In The Gardens Of Spain (which Penelope Wilton once portrayed). Perfectly suited to production under lockdown (one actor, one camera, one - pre-existing - Elstree set), Talking Heads was, as some prick at the Gruniad sneered, 'as gloriously miserable as ever' (in an appallingly offensive example of hippy Communist twattery which sought - and failed - to parody Bennett's oeuvre. For merriment and japery, presumably). Yes, it was - and that's why it worked; in 1988, 1998 and 2020. Because some things are consistent and misery happens to be one of them. But, importantly, misery also loves company and Talking Heads was a really good companion for lockdown. 'These maudlin, piercing, funny/sad vignettes are best savoured, not splurged. Bennett's world is an uncomfortable place to linger,'wroteScreen Daily. There was a lot of misery about relating to Talking Heads; 'miserable' was a word which also cropped Metro's review ('Great-but-miserable stories that are as powerful now as they were thirty years ago'). And, in The Stage's review ('Magnificent misery'). And, in the Independent's review ('with its heady mix of misery, claustrophobia and barbed-wire wryness, Alan Bennett's Talking Heads is perfect for revival as we negotiate the long, strange summer of Covid-19'). And, probably, in just about every other review of the series. This blogger isn't saying that all TV critics have a limited imagination, dear blog reader, but, when it comes to Alan Bennett ... Nevertheless, misery can be good. The Smiths, Leonard Cohen, Glengarry Glen Ross ... Turf Moor on a wet Wednesday night in January. You get the general idea? Talking Heads was The Queen Is Dead of misery, if you like, rather than the 'Burnley 0, West Bromwich Albion 0 with four minutes of injury time to go' variety. Another Gruniad review (marginally less sneering than the previous one, though only marginally) described it as 'still a masterclass in storytelling.' And, a miserable one at that.
38. Blood Of The Clans
'For centuries, the Scottish Highlands have been a law unto themselves. Two kingdoms, one king.' Long-term From The North favourite Scottish Neil Oliver (and his lovely hair) presented this ostentatious drama-documentary series telling the tales of Scotland's most epic and bloody conflicts and the characters who made their mark in a memorable era of the country's history. Reviews were good with positive comments from the Herald ('Even if Oliver's style was not to your taste, you were guaranteed to come away having learned something'), the i ('a compelling tale') and the National Scot ('You know that bloody scene near the start of the first episode of Games Of Thrones where Sean Bean chops off the head of a Night's Watch deserter with a sword on a hillside while his men stand and watch and nobody looks like they've had a shower or a shave or a haircut or even moisturised for about a decade beforehand? Now imagine that, but with Neil Oliver popping up from time to time to witness the dramatised action and comment on it'). And, even from the Daily Scum Mail ('the presenter himself avoided the temptation to dress up. Instead he wore a crumpled cotton jacket and a straggling neckerchief, looking as though he'd slept in his clothes as he whispered to us from shadowy corridors or the corner of a tavern. His clan chieftains, meanwhile, were all silky moustaches and flowing locks. It was as though ... Crosby, Stills and Nash had gone to war with Jethro Tull'). There was also a really angry and discombobulated explosion of bile from a website called Highland Historian, the author of which does not appear to like Oliver at all. Ooo, pure dead vexed about Neil (and his lovely hair) and all his doings, so this chap was. Bad experience with a Hawkwind LP at an early age, was it? No matter, this blogger thought Blood Of The Clans was highly entertaining and so, seemingly, did the majority of the audience.
39. Vera/Endeavour
A three-episode seventh series of Endeavour - Russell Lewis's Inspector Morse prequel - was broadcast in February, taking Endeavour Morse into a new decade as he and the Oxford CID team investigated the discovery of a body on a canal path on New Year's Day 1970. Shaun Evans not only returned as the lead, but also directed one episode. Like its fellow ITV crime drama Vera - enjoying its tenth series with the excellent Brenda Blethyn - Endeavour seldom seems to crop up in many critics lists of 'must see-telly.' Yet, on an average Sunday night early in the year - pre-lockdown, remember - audiences of eight or nine million for these fine dramas are not uncommon. And, not even remotely undeservedly either. This type of show is something that British telly does so well and so effortlessly that it's hardly surprising the rest of world's TV industries looks at Britain with awe whilst all the box-set bores at the broadsheets are too busy cock-slurping Netflix, the latest Scandi-noir they've just discovered on BBC4 or some - probably illegally downloaded - 'gritty HBO drama' to even notice what's right under their noses. Sometimes, dear blog reader, the most surprising things are there. But, only if you actually go looking for them. Plus, this blogger loves doing the location-spotting thing whenever a new episode of Vera rocks up, given that most of it is filmed within a ten mile radius of the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House. Even if they do, sometimes, screw it up by having a character turn right in front of St Nicholas's Cathedral and then find themselves, not on Mosley Street but, instead, half-a-city away on Clayton Street West. Careless! Both Vera and Endeavour were, as expected, commissioned for further series; the former has been spotted out and about in Gatesheed filming in a socially-distanced way, so we should probably expect those episodes to be broadcast early next year. The latter, however, has been subject to an enforced hiatus. It's an ill-wind, dear blog reader, that blows nobody any good.
40. Dare Me
'There's something dangerous about the boredom of teenage girls.'Dare Me, the show run by Gina Fattore and novelist Megan Abbott, was a potent, trenchant exploration of spiky female friendship, the emotional complications of small-town America and the glory and pitfalls of heeding desire above all else. Told through a distinctly noir lens, Dare Me concerns the overheated lives of a group of cheerleaders whose carefully constructed equilibrium was disrupted by the arrival of a new coach in the form of Colette French (a beguiling Willa Fitzgerald). This was especially true for the controlling firecracker, head cheerleader Beth Cassidy (Marlo Kelly) and the yearning Addy Hanlon (Herizen Guardiola), whose story anchored the series. The show boasted fine-tuned writing and superb performances from Kelly and Guardiola that further illuminated the complex dynamics of race and sisterhood which underpinned the drama. 'Visceral, if at times vapid, Dare Me's slow-burning thriller pairs nicely with its moody atmospherics to create a deft exploration of the interiority of teen life,'declaredRotten Tomatoes.
