Saturday, May 16, 2009
Other stuff and The Apprentice ep 8
Right this is going to be a big one:
OK, I'm feeling better now, this week actually has been good for me as I've got the place to myself while the folks are away on holiday, so its the usual fend for oneself and try to remember to all the household chores (ok not that many really!). Last night though I was pleased cos I managed to finally get to cook for myself as I've been out at nights quite a bit this week so last night was a night in, made some sausage pasta, yum yum! The week to myself however could have been better if didn't have that viral bug come back on me like it did last Friday night as I felt a bit crap for half the week, but thankfully its cleared up for now (for now! or for a good while I hope!).
Anyways as I said its been a busy week, on Monday managed to get a couple of DVD/Blu-ray discs, so I was chuffed to finally get Doctor Who: The Deadly Assassin on DVD (OK nerdy mode on!) which was really good, hardly forgotten how good it was and it showed Tom Baker effortlessly holding his own without a companion to assist him (he basically needs someone to spout out the exposition to!). The story is a wonderful mix of suspense, thrills, high drama and there's some comedy too of course (I love the line where Cardinal Borusa says to the Doctor "You will never amount to anything in the galaxy as long as you retain your propensity for vulgar fascetiousness!"). The story is about the Doctor returning to his home planet Gallifrey to try and prevent the assassination of the President of the Time Lords only to find himself framed for the crime himself.
The cast are all great in the show with excellent performances from George Pravda as Castellan Spandrell, Angus MacKay as Cardinal Borusa and Bernard Horsfall as Chancellor Goth. The only thing that slightly let it down for me was that the Master albeit played excellently by the late Peter Pratt was perhaps a little too dramatic all the time with too much emphasis on high drama and hardly anything in the way of wit and humour. In short it didn't remind of the Master as he should be, but I guess as the character was dying he would be highly melodramatic. All the same The Deadly Assassin is a classic from a time when Doctor Who was at its absolute peak, and its a real reminder of just how good the show can be, as this show certainly stands miles above the current Russell T Davies ressurected campathon, much as I enjoy it, it'll never scale those heights again.
Now onto The Apprentice episode 8 which was once again very entertaining and had me shaking my head at the screen at certain points going "Why? Why? Why, Debra??!". But anyway this week's ep saw the two teams having to come up with an idea to rebrand Margate, Empire chose a theme of the gay community while Ignite's theme was family. From the get go Ignite's campaign showed much more promise mainly because the team worked as a team, apart from some resistance from ever gobby Lorraine always having her say. But Yasmina proved herself to be an excellent project manager again as she kept a level head and just got on with it. The Empire team however was a different story, with Debra bulldozing her way into being the project manager despite Howard initially stepping to do the job. Howard despite not getting to be project manager did manage to supervise the creative side of the task and he did an excellent job. However I think their task was let down by a lack of support from Mona, and James to be fair did his best to pitch in despite making the odd off colour comment (to the guy models pretending to be a gay couple he said "OK guys we're not making a porno!"). Their posters were frankly awful and their leaflet for their campaign left a lot of blank space in it, too, this was mainly Debra's fault as he spent so much time mucking about not making a decision. Another important point here was that Debra doesn't listen to anyone, or rather she is unable to as it goes in one ear and out the other! Howard while trying to make a good point about the poster having too many words just fell on deaf ears while Debra was supposedly listening, and their posters ended up with too many words. During the pitches by the teams, both pitches were well received but it was Empire who fell short of the mark as people thought their posters were dreadful and confusing.
In the boardroom Sir Alan told them that of the two teams Ignite were the winners as the Local residents and Industry experts gave them 7/10 while Empire only got 4/10. After that in the boardroom Debra who came back in with James and Mond, showed a bit more restraint this time probably because of her verbal warning from Sir Alan about her attitude towards Nick last time. But in the end Sir Alan had to chalk it up to how people had peformed in the past weeks and he decided to fire Mona because of her lack of creativity (although he did fire her "with regret"). To be honest though I thought Sir Alan was wrong to fire Mona too, as she herself said, if anyone should have been fired it should have been Debra, she mis-managed the task badly and didn't listen to anyone. James was also skating a bit on thin ice as his contribution wasn't major from what I'd seen Mona took more to the asking the questions, James seem to hang around the background. I'm also not so sure about James in the show now as I think he seems to be watching his own back and try and not get himself fired as well as being a bit of a grass by dobbing on other people (namely Mona). So out of the remaining contestants so far, the ones I'd like to see with a chance of winning and getting into the final would be Yasmina, who has really proved herself as a manager and has a good positive way of working with everyone, and Howard, who really stepped up in this episode and also is very level headed and Kate, who is very capable although she does appear to be a bit icy at times.
