Ooh, beer commercials. They think they’re so clever. They sell beer and make men go ‘I like beer. Let’s drink a beer because we’re men who like birds’.
Oh bollocks. What’s the point? I really can’t do it. This ad is just too good. It’s an ad that, whilst it may not make you go forth and act like a tit in pubs, it does highlight that sometimes to be genuinely memorable, you have to be a teensy bit clever. Are you listening Oven Pride and webuyanycar.com?
To take a break from my usual vitirol smeared over low income earning ad execs, let us just take a seat and enjoy a minute and a half of actual television gold. It’s not clever in the truest sense, but it will make you laugh.
Enjoy. I’m off to balance the universe for this article and shave a cat.
It’s been reported in the Daily Star, The Telegraph and even on a website in India, Lady GaGa is to appear in Doctor Who!
Except…
Except, she’s not is she? This is the least feasible story ever and feels like someone has just taken me up on my Doctor Who Press Release kit. Gareth Roberts has appeared in the July Issue of Doctor Who Magazine discussing his latest script for the show which is due to co-star James Corden. Discussing his previous draft for the upcoming ep, Roberts suggested that the script may one day resurface as Big Finish project (a series of audio plays starring the 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th Doctors) or Lady GaGa doing it because she’ll need the work.
The brilliant/face palm thing is that the Daily Star et al have taken his exact quote and, despite it reeking of sarcasm even when separated from the rest of the interview, have reported it as absolute FACT! With a capital F and a capital ACT and a lowercase arse.
From the Daily Star:
The star, 24, has already sported costumes which resemble Cybermen, Yeti, Ood and Tree People.
And scriptwriter Gareth Roberts revealed he has already come up with a storyline that would see The Doctor (Matt Smith, 27) go GaGa.
Gareth told Doctor Who magazine: “The script might end up on screen one day with Lady GaGa, who will have fallen on hard times.”
In a way it’s fantastic. Right down to pointing out that Lady GaGa dresses weirdly and, ergo, should be in Doctor Who. As they suggest, she could be a Cyberman, Yeti, Ood or a horrific, highly popular, more-iconic-than-the-Daleks, Tree Person…
Ah yes, the Tree People, a race of trees that resemble people, or are they people that resemble trees? Truly that is the mystery of their race. Either way, they burn up a treat. It’s fair to say that whoever wrote the article thought ‘’Ang on! There were tree people in that episode with Billie Piper. Lady GaGa looks like a twig. Yeah, I’ll whack that down’.
So, if you’re a blogger looking for info on this story or a tabloid hack, please allow me to be one of many to tell you that you are talking arse.
(I am very aware that there is a good chance that I could be misquoted and later this week you will see the headline, Lady GaGa to Play Talking Arse.)
Warning: The following article contains spoilers to the shows Ashes to Ashes and Lost.
So, it’s the start of a new week and the end of two popular sci-fi shows. Namely Lost and Ashes to Ashes. Both have spent several series layering twist and turn upon twist and turn till everything came out a bit twisty and turny. Like the scoreboard from new faces.
And how did they both resolve their storylines? With a big dollop of death.
Nothing like death to trim a few storyline threads you’ve got hanging off your immaculate story suit which was made by the story tailor in story lane in story town…
I’m drifting.
In the case of Ashes to Ashes, Alex discovered that she had been dead since she was shot trying to save her daughter in series one and that Gene, a 45 year misogynist who turned out to be the spirit of a 19 year old copper, was simply there to guide her from this life to the next. All rather touching and guessed by pretty much the entire fan community, most of whom will have had their grannies down as a wager as soon as John Simm’s monologue was over Life on Mars.
Lost also went for the death motif by suggesting that a number of scenes in the final series were in fact the main characters reliving their lives in a style of their choosing before going over to the other side. Apparently, when you die you’ll be able to relive the favourite moments of your life. Even if that moment is being stuck on an island with a shadowy organisation, polar bears, no way of escaping and only the prospect of eating Hurley to give you comfort.
Both finales have been met with the usual ‘OMG!!1 IT WAZ MAZING’ vs ‘I could write better. I have already written a 12 page synopsis which I have sent to the BBC in the hopes that they will sit up and take notice’.