41. Hunters
'You know what the best revenge is? Revenge.' The recent Oscar-winner Jojo Rabbit showed how difficult it can be to handle the Holocaust on-screen - thus, all credit to this Amazon series written by David Weil and executive produced by modern horror maestro Jordan Peele, for somehow managing to walk a tricky tightrope between providing stylised, suspenseful entertainment and honouring the unimaginable crimes against humanity which occurred in Auschwitz and Dachau. Set in 1970s America, it tells the story of a group of Jewish vigilantes, led by Al Pacino giving his finest performance in years, who are on a mission to hunt down surviving Nazis who have inveigled their way into the American establishment. As much as anything else, it makes for a stinging - and, horribly au currante - parable about how neo-fascism is never far away from us even in our liberal democracies. Its release came at a time where the rise of anti-Semitism, white supremacy and other forms of scummish, hateful bigotry had significantly increased throughout the world. Weil, however, felt 'casual' forms of anti-Semitism had taken place throughout his life. 'I think as a young Jewish kid growing up on Long Island, there are feelings of wanting to be powerful,' he told the Digital Spy website. 'You rarely see Jews depicted as superheroes; as having might and strength. They're often nebbishes or Woody Allen or very intellectual. But to have power to reclaim your place and get justice for your ancestors is definitely a wish-fulfilment. And that's what Hunters became.'Hunters received very mixed reviews, with praise for its premise, messages, action sequences and performances, but some suspiciously agenda-soaked criticism for its historical inaccuracies and, specifically, its conclusion. The Boston Globesummarised the show as 'audacious, tonally complex, not always in control of its message, visually arresting and, particularly in its grim flashbacks to the brutalities and the courage in the death camps, moving.' On the other hand, some smear at the Detroit News - who would have done great things if he'd been part of Comrade Corbyn's Labour shadow cabinet, no doubt - labelled it 'uneven, awkward, often dull' and 'sort of yucky.' Reviews debated Hunters' revenge fantasy premise and Nazi subject matter, specifically, as 3AW's noted, 'the oft-raised issue about exploiting one of the most horrific man-made events in history for our entertainment. Can the show be seen as an indirect tribute to the work of Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal? Or is it just bad taste? Can it be both?' This blogger is with Weil in believing that it can. Writing in the Gruniad, the Jewish writer Charles Bramesco praised the drama's 'shameless, gory, Nazi-killing catharsis' and added that 'the show does its viewership the service of assembling a squad of Nazi-hunters who hate their marks with every fibre of their souls and letting the folks at home share in the vicarious thrill of getting bloody justice. That the show goes so far over the top must, surely, be the point.' The fact that the main Gruniadreview published a week earlier was an offensively pusillanimous example of liberal queasiness which included the disgraceful claim that Hunters'fetishises the horrors of the Holocaust' is, once again, reason enough why you should probably seek out Hunters if you haven't already seen it.
42. Gangs Of London
'We're born into a certain world. It's chosen for us. Some might think it's brutal. I say it's glorious.' Gareth Evans came to public attention with the 2011 action movie The Raid. In April, he made his TV debut with this Sky Atlantic/HBO co-production. Gangs Of London took place in a capital torn apart by international criminal gangs. For twenty years, Finn Wallace (Colm Meaney) was the most powerful crime boss in the city. Billions of pounds flowed through his organisation each year. But now he's dead and nobody knows who ordered his murder. With rivals everywhere, it's up to his impulsive, borderline-psychotic son, Sean (Joe Cole), with the help of the Dumani family headed by Ed (Lucian Msamati), to take his father's place. If the situation wasn't already dangerous enough, Sean's assumption of power causes ructions on the streets with the Albanian Mafia as well as Kurdish freedom fighters, Pakistani drug cartels and Welsh travellers. In the middle of this is Elliot (Sope Dirisu), who appears to be a low-level employee of the Wallace family and a prime opportunist but who is, secretly, undercover Old Bill. GQ described it as 'a strong early contender to be the best show of the summer.''The highly choreographed action scenes are nothing short of stunning, but series creators and action-movie veterans Gareth Evans and Matt Flannery know that it's the characters that really do the heavy lifting,'added the Sydney Morning Herald who also called the show 'like Succession for psychos.''Joe Cole gives a memorable performance as he channels his inner Al Pacino with a calm and calculated menace, while Sope Dirisu delivers the action chops,'consideredIGN. 'The violence and head-splattering gore are relentless and it's perfectly choreographed fight scenes could be mistaken for a much darker version of Swan Lake. This one is not for the faint-hearted,'said the Two Minute Telly website. Aided by fine performances from the likes of Michelle Fairley and Valene Kane, it managed to avoid a few of the expected clichés of gangster-drama whilst cheerfully embracing many others. Gangs Of London was loud, flashy, a bit schizophrenic and very violent. 
43. McMillion$
'This story has got everything. Revenge. Drugs. Greed ... Ronald McDonald!' At the beginning of this century, dear blog reader, a scam enabled numerous people to fraudulently win millions of dollars from the McDonald's Monopoly®™ promotion. How that happened - and how an FBI investigation determined those responsible - is at the core of this fascinating HBO documentary series filled with 'you have got to be kidding me'-type moments. McMillion$ goes deeper than that, however, revealing the long-term pain and guilt which affected many of those involved in the scheme as well as their families, all because of what may sound, at first, like a relatively harmless - and victimless - con. Using in-depth interviews with those involved in every aspect of the crime, McMillion$ offered an insider's view into one of the most notorious fraud cases of recent decades. 'Like something out of a movie, McMillion$ effectively - if not always artfully - captures the chaos of this once-in-a-lifetime, very real con and the colourful cast of characters at its centre,'notedRotten Tomatoes. 'Compassion, not chaos, is the key to McMillion$ success'addedIndieWire. The storytellers carefully shifted tones, sucking viewers into an outlandish story before driving home its substantive impact. 'Arguably about one episode too long, it nonetheless drilled down with panache into the semi-fascinating lives of a staple of American fiction'wrote the Observer. The - delicious - central allegory of a story concerning rapacious greed and McDonald's couldn't be faulted, of course. Irony? It's something you mum does with your shirts after washing, dear blog reader.
44. A Greek Odyssey With Bettany Hughes
'Even here in the hot tub, it's clear that the Greek tradition of "Philoxenia" - welcoming strangers as friends - is still going strong.' Historian, author and broadcaster Bettany Hughes has been a great favourite of From The North since her groundbreaking Channel Four series The Ancient World in the early 2000s. Like fellow From The North favourites Janina Ramirez, Lucy Worsley and Alice Roberts, Bettany is the coolest history supply teacher we never had, full of enthusiasm, cheeky humour and fascinating atom bombs of information. Now a regular on Five, her latest series A Greek Odyssey was set against the backdrop of the beautifully picturesque Mediterranean as Bettany embarked on a journey to reacquaint herself (and us) with the Greek Islands and their vast mythology. From the islands themselves to deep beneath the sea, Bettany unpacked their history as she discovered shipwrecks of Roman ships and took an in-depth look at the legend of the Minotaur. 'For thirty years I've had a love affair with the Greek islands,' she told Nicole Russell. '[I loved] the journey of Odysseus - the legendary Greek warrior who fought in The Trojan War and who then had to make a ten year journey home facing all kinds of adventures and challenges along the way; monsters, shipwrecks and women determined to seduce him. I've longed to follow in his path.''Bettany sees the tradition of a warm Greek welcome is very much alive today on Chios, fifth largest of the islands, situated in the Northern Aegean Sea,'wrote the reviewer at News Letter. They were referring to the bit where she went swimming whilst still telling her story to camera. Impressive multitasking. Then again, she is a Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries, it's hardly surprising she can do two things at once. All this, plus 'thigh flashing Spartan girls'. What more could anyone ask?
