Torchwood season :: 1-10 July

Never mind creation and dinosaurs, Torchwood is back!

There was an interview with Russell T Davies about Doctor Who and Torchwood on Front Row last night. And for three days this week, Radio 4’s Afternoon Play (14:15-15:00) is running a sequence of 45 minute dramas featuring the regular cast.

• Wednesday 1 - The Torchwood team investigate after a strange teenage girl is arrested (Anita Sullivan)
• Thursday 2 - The Torchwood team go to Delhi on the trail of a dangerous energy field (James Goss)
• Friday 3 - Torchwood investigate when people start falling into coma -like trances (Phil Ford)

Update - the R4 plays are available to download as mono MP3s for three days after broadcast - easier to listen to on your MP3 player than online ... and there's a how-they-recorded-it post on the Radio 4 blog.

And then next week, Torchwood is striped across BBC One and BBC HD from Monday to Friday at 9pm (and repeated at 23:45 on BBC Three, 00:15 on Friday). The story arc follows is summed up in the press pack:

An ordinary day becomes a world of terror, as every single child in the world stops. A message is sent to all the governments of Earth: “We are coming”.

But as a trap closes around Captain Jack, sins of the past are returning, as long-forgotten events from 1965 threaten to reveal an awful truth.

Torchwood are forced underground, as the government takes swift and brutal action. With members of the team being hunted down, Britain risks becoming a rogue state, with the mysterious and powerful 456 drawing ever closer.

Fairy Tales - Echo Beach / Moving Wallpaper - Shameless - Grand Designs - Torchwood - Primeval

Quick TV round-up for those who care!

Last night saw the airing of the first of four Fairy Tales on BBC One, with Rapunzel finally letting her hair down at the tennis. The anthology of tales with a contemporary retelling were all shot in Northern Ireland by Hat Trick. The Daily Telegraph were uncharacteristically upbeat in their review:

“Cross dressing, cod lesbianism and idiocy on the international tennis circuit probably wouldn’t be most people’s idea of the perfect background for a modern reappraisal of a classic fairy tale. But unlikely as it may seem, BBC1’s reworking of Rapunzel as a slapstick comedy, in which a failing East European tennis pro is persuaded to bluff his way into a UK ladies’ tournament in a desperate bid to win some cash, was an unexpected hoot.”

Also started last night was ITV’s new soap Echo Beach (Jason Donovan and Martine McCutcheon based in sun-kissed Cornwall) immediately preceded by the behind-the-scenes show Moving Wallpaper which takes a fictional look at the production process and stars Ben Miller as the series’ producer. Didn’t catch it live last night, but it’s got mixed reviews in this morning’s press.

The twelve episodes of Echo Beach and its associated mockumentary are made by Kudos, who rarely (if ever?) pick up commissions from ITV and are better known for their BBC and Channel 4 fare: Life on Mars, Hustle, Spooks, The Amazing Mrs Pritchard, Pleasureland.

Update - having caught up with the first week's run, I'd comment that Moving Wallpaper was reasonable viewing - and it made Echo Beach bearable (standalone it would have been pretty naff). Worth taping and giving it a chance for at least the next couple of episodes in it's 12 week run. Suspect it'll be a terrific success - but won't be recommissioned. Update - Second episode of MW was worth it purely for the Casualty joke - tripping on the mint imperials and landing headfirst on a fork stuck in blutack!

The latest series of Shameless snuck on Channel 4 on New Year’s Day and continues on Tuesday nights at 10pm. If like me you missed the first few episodes of the sixteen-part series, they’re available for free on C4’s catch-up service 4oD.

Kevin McCloud is dusting off his hard hat and optimism in the face of doom to present another series of Grand Designs starting at 9pm next Wednesday (16th) with a house that is being built 60% underground to meet planning restrictions. The half hour Grand Designs Trade Secrets sister series over on more4 immediately afterwards is often worth a watch to find even wackier examples of crazy architecture.

Update - Given that the couple's architect wasn't retained during the build, his/her design must have been very detailed and well thought out for the build to have completed so successfully. Felt nearly too straight-forward and drama light for the first in the new series? Property shows = watching other people make mistakes at their cost. Interesting that C4 didn't seem to trail the more4 Trade Secrets show as part of the closing credits - preferring to promote Jamie Oliver.

