We brought in another fellow volunteer, Nadya, and did our first two recordings in September. They're published on Vanessa's Wordpress blog "Pop Goes the World" if you'd like to have a listen. Vanessa was armed with Entertainment Weekly, I came armed with the appropriate issue of TV Week.
The first podcast was about the new shows coming to the new TV season.
My picks for new were New Girl (Tuesdays on CityTV and Fox), Against the Wall (Wednesdays on Bravo with multiple repeats), Ringer (Fridays on Global), Unforgettable (Tuesdays on CBS and CTV), Terra Nova (Mondays on CityTV and Fox), Person of Interest (Thursdays on CBS and CityTV) and A Gifted Man (Fridays on CBS and Global).
The second podcast was about returning TV shows and what we were looking forward to.
My picks for Returning were Being Erica (Mondays on CBC), Drop Dead Diva (Sundays on Slice), Parenthood (Tuesdays on GlobalTV and NBC), Supernatural (Fridays on the CW, and on Space delayed by a week), Warehouse 13 (Thursdays on Showcase with multiple repeats), and I grouped NCIS/NCIS:LA/Hawaii-Five-O under one. They essentially follow the same formula. NCIS followed by NCIS:LA broadcasting Tuesdays by CBS and Hawaii-Five-O (Mondays on Global).
Our next one is scheduled to be recorded on October 30 and I'm making notes for it. As is quite often the case, some of 'my' shows have failed to impress and others I had absolutely no knowledge of at the time that I think are pretty good and would have deserved a mention. Specifically, and listed in no particular order: Suits, Silk, Party Animals, Case Histories.
Other shows I find I'm watching mainly to see who turns up as guest stars, and although I do like them on their own, they do fall under the category of 'familiar fare' - you know what you're going to get: A Touch of Frost, Law & Order UK, Hustle. They're a little like my above grouping of NCIS/NCIS:LA/Hawaii-Five-O, except I like them for the main cast more than the guest stars.
Speaking of which, I started work on something some weeks back. The temporary name of it is "MyIMDB", which, for obvious copyright reasons, I won't be keeping. It had begun to bother me that over the years I keep seeing the same faces pop up in programmes I was watching and I could never remember their names. I suppose that's the perceived fate of 'character actors' (not the best of terms - actors plays characters, that's the job), but I not only wanted to actually remember where I had seen them before, and some I have been seeing for a few decades, I wanted to actually know their names. A peace of mind thing, I suppose you could say. Currently it concentrates on faces on British television programmes (but not exclusively British-born), and I'm considering expanding it to North American (Canadian focus, but again, not exclusively) actors as well.
Just as a forewarning, it's currently 50 pages long, and I will be publishing profiles periodically. It's not going to anyone's complete resume, just the programmes I personally have seen them in.
If you have any suggestions as to what to call it or who to include, I would welcome them.
In the meantime, I think that's me done for now.