45. The Shipman Files: A Very British Crime Story
'All the old people liked him.' Chris Wilson's three-part documentary on Britain's most prolific serial killer, Doctor Harold Shipman, was a worthy sequel to its predecessor in BBC4's A Very British Crime strand, Liza Williams' 2019 The Yorkshire Ripper Files. Like Williams' series, Wilson had his own specific agenda to push (in Williams' case it was uncaring 1970s attitudes towards sex workers; Wilson's focus was on society's appallingly dismissive view of the elderly). Aside from wanting to know quite how Shipman managed to get away with murdering an estimated two hundred and fifty victims under his care and discussing numerous opportunities to have stopped his homicidal spree sooner (convicted of forging prescriptions for pain-killers in the 1970s, for unknown reasons the GMC chose not to withdraw his medical licence), most of Wilson's ire was directed at media perceptions of his victims. The vast majority were pensioners and Wilson saw Shipman's activities as part of a wider issue - the lack of value we tend to place on those who have, it is felt, 'had a good innings.' Wilson particularly highlighted media depictions of Shipman as 'Doctor Death', killing old women by the score and contrasted it with the revelation made during Dame Janet Smith's inquiry into his shameful doings that a handful of Shipman's earliest victims, during his time at Pontefract Hospital, may have been young children. Murdering the old was one thing, as far as the media was concerned Wilson suggested, but kids? That was something else entirely. Using archive footage from a - genuinely disturbing - World In Action episode from 1983 in which Shipman had appeared discussing treatment of the elderly and the mentally ill Wilson raged, not without justification, at the the prevailing prejudices that older lives don't really matter. 'They were old, they would have died anyway,' was the phrase which was the most chilling and yet, tragically, the most authentic-sounding. Reporter Nicci Gerrard, who covered Shipman's trial, noted: 'There was no real sense of these being full and rich lives. It was a silent massacre.' As the son of one of Shipman's victims said of his mother who was, initially, thought to have died peacefully at home aged eighty one, they believed she'd had 'a 'millionaire's death' (that is painless and following a full life, well-lived). And, of course, the irony was that it was Shipman's greed which got him caught - forging a will for one of his patients, Kathleen Grundy, which raised the suspicions of her family. If he hadn't done that, Wilson suggests, there's a more than decent possibility he could have carried on with his awful deeds for many years afterwards (he was, after all, only fifty three when he was apprehended by the police). Although well-reviewed for the most part (notably in the Torygraph), sadly, Wilson's impassioned essay found a few detractors. Like the Irish Times ('repetitive and rather unfocused. He had the documentary maker's terrible habit of putting himself the centre of the story, starting numerous sections with, "I wanted to find out about ..."') and the i (who, snivellingly, described it as 'a lacklustre film that fails to compete with Netflix's true-crime docs' as though that is, in and of itself, a TV crime). Both of these reviewers, seemingly, objected to Wilson continuing to raise the same questions and provide the same conclusions about how Shipman got away with it for so long, a disappointingly tasteless use of TV reviewing lacking both a moral compass and, frankly, a heart. Some horrific louse of no importance at the Daily Lies, meanwhile, found half-a-dozen malcontents on Twitter whinging about a surfeit of crime documentaries and drama on television that week in an article which claimedBBC Viewers Demand Change To Schedules As Chilling Harold Shipman Documentary Airs. 'Demand', please note, not 'ask politely' which might have been a more effective tactic. All of which goes to prove, dear blog reader, that serial killers are not the only worthless lice currently inhabiting the planet and using up valuable resources.
46. Springwatch
Due to the pandemic, the 2020 series of the BBC's popular natural history format, starting in late May, did not come from a central base as it always had in the past. Instead each presenter appeared from a location near their home, respecting guidelines on social distancing. Chris Packham - joined by his zoologist step-daughter Megan McCubbin - was in the New Forest, Iolo Williams in Montgomeryshire and Gillian Burke in Cornwall. Although she sent a video message from her home in South Africa, Michaela Strachan was unable to return to the UK to participate. Steve Backshall was guest presenter during the first week, from his home on the Thames, with Gordon Buchanan presenting from Loch Lomond National Park in week two and Ellie Harrison in the Golden Valley, near Stroud, in week three. The first Thursday episode started - at 8pm - with the presenters joining the national 'Clap For Our Carers.' Except, that was, for Gillian due to her proximity to some wild beavers at the time. Hopefully, the beavers appreciated this. The Gruniad (predictably) loved it. The Independent loved it ('a green jewel in the BBC's crown'). Even the Daily Scum Mailloved it (though they couldn't resist a nasty, agenda-soaked dig about viewers, allegedly, 'preferring' the lockdown format based on a handful of such comments on Twitter - which is, of course, The Sole Arbiter Of The Worth Of All Things these days). The nation also loved it - a, necessary, oasis of calm for an hour each night where we could relax and be assured that whatever the human race is doing to screw-up the planet, nature will somehow find a way to survive. Packham kicked-off the opening episode with a ruminative, emotionally-charged intro, referencing the 'extraordinary Spring of 2020,' saying that while everyone was having to adapt to 'unprecedented times,' the natural world offered 'solace' and 'therapy'. He isn't a national treasure for nothing, you know? 'There's never been a more important time for us to take the time to appreciate the wildlife outside our window,' Packham told viewers. Autumnwatch followed in October (with a returned Strachan) - again, exactly at a time when what we all really needed was a damned good dose of therapy.
47. Mrs America
Created and co-written by Davhi Waller this drama detailed the political movement to pass the Equal Rights Amendment and the unexpected backlash led by conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly in the 1970s. It featured a large - and very impressive - ensemble cast led by Cate Blanchett, Rose Byrne, Elizabeth Banks, Margo Martindale, John Slattery and Sarah Paulson. It would be more than enough to recommend Mrs America for the performances alone. Blanchett as Schlafly was the headliner, but the series was brimming with unbelievably great work from Byrne as Gloria Steinem, Uzo Aduba as Shirley Chisholm and a quite stunning turn from Tracey Ullman as Betty Friedan. That line-up had been the source of some pre-broadcast concern about the show; there was an idea that, perhaps, Mrs America unfairly centred on Schlafly instead of the more progressive women of her era, or that in telling a story about her, it would seek to excuse her obnoxious behaviour. But, thankfully it didn't. Over its full series, Mrs America instead situated Schlafly inside a wider web of her enemies and allies, focusing on other women to illustrate exactly how damaging and heartless Schlafly's gender-politics became. She was the villain of the piece and the series made no excuses for that or for her. But while it sketched a hostile portrait of Schlafly, Mrs America also managed to pull off an adept demonstration of the power and limitations of second-wave feminism. James Poniewozik, writing in the New York Times, called it 'breathtaking' and 'a meticulously created and observed mural that finds the germ of contemporary America in the striving of righteously mad women.' He also praised the cast, singling out Blanchett's tour de force ('Her final scene, wordless and devastating, might as well end with Blanchett being handed an EMMY onscreen'), Ullman ('tsunamic as Friedan, the outspoken Feminine Mystique author now raging for relevance in the current wave of feminism') and Martindale ('a tornado in a hat, a piquantly funny force of personality'). Judy Berman of Time suggested Waller's history as a writer for Mad Men and Halt & Catch Fire was 'evident in Mrs America's vivid, complex depiction of our country's recent past ... This degree of moral, political and philosophical complexity is what differentiates Mrs America from so many other recent dramatisations of women's movements past.' Berman also considered that the series 'does the feminist movement justice by refusing to sanitise it.'The Hollywood Reportercalled the series 'a tremendously executed balancing act' and added 'there's no denying that Mrs America makes history come alive, in thoughtful and achingly real detail.' Predictably, the series also came under fire from scumbag conservative groups over the allegedly 'inaccurate' depiction of Schlafly declaring it to be 'Hollywood liberal propaganda.' Which was funny considering what an objectionably confrontational and downright nasty piece of work Schlafly was. As Caryn James wrote in her review for BBC Culture: 'Schlafly's cultural conservatism included working against abortion rights and same-sex marriage, issues that have become political lightning rods again in the Trump era. The series pointedly reminds us that Schlafly’s blinkered version of the US never really went away.' As alleged 'liberal propaganda', of course, the Gruniad lapped it up. So, intriguingly, did that bastion of liberalism, the Torygraph. So did the Scum Mail Group-owned Metro (which observed: 'Given television's acknowledged liberal bias, you'd justifiably expect a hatchet job' before deciding that was, actually, far from the truth). Truly, dear blog reader, we are living in a strange, topsy-turvy upside-town world.