And making the assumption that the audience for property shows doesn’t significantly overlap with those who will tune in for sci-fi, BBC Two have scheduled the new series of Torchwood in the same Wednesday 9pm slot (repeated on BBC Three at 11pm). Available in high def on the BBC HD satellite channel. The promised family friendly repeat looks to be at 7pm the following Wednesday evening, immediately followed by the Torchwood Declassified behind-the-scenes spinoff.

Update - Thank goodness for iPlayer having Torchwood available to stream (and download) immediately after the show finished on BBC Two. Great opening, with the real life comment that Cardiff residents make about the show's filming - "Bloody Torchwood!" worked into the script. A show that didn't take itself too seriously, but had pace, tension and enough confusion to get the viewer through to the end (where they neatly summarised the background to Torchwood for anyone unfamiliar). And good to see that Gwen's life hasn't become any less complicated!

And if Russell T Davies doesn’t provide enough beasts and monsters, the second series of Primeval starting on ITV at 7pm on Saturday night (12th) will surely quench your thirst for dinosaurs and other animals that had to be CGIed as they were too dangerous to be taken out of their cages.

If you care that you can’t remember what happened at the end of the first series of Primeval, ITV are helpfully showing the last episode at 1.45pm on Saturday - just in time to put young kids off their lunch - sandwiched in-between a Coronation Street Omnibus and Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Guess which scheduler wants to win this Saturday’s ratings war!

Update: Primeval failed to achieve the balance between levity and taking itself seriously. The fact that massive creatures could come through a time anomaly and eat up human civilisation isn't really that terrifying ... or funny. So unlike Doctor Who with its doom-laden yet jokey plots, it didnt really engage me. Besides, weren't dinosaurs boring by the second Jurassic Park film?

Series 3 Torchwood promo online from 9pm tonight

I’m a fan of Torchwood, the Doctor Who spin-off show. Fewer dinosaurs than Primeval, real lives on show, and the one novelisation I read was pretty good too.

It has been in a rapid ascendancy. Its first series was shown on BBC Three (and repeated on BBC Two). The second series – which had stronger storylines than Doctor Who at the time - then premiered on BBC Two and was endlessly repeated on BBC Three. (A CERN-based radio play turned up on Radio 4 on Big Bang Day.) And the third series is due on air later in 2009 and will be screened over five nights on BBC One (and no doubt repeated back home on Three).

From 9pm tonight, a minute-long trailer for the third series will be made available on the programme website to promote the “epic story ... Torchwood's greatest adrenalin-fuelled, high octane adventure yet.” Aren’t press releases wonderful!

Torchwood: Children of Earth re-joins Captain Jack (John Barrowman), Gwen Cooper (Eve Myles) and Ianto Jones (Gareth David Lloyd) who are still coming to terms with the death of two of their closest friends. Despite their pain, they have a job to do.

This time they are faced with their fiercest threat to date - one which throws the future of Torchwood and the entire human race spiralling into danger. They battle against the odds but do they stand a chance of saving mankind?

Russell T Davies has executive produced the series along with Doctor Who stalwart Julie Gardner, and writing alongside Davies are John Fay and James Moran.

Update - clip should be embedded below:

Torchwood back on Radio 4 | Primeval on the big screen

Two bits of sci-fi news.

Torchwood popped up with Lost Souls, an Afternoon Play on Radio 4 back in September on the day the Large Hadron Collider was switched on at CERN – shortly before it went offline for unplanned maintenance!

And now there’s news that three more 45-minute radio plays have been recorded for airing on R4 this summer before the show’s third series returns to BBC Three Two One over five consecutive nights.

Asylum by Anita Sullivan. The story of a teen runaway called Freda who is brought to the attention of Torchwood by PC Andy. As Gwen, Jack and Ianto investigate where this troubled girl has come from, Andy finds himself drawn closer than ever before into the world of Torchwood.

Golden Age by James Goss. Torchwood go to India to investigate the disappearance of hundreds of people. The trail leads them to an old colonial club which seems strangely stuck in the past as does its young and beautiful owner, the Duchess.