Phew! That was a long un. That's all for now.
OK, I'm feeling better now, this week actually has been good for me as I've got the place to myself while the folks are away on holiday, so its the usual fend for oneself and try to remember to all the household chores (ok not that many really!). Last night though I was pleased cos I managed to finally get to cook for myself as I've been out at nights quite a bit this week so last night was a night in, made some sausage pasta, yum yum! The week to myself however could have been better if didn't have that viral bug come back on me like it did last Friday night as I felt a bit crap for half the week, but thankfully its cleared up for now (for now! or for a good while I hope!).
Anyways as I said its been a busy week, on Monday managed to get a couple of DVD/Blu-ray discs, so I was chuffed to finally get Doctor Who: The Deadly Assassin on DVD (OK nerdy mode on!) which was really good, hardly forgotten how good it was and it showed Tom Baker effortlessly holding his own without a companion to assist him (he basically needs someone to spout out the exposition to!). The story is a wonderful mix of suspense, thrills, high drama and there's some comedy too of course (I love the line where Cardinal Borusa says to the Doctor "You will never amount to anything in the galaxy as long as you retain your propensity for vulgar fascetiousness!"). The story is about the Doctor returning to his home planet Gallifrey to try and prevent the assassination of the President of the Time Lords only to find himself framed for the crime himself.
The cast are all great in the show with excellent performances from George Pravda as Castellan Spandrell, Angus MacKay as Cardinal Borusa and Bernard Horsfall as Chancellor Goth. The only thing that slightly let it down for me was that the Master albeit played excellently by the late Peter Pratt was perhaps a little too dramatic all the time with too much emphasis on high drama and hardly anything in the way of wit and humour. In short it didn't remind of the Master as he should be, but I guess as the character was dying he would be highly melodramatic. All the same The Deadly Assassin is a classic from a time when Doctor Who was at its absolute peak, and its a real reminder of just how good the show can be, as this show certainly stands miles above the current Russell T Davies ressurected campathon, much as I enjoy it, it'll never scale those heights again.
Now onto The Apprentice episode 8 which was once again very entertaining and had me shaking my head at the screen at certain points going "Why? Why? Why, Debra??!". But anyway this week's ep saw the two teams having to come up with an idea to rebrand Margate, Empire chose a theme of the gay community while Ignite's theme was family. From the get go Ignite's campaign showed much more promise mainly because the team worked as a team, apart from some resistance from ever gobby Lorraine always having her say. But Yasmina proved herself to be an excellent project manager again as she kept a level head and just got on with it. The Empire team however was a different story, with Debra bulldozing her way into being the project manager despite Howard initially stepping to do the job. Howard despite not getting to be project manager did manage to supervise the creative side of the task and he did an excellent job. However I think their task was let down by a lack of support from Mona, and James to be fair did his best to pitch in despite making the odd off colour comment (to the guy models pretending to be a gay couple he said "OK guys we're not making a porno!"). Their posters were frankly awful and their leaflet for their campaign left a lot of blank space in it, too, this was mainly Debra's fault as he spent so much time mucking about not making a decision. Another important point here was that Debra doesn't listen to anyone, or rather she is unable to as it goes in one ear and out the other! Howard while trying to make a good point about the poster having too many words just fell on deaf ears while Debra was supposedly listening, and their posters ended up with too many words. During the pitches by the teams, both pitches were well received but it was Empire who fell short of the mark as people thought their posters were dreadful and confusing.
In the boardroom Sir Alan told them that of the two teams Ignite were the winners as the Local residents and Industry experts gave them 7/10 while Empire only got 4/10. After that in the boardroom Debra who came back in with James and Mond, showed a bit more restraint this time probably because of her verbal warning from Sir Alan about her attitude towards Nick last time. But in the end Sir Alan had to chalk it up to how people had peformed in the past weeks and he decided to fire Mona because of her lack of creativity (although he did fire her "with regret"). To be honest though I thought Sir Alan was wrong to fire Mona too, as she herself said, if anyone should have been fired it should have been Debra, she mis-managed the task badly and didn't listen to anyone. James was also skating a bit on thin ice as his contribution wasn't major from what I'd seen Mona took more to the asking the questions, James seem to hang around the background. I'm also not so sure about James in the show now as I think he seems to be watching his own back and try and not get himself fired as well as being a bit of a grass by dobbing on other people (namely Mona). So out of the remaining contestants so far, the ones I'd like to see with a chance of winning and getting into the final would be Yasmina, who has really proved herself as a manager and has a good positive way of working with everyone, and Howard, who really stepped up in this episode and also is very level headed and Kate, who is very capable although she does appear to be a bit icy at times.
Phew! That was a long un. That's all for now.
# posted by kenny @ 11:59 am 