48. Britain By Balloon
'An aerial trip over Britain,' Five's Britain By Balloon did exactly what it said on the tin. And, it was the perfect antidote to those long Sunday nights in April and May when the entire country was banged-up in their gaffs and, frankly, by that stage were climbing the bloody walls. 'We may be staying away from beauty spots, but this programme offers a way to experience them from your own home,' noted the Daily Scum Mail which was rather rubbing people's noses in their own enforced isolation. Nevertheless this was simple, undemanding, calming and - not for nothing - beautiful'slow television' of the kind we've highlighted in a couple of previous From The North'Best Of' lists (here and here, for example) which has become increasingly popular with older viewers. Those who are, perhaps, somewhat jaded by the constant diet of noise and shouting on television these days and who, every now and then, simply like to look at something quiet, pretty and, more important this year than any other, safe. This blogger, who hasn't yet received his free bus pass, nevertheless falls into this category. Not every TV programme needs to have a format which is loud and flashy and down wid da kidz with the hippin' and the hoppin' and the baseball cap on backwards. Older people watch TV too, you know? And, so do balloonists for that matter. 49. We Hunt Together
'Every decision we make is proceeded with so many thousands of tiny factors that are completely beyond our control.' A new take on the classic cat-and-mouse crime story, We Hunt Together explored the dangerous power of emotional manipulation and the intoxication of sexual attraction which can lead to dire consequences. Hermione Corfield played Freddy who is charming, highly intelligent and, most importantly, a complete and total bloody psychopath. Dipo Ola was Baba, the opposite of Freddy - a former child soldier, damaged yet compassionate. However, his chance encounter with Freddy awakens his predisposition for mayhem and the pair's lust for one another creates a deadly cocktail of manic ultaviolence. From The North favourite Eve Myles and Babou Ceesay, meanwhile, played Detective Sergeant Lola Franks and Detective Inspector Jackson Mendy who are thrown together to work on a high-profile murder case. Their unconventional relationship and differing opinions cause conflict during the investigation and this, coupled with Lola's inability to deal with her own demons, has the potential to push them to breaking point. The Hollywood Reporter, in an otherwise rather sniffy review, nevertheless was fulsome in its praise of director Carl Tibbetts''gorgeously haunted London.'What's On TVdescribed the series a 'gripping,' whilst the Torygraph was impressed with the 'classy cast.' This blogger thought it was pretty good and, occasionally, highly impressive with its brooding atmosphere of damaged menace. Made by BBC Studios and broadcast on the, somewhat obscure, Alibi Channel (and Showtime in the US), the series also guest-starred Kris Marshall and was quickly renewed for a second series.
50. Match Of The Day Top Ten/Sky Cricket Lockdown Vodcast
As the Coronavirus pandemic began to really bite and country-wide lockdown became a terrifying reality, one of the first things to go was organised sport. Through those darks days of March, April and May, with football and cricket both being something we used to watch, Sky Sports (and, to a lesser extent, the BBC) tried to work out what to do to keep those, like this blogger, suffering from Cold Turkey withdrawal symptoms entertained. The concept of turning previously established (but little-watched) online vodcast chats into actual TV programmes arrived in the nick of time to save the sanity of the sport-deprived. Thus, we got Gary Lineker, Alan Shearer and Ian Wright deciding - via Zoom - what were the greatest ever Premiership matches on one side and the likes of Ian Ward, Rob Key, Nasser Hussain and David Lloyd making up their best test elevens from the last two decades on the other. The slight downside was that both Match Of The Day Top Ten and Sky Cricket Lockdown Vodcast continued an annoying recent trend of, effectively, suggesting that cricket only began in 1990 when Sky obtained the broadcasting rights and football (1966 and all that, aside) didn't kick-off till 1992 when the Premier League began. Nevertheless, both of these formats were welcome dollops of entertaining raiding of the archives and, most importantly, fun at a time when their audiences really needed some. These were like the best pub arguments you've ever taken part in, only this time featuring people who, for the most part, actually knew what they were talking about. Match Of The Day even managed the almost impossible task of making Ian Wright into a vaguely likable human being (something that two decades of previous appearances across various channels had, wholly, failed to achieve). Thankfully, of course, the summer brought some easing of the squeezing and football and cricket (and F1, cycling, athletics, tennis and, even, Christ help us, snooker and darts) did, eventually, resume. Albeit all of them inside their own - socially isolated - bubbles. And we could, at last, watch some sport that wasn't a previously well-remembered (or, occasionally, half-forgotten) repeat. Which, apart from helping the mental health of the nation immeasurably, also reminded us about why sport is so vital as both a participation event and as a viewing spectacle. That came when - during the first England versus West Indies test - Michael Atherton, whilst sardonically reading out various tweets he'd received celebrating the resumption of club cricket that weekend, was prompted to inform viewers that one 'Hugh Jardon' had just taken six-for-nine for Cockermouth. Which made the summer, frankly. Bowling googlies on a sticky wicket, one imagines. Whilst the slip-cordon stood with their legs apart waiting for a tickle. Nah, lissun.
Also mentioned in dispatches: Cold Feet, The Windermere Children, Britain's Favourite Walks, Tony Robinson's History Of Britain, In Search of Dracula With Mark Gatiss, Stumptown, Evil, Avenue Five, Tunes For Tyrants, Wild Animal Babies, The Deuce, This Country, Belsen: Our Story, Defending Jacob, Cheer, Inside Number Nine, Little America, Bojack Horseman, Frankie Boyle's Tour Of Scotland, Unorthodox, Better Call Saul, The Blacklist, Grayson's Art Club, Dead To Me, Natalie Wood: What Remains Behind, Home Before Dark, Giri/Haji, Brassic, On The Record, The Pale Horse, Flesh & Blood, White House Farm, Feel Good, Sex Education, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Pen15, Sitting In Limbo, In My Skin, Art Of Persia, The Luminaries, Cobra, Semi-Detached, Empire Of The Tsars, In The Long Run, Little Birds, Condor, Barkskins, Lovecraft Country, Race To Perfection, Albion, Everything: The Real Thing Story, George V: The Tyrant King, World War Weird, Freddie Flintoff: Living With Bulimia, An American's Aristocrat's Guide To Great Estates, The Marvellous Mrs Maisel, Ghosts, Watchmen, Life, Tin Star, Honour, Out Of Her Mind, Has Covid Stolen My Future?, Long Hot Summers: The Story Of The Style Council, Adult Material, Industry, His Dark Materials, The Mandalorian, The Virus: What Went Wrong?, Small Axe, Strictly Come Dancing.
The opening episodes of The Queen's Gambit and the latest series of The Crown arrived at the Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House just as this bloggerisationism was in the process of being completed. Both will, likely, feature in 2021's From The North awards. Meanwhile ... 

Thirty Programmes Which Were, Frankly, Neither Use Nor Flamin' Ornament:-

1. Jack Whitehall's Father's Day/Jack Whitehall's Sporting Nation
We've been here before, of course, dear blog reader. Many, many times previously. But, the question needs to be asked again. Just who, exactly, is it that keeps giving this odious, worthless, lanky streak of rancid, obnoxious piss, this waste of oxygen a portion of this blogger's hard-earned licence fee to make television programmes which have no worth and even less likeability? This blogger is, frankly, flummoxed and would love an answer to that question, dear blog reader. Because whomsoever it is desperately needs a damned good talking to. As to what Bloody Jack Bloody Whitehall needs, this blogger will refrain from further comment for fear of crossing the boundaries of acceptable criticism, taste and decency. Except to note that we have laws in this country which ought, in theory, to protect people from such cruel and unusual punishment as programmes featuring Bloody Jack Bloody Whitehall. In the year that comedy geniuses like Terry Jones and Tim Brooke-Taylor sadly left us, the outrage that Bloody Jack Bloody Whitehall is alive and getting paid as well is the final, necessary, proof that There Is No God.