The Dead Line by Phil Ford. A series of mysterious phone calls lead Jack into danger, and result in 'a very emotional moment for Ianto'.

Secondly, it’s been announced that the screen rights to ITV’s Saturday evening show Primeval have been picked up Warner Bros. Broadcast magazine explains that Akiva Goldsman will write the screenplay (recently worked on the new Angels and Demons film) while Kerry Foster will produce the movie.

“There is a solid mythology to the series, but the movie has the dinosaur element of Jurassic Park and the time travel element of Lost, and it just feels like the kind of big movie that Warner Bros. does well,” Foster said.

Now all we need is some news about Sky’s revival of Blake’s 7!

Torchwood: Another Life

I wanted to read three books while off on holiday this year. Managed about two and a half. I’ll come back to Jim and Casper Go to Church in a later post. (Though in the meantime, a big thank you to Ally for the tip-off.)

Amongst more serious tomes, the escapism book—that will confirm to regular AiB readers that I’m a (literary) lost cause—was one of the Torchwood novels, a spinoff from the TV spinoff from Doctor Who. I’d picked it up in the BBC Shop in Belfast before it closed in the Spring.

Based in a severely flooded Cardiff, the story echoes the inclement weather being experienced around the UK recently! Despite the tiny font size, Torchwood: Another Life (written by Peter Anghelides) was an original story and a remarkably good read, building on the familiar characters and locations. It could have done with some stronger editing to take out a couple of unfortunately repeated details and phrases, and to fix the two spulling miztakes I noticed as I breezed through.

As the third Doctor Who series ended and companion Martha Jones (played by Freema Agyeman) stepped out of the Tardis for a half-season break to allow Catherine Tate a reprise of her Runaway Bride character, it was announced that Martha will be popping up in the next series of Torchwood which will noq definitely not be aired until early 2008. However, it will be shown first on BBC Two, unlike the first series which was run on BBC Three.

If you’re a Whovian, or just a fan of sci-fi fiction, check out the Torchwood books. They’re as good as many of the more recent Doctor Who novels - the sci-fi equivalent of Mills and Boon!

Torchwood series two - pre and post watershed

As a not-so-closet Doctor Who fan, it’s good to hear a few more details about the Torchwood spin-off that’s starts screening its second series on BBC Two in mid-January.

Amongst the thirteen episodes, expect more shenanigans from Captain Jack, Gwen (now engaged), Owen, Toshiko and the understated tea boy Ianto in and around the murky world of Cardiff Bay. Martha Jones pops in to help out in three episodes, slightly older and wiser since we last saw her in the Tardis, having now completed her medical studies. (Spoilers ahoy!)

The first series originally aired post-watershed on BBC Three, repeated on BBC Two.

This time around, the main show goes out on BBC Two. Satellite viewers with access to the BBC HD channel will again get to see Torchwood in its full high-definition g(l)ory. And a special family-friendly repeat will be shown - unsure whether on BBC2 or CBBC - eliminating the worst excesses of language, sexuality and violence in a slightly shorter show.

It’ll be interesting to see the variation in the edits, and whether major plotlines are eliminated from younger-pitched version. At Monday’s press launch, creator Russel T Davies was reported as saying:

“We’ll cut the swearing and cut the violence, but no we will not be cutting the kissing, so no story there.”

Linnea Dobson over in Firefox News wonders about the US version too. To make room for ad breaks, the first series was severely hacked to shorten each episode, removing a lot of the depth of the narrative. And will the US audiences see the child-friendly version? Or a third edit?

Update: Check out other posts that mention Torchwood ...

Torchwood - end of the first series

Well, Torchwood certainly went out with a bang. (Spot who’s been catching up on recordings from over Christmas and the New Year!) I’ve previously commented that about the half the episodes were good, and the rest felt poor.

Episode 10, “Out of Time”, was amongst the best for the series. It’s a completely different style of episode, reminding of the odd Doctor Who episode that peppered the first and second (new) series and split the fan base by being less Doctor-based and more driven by the other characters: Father’s Day and Love & Monsters. It was slower, more reflective piece, looking at how situations affected lives, rather than focussing on aliens and gadgets.