Angry Ashes to Ashes fans seem to be upset primarily because they had already predicted the ending back in series 2 and certain Lost fans are grumbling because they didn’t predict how the show was going to end. So, it’s really turned into one of those ‘dammed if you do, dammed if you don’t’ moments.
This all in all makes you feel a bit sorry for Steve Moffat. In a month’s time, the new showrunner will be placing the final two episodes of his first series of Doctor Who at our feet and hoping we don’t kick him whilst he’s down there kneeling.
Whilst a few papers *cough* Daily Mail *cough splutter* have been more than vocal about this latest series of Doctor Who, it’s worth noting that overall it’s been pretty consistent. Steve, like RTD before him, has made some bold choices in terms of directors, writers and actors. Yes, with Rory on board the TARDIS, it does seem like it’s in danger of becoming Scooby Doo, but it is holding together despite the prospect of James Cordan on the horizon.
So, with the Pandorica still to be opened, Rory and Amy yet to be married and the crack in time getting ever bigger is Moffat going to be able to end it all satisfactorily? Not a snowball chance in Hell. Whatever he has written will not be good enough to the over-zealous fan boy, who will take great pleasure in letting everyone else know how the story should have ended. Despite RTD and Moffet being very open about how they collaborated on a few ideas before the series started so that it could be linked with last years specials, there will be cries of ‘RESET’ and ‘Doctor Who 1963-2010’ when the final credits roll. Some fans will blame Karen Gillan’s legs whilst others will lament that it hasn’t been the same since Adric died. Some fans will be hated and crucified for loving the finale and those who hated it will be treated the same. Some will convoluted ideas about how the DoctorDonna should break through his dimension with Rose in tow and help the 11th Doctor. Some fans are just born idiots.
So, can I put forward the thesis that we end the war now and save millions of lives. When it’s all said and done, let’s just be happy that we’re that little group of 8-80 year olds who take 45 minutes of their lives each week to enjoy some escapism and, though sometimes the execution can be a little bit off-kilter, the heart and the imagination is still there as it was with Hartnell, Pertwee, Troughton and Baker.
Sofas are a devilishly tricky thing to farm off to the great unwashed. I sit here on one presently and later on, I’ll probably lie on it whilst watching Doctor Who, but that’s it. That’s it two functions used up in an evening’s television. Yes, tonight, there will be people around Manchester giggling on their couches with candle wax and vacuum attachments whilst I struggle my way through Oblivion, but, let’s be honest, those people are few and far between. No, in my honest opinion, there’s not much you can advertise about your couch apart from the fact you can sit on it comfortably criticising adverts like a disgruntled bargain basement Charlie Brooker.
That said, it hasn’t stopped companies from trying. In 2009, DFS encouraged us to dance self-consciously to bad radio rock in front of computer enhanced couches that were made to look bigger than they actually were.
It’s interesting to note that performing this bizarre dancing ritual is preferable to looking after your husband who has keeled over from an apparent heart attack.
Australian Sofa company, Freedom, suggested that sofas could be used as the final cry of victory in a domestic fight.
The problem being that they inadvertently suggested that if you wanted one of their sofas, you were probably a smug tosser who was cheating on your girlfriend.
So, aside from dancing and coming across like a complete set of piss teeth, how do you sell your couches? Over to CSL…
See, that’s how you do it? You tell your potential customers that they have excellent taste in sofas, but piss poor choice in men. Of course, it all makes sense now. Yes, men use you like a set of stabilisers until they can get their mitts on a better bike, but never mind you’ve still got that lovely couch. You know, the purple one that you caught your boyfriend chatting up your sister/best friend/gran on.
There you go. You remember. You love that couch. Who needs men eh?
So, where do we go from here? Well, let’s follow the CSL example that life is crap but commerce doesn’t have to be.
I’ll never forget having to go home to tell my wife that I had contracted an STD from her mother. It was the day that Halford had their two for one sale on mufflers.
When I lost my limbs in a horrific car accident, I was so happy because at least I wasn’t going to scuff my new white Nikes.