2. The Masked Singer
The Masked Singer originated in South Korea - as King Of Mask Singer (it loses a lot in translation) - and was developed by the Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation. The British version began in January with a judging panel of Jonathan Ross, Davina McCall, Ken Jeong and Rita Ora. Who tried to guess the identities of a series of z-listers, out-of-work performers and various other desperate souls who couldn't find themselves a proper job who were all doing karaoke-style renditions of pop classics. All whilst wearing oversized masks and looking either completely ridiculous or genuinely terrifying. Sometimes both. Among those behind the masks were the likes of CeeLo Green, Denise Van Outen, Skin (no, me neither), Kelis, former footballer Teddy Sheringham and EastEnders' Patsy Palmer along with one or two people that this blogger used to, actually, have a bit of respect for. Like, for instance, Nicola Roberts, Jason Manford and the former Home Secretary Alan Johnson, though the latter only lasted one episode. Still why, Alan? Why for the love God, why? Wasn't being in Ed Millimollimandi's shadow cabinet enough excitement for one lifetime? Nicola eventually won the 'coveted' title though, sadly, that didn't mean she was likely to have an actual hit single this side of the next Girls Aloud reunion. So, no change there, then. Perhaps the nadir of this strange malarkey was reached in episode three with someone whom we later discovered to be The Darkness singer Justin Hawkins warbling his way, unsteadily, through 'True Colours'. Ten-out-of-ten for comedy value, certainly but, really, is this what passes for light entertainment in 2020? Well, seemingly, it is because the series (broadcast before The Plague hit town, remember) achieved quite decent-sized audiences for ITV (the final was watched by over seven million punters) even though it gave the Torygraph the excuse to use the word 'preposterous' in a reviewing context. Which, let's face it, is never a chore for any TV reviewer. A second series was commissioned before the first one had even finished. This entered production - in a socially distanced bubble - in September. It was also announced that Mo Gilligan (no, me neither) would replace Jeong on the panel. None of this, however, prevented The Masked Singer from being a singularly rotten idea, presented with ITV's usual hysterically overblown sense of pompousness and noise (Ross, in particular, spent the entire series bellowing gormless inanities to camera after every performance) and, ultimately, being a perfect example of The Emperor's New Clothes. The Masked Singer was much like life, dear blog reader. Life, that is, as described by Macbeth - full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
3. Total Wipeout: Freddie & Paddy Takeover
So, to sum up, former England cricket legend Andrew Flintoff (nice lad, bit thick) and odious professional Northern berk Paddy McGuinness, after broadcasting careers of varying degrees of shite, found themselves as the BBC's latest inheritors of the Top Gear presentation gig (along with the third one that no one can remember the name of). Despite the BBC's extremely dubious efforts to convince everyone that the once-popular motoring show is now more popular than ever (it isn't, as previously discussed), their latest wheeze was to revive a format once fronted by one of their Top Gear predecessors, Richard Hamster. And then, to shoehorn this couple of guffawing pastinaceous planks into it in the hope that people will forget what Oscar Wilde once said about sarcasm. Too late. In doing so they gave the Torygraph reviewer the perfect opportunity to say what everyone else was thinking: Top Gear Duo's Banter Was A Load Of Big Red Balls. He probably gave himself the day off after he came up with that line, to be fair. 'Total Wipeout is a simple, entertaining game show, but this highlights package is trampled on by the inane wittering of Freddie and Paddy,' he added. 'The first episode aired on 8 August 2020 and received negative reviews,'Wikipedia noted and, if you look up the phrase 'that's rather understating the matter' on Goggle, dear blog reader, you'll find this right at the top of the list. Hardly anyone had a kind word to say about it and the whole futile exercise was, rightly, lambasted, by just about every critic with access to a PC and some vitriol to spare. 'Is the future of TV Freddie and Paddy shouting over old shows?'asked the Gruniad before adding, helpfully, 'let's hope not.' Indeed. BBC Slammed For 'Ruining' Iconic Total Wipeout With Paddy McGuinness was the Daily Star's headline. Jesus, that was bad news for the production - when an organ of the media as traditionally 'lowest-common-denominator' as the Daily Lies cannot summon up any enthusiasm for your show, you know you're in trouble. After What Paddy McGuinness Has Done To Brill Total Wipeout, Take Me Out And Shoot Meadded the Sun's Ally Ross. Which had the serendipitous brilliance of being both an incisive piece of critique and, also, a jolly good idea at the same time. This blogger has never made any secret of his utter loathing for McGuinness, a one-trick pony whose one-trick is about as funny as cancer of the buttocks. (Even his co-star described him as 'a liability' in an interview with the Metro.) But, Freddie Flintoff seems to be a jolly likeable chap; he was a great cricketer, he's a fun interview subject with a decent ability to deliver pithy one-liners and his BBC documentary, Living With Bulimia, was a touching, brave and absolutely worthwhile conceit which gained widespread praise. Sadly, his career as a comedy broadcaster has seen Preston's finest take one misstep after another (starting with the woeful A League Of Our Own which you may be horrified to discover is still running, dear blog reader). Given the BBC's seeming desperation to make everyone forget that Top Gear existed before 2019, perhaps we should be expecting the Freddie and Paddy takeover of Toy Stories or Cars Of The People next year?
4. Harry Hill's World Of TV
In the 1994 The Simpsons' episode Bart Gets Famous, Bart's brief flirtation with fame as The 'I Didn't Do It' Kid becomes a subject of ridicule on a radio talk-show. Discussing the subject of 'one-trick ponies', one of the hosts notes: 'Boy, did that get old fast!' Which, when you think about it, is a fairly accurate summation of Harry Hill's entire schtick. TV Burp was, admittedly, pretty good when it started, but that was over a decade ago and, everything Hazza has done since then - a whole series of formats for a variety of different broadcasters - have been about as funny as a big hairy wart suddenly appearing on one's chap-end. 'It's been eight years since Harry Hill ended his run of TV Burp on ITV,' lamented the i's reviewer. 'It was splendidly stupid, funny and most likely the basis on which the comedian's new series, Harry Hill's World of TV, this time on BBC2, was commissioned. Unfortunately, it didn't hold a candle to the original.' She went on to describe the show as 'a decidedly unfunny trip through soap history.''Its ambience was hampered by being a lockdown clip-show so it didn't have the guest interaction that gave TV Burp its manic energy,' added The Times. Perhaps inevitably, some plank at the Gruniad Morning Starclaimed they had rather enjoyed it. But, sadly, this was just another example of the diminishing returns in Hill's rapidly dwindling career. Was it as thoroughly wretched as Hill's notorious 2015 revival of Stars In Their Eyes? No, it wasn't - to be fair, not a single programme on this year's 'Worst Of' list (not even one featuring Bloody Jack Bloody Whitehall) was that horrific. But, World Of TV still wasn't very good. And, when you're coming off the back of half-a-dozen previous duds like Harry is, that's not a good place to be in.
5. Rich Kids Go Skint
Each year, as regular as clockwork, From The North's annual 'Worst Of' lists always seem to include at least one example of a strand of factual telly which is, seemingly, beloved by executives and producers who can't afford an original idea - 'life-swap telly.' In which someone from a particular lifestyle is given the opportunity - for a brief time and, presumably, for plenty of money - to experience 'how the other half lives.' This, in the past, has led to such gross disasters as 2009's offensive horror The Duchess On The Estate, the same year's crass, ignorant Mel B vehicle Seven Days On The Breadline and 2011's genuine curiosity Geordie Finishing School For Girls among many others. Quite why executives and producers so love this type of programme is unknown since very few of them ever get any sort of audience to speak of. Largely because most viewers can spot a pile of hypocritical diarrhoea a mile away. Any hint of realpolitik aside, it's possibly because they're relatively cheap to make. Most of these formats involve a process known as 'poverty tourism' - as with last year's horrorshow The British Tribe Next Door, for instance. In which people from, let's be charitable and say 'fortunate' backgrounds pretend to be stinking dirt-poor for a week in a living embodiment of the lyrics of Pulp's 'Common People'. 'It's a prime-time TV bait formula: a person from one background - "rich" - is thrust into the lives of a family from another background - "poor" - and entertainment ensues,' as described by the Evening Standard. It's also patronising and offensive on just about every level. Rich Kids Go Skint was the latest example featuring a handful of the titular 'rich kids' (not the post-punk band of the 1970s in case you were wondering) who were paired up with families 'not as wealthy as them' and were, usually, required to do basic everyday tasks such as food shopping, cooking dinner and washing up. All of this giving them - it was claimed - 'an understanding of how living with a small amount of money can be incredibly hard for the families.' No shit? Seriously, if you need a TV show to convince you that it's not much fun being poor, you're probably already a lost cause to humanity. Four series of this bloody disgrace have been produced so far and broadcast on the 5Star channel. The most recent was right at the back end of 2019 - so late, in fact, that it avoided making last year's From The North list. But, it's never too late to hand out a well-deserved pants-down punishment beating to something as repellent as this. And, to name-and-shame those responsible. The executive producers of Rich Kids Go Skint are Asif Hasan and Nick Parnes, the producer is Roger Oldham and the editors are Gruff Lovgreen and Ian Golf. All of whose families, one assumes, are pure-dead proud of them. An early episode was criticised by the Daily Mirra - Rich Kids Go Skint Brat Blasts Single Mum's 'Bad Decisions' As She's Forced To Swap Hefty Allowance For Three Pounds-A-Day Budget. Of course the 'brat' involved - a teenager named Jodie - was not'forced' to do this or anything even remotely like it; rather, she was hired by a TV production company (and, presumably, well-paid) to do this and to get her whinging boat-race on telly into the bargain. The Sun was, similarly, unimpressed with another 'rich kid', Andrea, for saying he 'hopefully wouldn't be going to a council house.' Particularly not as his parents had lumbered him with a girl's name. One presumes the pay-cheque was some compensation for Andrea having to rough it for a week (if not for the naming fiasco). In the most recent series, it was the Daily Scum Mail's turn to get all righteously indignant about the antics of another one of these over-entitled lice. A tip for the tabloids; maybe, just maybe if you stopped writing articles about this horrible format, people might stop watching it and they would stop making it (let's face it, it hasn't got much of an audience anyway if it's broadcast on 5Star). 'Some genuinely sweet moments unfold. But most are awful,' concluded the Standard. 'Where do they find these people?' Now, here's an idea for TV executives; if the next series of Rich Kids Go Skint featured a reunited Glen Matlock, Steve New, Rusty Egan and Midge Ure having to live in abject poverty in a rat-infested slum for six months, that might actually be worth watching.
6. Little Mix: The Search
How ironic it was, dear blog reader, that 2020 should have seen not only Alison Ellwood's fascinating and - genuinely touching - documentary about a group of five women who made their mark in the harsh world of the music business (see above) but, also, this disgraceful abomination. Little Mix: The Search was a reality competition which began on BBC1 - that's BBC1, for Christ's sake - in September. In which the titular girl-group - Leigh-Anne Pinnock, Jade Thirlwall, Perrie Edwards and Jesy Nelson - judged a winning act who would join them as support on their Confetti Tour scheduled for next year ... Unless we haven't emerged from lockdown by then, obviously. Which would be a terrible tragedy as that would render this entire balderdash as pointless. Or, let's qualify that, even more pointless than it already was. That was the extent of what this production - paid for by my (and your) licence fee money, remember - wished to achieve, dear blog reader. Whilst The Go-Go's served as an inspirational example of young women who could write their own songs, play their own instruments and create their own destiny this risible ... thing amounted to an eight-episode advert for the manufactured group (who, let's remember, themselves first emerged from a show-with-a-voting-element, The X-Factor in 2011). In case you think this blogger is guilty of an element of snobbery here, let it be noted that manufactured pop groups are not a problem for him - The Monkees were a manufactured pop group and they were sodding brilliant (and, they once toured with The Jimi Hendrix Experience as their support act. You can be certain that match-up wasn't decided by a phone-in vote). Also manufactured, in their own way, were The Sex Pistols. This blogger always rather admired The Spice Girls and reckons Girls Aloud's Ten is one of fifty finest singles compilations made by anyone. But this lot, who do not appear to have an over-abundance of brain-cells, are symptomatic of everything that is wrong with music, television and indeed society in general in the Twenty First Century. As famous for their product endorsements (clothing, perfume) as for anything as dangerous as making a half-way decent record. Once upon a time, dear blog reader, you actually needed a modicum of talent to achieve much in the pop world - or, failing that, a Malcolm Gladwell-style ten thousand hours of practice and a decent idea of what you're hoping to achieve. There's nothing at all wrong with looking pretty and wishing to make as much money as possible - that's as rock and roll as it comes; from Elvis to Olly, from The Beatles to Boyzone, from The Supremes to The Bangles, from Oasis to ... No Way Sis. What is offensive - and vaguely sinister - is when that's all the ambition you have. At the same time as they were appearing in The Search, meanwhile, Little Mix were also involved in a series of - again, entirely self-promotional - adverts for Compare The Market Dot Com. In which they were acted off-screen by a couple of CGI meerkats. Simples. That - and archly horrific rubbish such as Little Mix: The Search - seems to be the 2020 version of going on a six month package tour of cinemas and town halls a few decades ago. Proof that, in so many ways, society has actually regressed with the passage of time. The 'highlight' of Little Mix: The Search - some laughably piss-poor overnight ratings figures, notwithstanding - occurred on 31 October when an episode of the series was hastily postponed due to Boris Johnson's announcement of a reintroduction of lockdown in England. Which proves that what ones mother always used to tell us was true; every cloud does have a silver lining. One of this blogger's fiends on Facebook noted that night's episode of Strictlywas going ahead but 'it seems, Little Mix are expendable.' If only wishing made it so, dear blog reader.
7. Rolling In It
Presented by Stephen Mulhern - so that's a big flashing neon warning sign before we've even made it to the end of the first sentence - Rolling In It is a game-of-chance which sees three contestants play alongside some of their favourite z-list celebrities in a bid to go home with a big cash prize. 'But they will need to have luck on their side because everything could change at the roll of a coin,' announced the pre-publicity. Three teams - made up of the player and their z-list celebrity partner - 'have to roll a coin down a moving conveyor belt towards slots which are labelled with large cash sums to win, though also "Bankrupt" slots which mean the player loses everything. As the game progresses, the money values get larger and as a result, so do the penalties.' If anyone lost the will to live whilst reading that description, dear blog reader, don't worry, you are not alone. 'ITV's new game show borrows from the seaside arcade game Roll A Win and is just as tedious,'said the reviewer in the i. Rolling In It Viewers Brand Stephen Mulhern's Game Show Most "Brutal Show Ever"claimed the Metro. 'A repetitive game show just like all the others,'added the Newsbreak website. That says it all, dear blog reader. Unoriginal, tedious and instantly forgettable.
8. Make Me Famous
'A reality TV fable without much of a moral,'according to the Independent, Make Me Famous was a sombre BBC3 - yes it does still exist, apparently - drama created and written by Reggie Yates. Billy (Tom Brittany) appears on a constructed reality series titled Love Or Lust. When he impresses the producers of the series, he believes his life is set to change forever. A year after the show has been broadcast, many of Billy's co-stars are doing well in their newly-forged 'celebrity' careers, but Billy struggles to balance the fame, social media and the assumptions people have made about him, which result in him having self-confidence issues. Noble in intent, it may have been and it featured one horribly realistic sequence (Billy attempting suicide due to online hate, which was filmed a day before the death of real-life Love Island-type individual Caroline Flack, who committed suicide whilst awaiting trial for assault due to, it was claimed, broadly the same reason). There was, nevertheless, something really rather skewwhiff and tacky about that particular tragedy being used as a specific selling point in Make Me Famous's pre-publicity. There is also, sad to say, something genuinely hypocritical about a man like Yates, who started as a child actor before making his name fronting kids shows with Fearne Cotton on CBeebies, having a go at TV for ruining people's lives. Think how many young viewers were traumatised by the sight of you and Cotton swanning around like you owned the gaff in Mighty Truck Of Stuff and Only In America, mate. They're mostly still in therapy. In fact, the worst trauma that Yates himself has suffered in his media career was when he made some dreadful, borderline anti-Semetic, remarks on a podcast and had to grovellingly apologise and resign from hosting Top Of The Pops. Mind you, this blogger will cut the man who voiced Rastamouse some slack at least. Nevertheless, Make Me Famous never seemed quite able to decide if it was casting a jaundiced eye into the mirror of reality TV or merely reflecting back viewers' own pre-conceived ideas about the state of 'celebrity' in the Twenty First Century. In any sort of decent, more tolerant world those unfortunate people whose lives are blighted by their own unwise desperation for fifteen minutes in the spotlight would escape the unremitting glare of media intrusion. And, therefore, there'd also be no need whatsoever for Reggie Yates. So, yeah, let's do that, then.
9. The First Team
An alleged 'comedy', created by Damon Beesley and Iain Morris, best known for their work on The Inbetweeners - and, if that wasn't enough to put you off before this series even started, dear blog reader, then don't say you weren't warned. The First Team followed Mattie (Jake Short), Benji (Shaquille Ali-Yebuah) and Jack (Jack McMullen), young players at a fictional Premier League club. The show received almost entirely negative notices from the cognoscenti, being described as 'a football sitcom fit for relegation,' with particularly harsh criticism from the Gruniad ('there's only so long you can watch bored footballers playing FIFA') and Radio Times ('it's hard to shake the view that most film and TV based on the sport tends to be a bit naff, with few managing to capture the on-pitch drama and absurdity off it'). Over The Moon? Not With This Second Division Comedyadded the Torygraph. 'The squad are ignorant, vain, self-obsessed, incompetent boors,'noted the reviewer of the Church Times (who, to be fair, didn't seem bothered by this and added 'it's very funny indeed' - which it wasn't). This blogger loves football, dear blog reader. He also loves comedy. But, put them together on television and the combination seldom, if ever, works - the, thankfully almost completely forgotten, ITV sitcom Feet First (1979) being a classic example of why. Because it was crap, basically. There are some thing that just don't belong together - chips and custard, for example. Or Bloody Jack Bloody Whitehall and any TV series with an ounce of dignity or self-respect. 'There was no rhythm and far too many characters - more than twenty names on the cast list for the first episode and that's before you count real-life celebrities such as Jurgen Klopp,'said the Daily Scum Mail. 'The First Team just isn't ready for the big time. Back to the training ground.' A good idea. In fact, now would seem to be a good time for The First Team to spend a season out on loan. Not in The Championship, obviously, that's still way above their level. What about the BetVictor Isthmian League?
10. Rob & Romesh Versus ...
For the second year running Romesh Ranganathan features in From The North's 'Worst Of' list which - as noted in 2019 - is sad because this blogger really does have quite a bit of time for Romesh and his comedy. Tragically, he keeps on picking some right proper bollocks to appear in (It's Not Rocket Science, The Misadventures Of Romesh Ranganathan, Judge Romesh and, of course, most disgraceful of the lot, A League Of Their Own). This turgid Sky vehicle pairs him with the terminally-unfunny buck-toothed specimen Rob Beckett and sees the couple 'travel around the world taking on challenges.' No one actually asked them to do this, of course, but they do it anyway. For our entertainment, allegedly. And, for their wallets. 'Rob is the giggling excitable one, while Romesh, aided by a sleepy right eye which conveys a sense of harsh judgmentalism [sic], adds a blast of deadpan scepticism,'notedThe Arts Desk. Tragically, the British Comedy Guide website claimed that 'another series is in development.' Is it too much to hope, dear blog reader, that this pandemic gets worse and kills us all so we never have to see it?
11. After Life
The latest vanity project for From The North ... whatever the opposite of 'favourite' is, Ricky Gervais. That's all you need to know, really dear blog reader. It's got that cheeky ragamuffin scallywag Ricky Gervais in it. It's, therefore, self-indulgent, very mean-spirited and not even half as funny as it thinks it is. And you should probably avoid watching it as you would avoid stepping in a dog-turd in the middle of the road. 'Gervais can do so much better than this bafflingly popular mess,'claimed the Independent. This blogger begs to differ.
12. Z-List Celebrity Dogs Behaving (Very) Badly
And, speaking of dog turds, the z-list 'celebrities' (with dogs) in this particular case being Denise Van Outen, Russell Watson and Michael Owen. The latter's Staffordshire bull terrier, Ronnie, had apparently 'gone berserk' and 'has attacked dogs in the past.' That's nothing - his malingering little shit of an owner once spent four years being paid a fortune to lie on the treatment table at this blogger's beloved (though unsellable) Magpies. So, the fact that the dog is a bit of a wrong 'un too is, frankly, not that much of a surprise. This blogger is aware that not everything on television has to be I, Claudius, World In Action or Twin Peaks: The Return. There is room for the frivolous, the bland, the lightweight, the 'never-mind-just-switch-your-brain-off-and-watch-some-pretty-pictures' varieties of TV programming. This blogger is neither immune nor averse to all four of these. However, Michael Grade's infamous statement about the value of content when he was ITV executive chairman had then and still has much merit to it. Grade said that the broadcaster had to get out of the habit of copycat programmes which failed to innovate. 'We have been very quick to copy other people's formats,' Grade told the Gruniad in 2007. 'We've stuck the word "celebrity" on the front of a copied format and pretended that's good enough. It's creatively bankrupt to be honest.' What went for ITV more than a decade ago, it would seem, goes doubly for Channel Five in 2020. Except in this case, it's not even someone else's format they're ripping off and sticking the word 'celebrity' in front of it's one of their own. Which, frankly, is reason enough to loathe this particular conceit on general principle even before you discover that Michael Owen is involved in it. At that point, a trip to the vet was the least the people who devised this tripe deserved.
13. I'll Get This
The format of this rigmarole sees five depressingly z-list 'celebrities' going out for dinner together with each placing their bank card on table at the beginning of the evening. They then play a series of games between courses, the winner of each game getting to take back their own card. The z-list 'celebrity' whose card remains at the end has to pays the bill for the whole table. Admittedly, the prospect of some hateful twonk so desperate to get their mush on telly that they'll even pay their own money to do so does have some novelty value. But most of those who appeared on this were either one of those 'everybody look at me, me, me, me, me' planks who stink up the majority of Dave's original comedy output (Rachel Parris, Ed Gamble, Phil Wang, Desiree Burch, Rob Becket) or they're, you know, Eamonn Holmes. 'nuff said. If this woeful, niggardly spectacle had been on Dave, Channel Four, or Five one could, perhaps, be excused for simply seeing it as another sad example of celebrity-by-non-entity and write it off as 'only to be expected' from those particular networks. That fact that it's on this blogger's beloved BBC is just depressing on so many levels. 'Creaky game show I'll Get This sounds as if it came from the "notes to self" on Alan Partridge's dictaphone, along with pitches for Dogs On The Dole or Monkey Tennis,'wrote the i despairingly. Wang and Gamble might've got saddled with the bill for their particular meals, dear blog reader, but it's the licence fee payers who, ultimately, financed for this fiasco. We - and dignity - are the real losers here. It reminded this blogger of those many - in most other aspects of life, quite sensible - people who consider alcoholic wife-beating Scouse junkie John Lennon's 'Happy Xmas (War Is Over)' as a profound and beautiful statement of hope and good cheer in an insane world. It isn't. It's an appallingly twee and risible song full of horrible, sickly-sweet Hallmark Christmas Card sentiment. And then, just when you think it can't, possibly, get any worse, Yoko Bloody Ono starts singing. That is what I'll Get This is like.
14. Hitmen
If there was ever a textbook example of the truisms 'stick to what you're good at' and 'never believe your own hype' then Hitmen fits the bill better than most. Sue Perkins and Mel Giedroyc are, of course, a pair of reasonably funny ladies who first made a name for themselves as presenters of a couple of Channel Four magazine shows which developed a cult following. And, then they got rocketed into The Premier League thanks to a programme about cakes. Nowt wrong with that, of course, long-running careers have been founded on far less. But, since Bake Off got burgled by Channel Four and Mel and Sue did what, at the time, seemed to be the honourable and decent thing and declined to go with it and stay at the BBC, in one fellswoop they appear to have developed the King Midas In Reverse thing. Everything they've touched has turned to shat in their hands. Poor Mel's got herself stuck presenting rubbish like Eurovision: You Decide and Let It Shine as the BBC tried to work out what to do with her whilst Perkins has, if possible, done even worse for herself; Don't Scare The Hare, the horrible, up-it's-own-arse Insert Name Here and her series of depressingly banal 'look at me, I'm Sue Perkins in a foreign country' travelogue shows, for example. Not only that, but her previous attempt at reinventing herself as a comedy actress - 2016's woeful sitcom Heading Out, kyboshed from on-high almost instantly due to lack of interest from pretty much everyone - proves that in whatever area her talent lies (and she certainly has some), acting isn't it. Sky One's Hitmen, in which the pair play two incompetent professional assassins, was almost entirely laugh-free. 'I had a soft spot for Mel and Sue long before they became synonymous with dough-based innuendos. So when I heard they were reuniting for a Sky sitcom about a couple of hapless "hitwomen", I wanted it to be brilliant,'wrote the Radio Times' reviewer. But, she decided, it wasn't. 'You get the feeling you’d have more of a laugh just sitting in a room with Mel and Sue and a couple of cinzanos.' Other reviews were similarly of the 'could do better than this crap' variety. The sad thing is, this blogger genuinely doesn't think that they could these days.
15. Breeders
God, but Martin Freeman has made some desperately rotten career choices since they stopped making Sherlock hasn't he? Sky's Breeders - a kind of 'if-possible-even-worse' cheaper version of the BBC's (equally sneering) Motherland - continues Twenty First Century TV's obnoxious trend of suggesting that the only people who have ever experienced the 'trials' of parenthood are twatty Middle Class hippy Communists. Gurning, as they do, into their breakfast muesli about how 'difficult' their completely perfect suburban lives have become since their kids came along. And, how doing anything so 'ordinary' as child-rearing is too much like hard work. This blogger hates these kind of punchable conceits, dear blog reader - and he hates, with a righteous passion, the people who make them. The product of the arrogance of the bourgeoisie who, seemingly, believe their lives are the only ones which actually matter and that the world begins and ends within a three mile radius of downtown Islington. 'I can't work out who Breeders is for,'saidNew Statesman. 'I can't think that most parents will warm to it, however little sleep they've had. But on the other hand, it doesn't make the non-parent want to cheer either.' Despite a decent cast (Alun Armstrong, for God's sake, alongside Daisy Haggard and Freeman), this nasty full-of-its-own-importance ... thing should be shovelled into the nearest puddle of diarrhoea and left to sink. Tragically, the pandemic delayed - but couldn't actually stop - production of a second series.
16. The Sister
A psychological thriller directed by Niall MacCormick and adapted by Luther's Neil Cross from his own novel, Burial, the four-part series starred Russell Tovey, Bertie Carvel, Amrita Acharia and Nina Toussaint-White and was broadcast on ITV in October. It seemed to have a lot going for it - a decent source text and a terrific cast. But, everything went pear-shaped thereafter; a severe limitation in a series with a denouement as risible as this. Whilst the Gruniad described the drama 'supernaturally-tinged dose of nail-bitery, doled out in suspenseful chunks' and the Independent thought that although the drama was full of 'horror-movie cliché[s]' of 'dark, rainy nights in shadowy woods with ghoulish dialogue' that made it 'ideal for near-Halloween viewing' most people who aren't Middle Class hippy Communists thought it was a load of old toss. The Sister Ending Branded 'Too Stupid For Words' Amid Second Murder And Ghost Twistfrothed the Daily Mirra. Whenever a tabloid uses the word 'branded' that usually means they've found about four people on Twitter who didn't like something very much. This wasn't four people. The Sister Viewers Fume They've "Wasted Four Hours" After Each Episode Gets "More Stupid Than The Last"alleged the Sun. Whenever a tabloid uses the word 'fume', that usually means they've found six impotently furious Twitter users cheering themselves up by telling the world how much they loathed something (like, showing intlligence on University Challenge, for instance). This wasn't six people. 'The Sister has been airing each night this week and while the show boasts an impressive cast and seemingly gripping storyline, it seems viewers at home were left feeling unimpressed by the drama,'claimed the excellently-named Francesca Shillcock in Hello! magazine. Whenever Hello! writes a negative review - about pretty much anything - it usually means they've found a dozen people on Twitter whinging like whingy-whingers. This wasn't a dozen people. The Sister Final Episode Has Viewers Beside Themselves At 'Mad' Twistsjudged the Newcastle Evening Chronicle. Whenever the Evening Chronicle features an article about fans being 'beside themselves' it usually involves the latest on-going at this blogger's beloved (though unsellable) Magpies. This wasn't. Basically, everyone (and their dog) seemed to have sat through The Sister got to the end and thought 'well, that's four hours of my life I'll never get back.' The ending - not so much ambiguous as downright encrypted - required the Digital Spy website to write a piece which attempted (unsuccessfully) to explain it. '[A] half-baked dramatisation of [an] esteemed novel' was The Art Desk's view. 'The convenient coincidence that Holly's best friend Jackie happens to be one of the police officers who investigated her sister’s death is just another credibility-bump in a road already rendered impassable with them.' It's awful, dear blog reader, when something written by someone you really admire and starring some actors you've always enjoyed turns out to be a turd. It happens, thankfully, far less often than one might imagine. But, it happened with The Sister and that's, genuinely, sad.