For those who haven’t been following the series, the story begins when three people from 1953 accidentally fly through a rift in the time-space continuum and land at an airstrip near Cardiff in 2006, breaking goodness knows how many CAA regulations. The story then unravels the complexity of the 1950s characters as they live in a world that had moved on, and no longer feels like their home, and watches as a member of the Torchwood befriends each visitor.

• John Ellis is crushed when he discovers that his son is an old man and has Alzheimer’s, unable to recognise his father. John chose suicide as a way out of his nightmare. (It’s a brave production decision to portray John’s desperation in this way, and one I question a little given that it’s only science fiction.)
• Diane finds love (with Owen) but won’t settle and flies off to try and find the rift again.
• Emma is the most naïve of the three, and yet is the only one to stay. With 1950s styles back in fashion, her insight is in demand, and she hops on a train to London to join the rag trade!

Each character is confronted with different problems and we watch them working through them. It’s a sensitive episode, and worthy of a place amongst the other twelve in Torchwood’s first series. And before we get too intense, it’s still only science fiction and to get too wrapped up in it would be to take it too seriously!

The final double bill (episode 12 “Captain Jack Harkness” and 13 “End of Days”) places the stress back on the Torchwood team. What risks will they take for each other and those that they love? Is Ianto the only male on the show that Gwen doesn’t carry a flame for? The villain, intriguingly named Bilis Manger, is incredibly creepy.

The final couple of minutes is weak. It felt like they’d cleared out the studio and filmed it with only the minimum of crew around to keep the storyline quiet. And after the noise and bustle of the previous hour and a bit, it contrasted badly, feeling tacked on the end as an afterthought. The wheeze of a TARDIS and the disappearance of Captain Jack surely a cue into the third series of Doctor Who that is due for UK transmission in the Spring 2007. (In fact, Who Spotters already predict that Captain Jack will appear in episode 11 called “Utopia”. Too much detail.)

We can look forward to the second series.

Rogue Spooks – doing a Torchwood

I’ve been a fan of the Spooks (known as MI-5 in the US) since the first series. I think it was the second episode that brutally killed a female character in frying fat.

It was an uncompromising moment. She could have been shot, or the captors could have relented. But no. The story, and the producers and writers, went through with the horrible scenario. As someone pointed out in the poor-man’s episode guide that is Wikipedia, it “… set the precedent that, in Spooks, anyone can die at any time”.

Why am I telling you this?

Well, just as Doctor Who has now spun off Torchwood, the BBC have announced at their winter and spring schedule launch that we should expect a Rogue Spooks show to appear on our screens in late 2007. It will follow MI5 recruits who “follow a different rule book”.

Sounds very like the plot of a David Wolstencroft novel: Good News Bad News and Contact Zero – both excellent page-turning reads. And this should be no surprise since he’s the creator of the Spooks drama.

Torchwood is doing very well on BBC Three (and the repeats on BBC2) – much better audience figures than Sky are achieving with the third series of Lost (recently stolen from Channel 4).

The quality of Torchwood episodes has been variable. Roughly half are very watchable. The rest are pretty woeful. I’m not sure that the cheaper production costs that Torchwood enjoys are a good excuse for poor (or variable) writing. Maybe if Russell T. Davies had time to write more episodes it would have a better batting average?

I worry that Rogue Spooks will have the same problems.

Torchwood special on Radio 4 this summer ... to mark the opening of new particle accelerator (LHC) at CERN

The current series of Torchwood has been a lot stronger than the first, and probably better viewing that Doctor Who (though it’s some kind of heresy to admit this in a public forum).

So greet with interest news that there’s to be a one-off Torchwood special masquerading as Radio 4’s Afternoon Play this summer, to coincide and tie in with the opening of the world’s largest particle accelerator at CERN.

Veteran of penning Torchwood episodes and Doctor Who online material, Joseph Lidster is writing the radio play which will star the usual cast (John Barrowman etc) and the show’s regular production team.

The Large Hadron Collider is a spectacular 27km ring running 100m under the Switzerland/France border outside Geneva. (Workers have to carry their passports at all times in case they have to evacuate the facility into a different country from the one they went down to work in!)

You can apply online to go along to visit LHC on 6 April 2008 if you think you’ll be near Geneva. Regular tours of CERN are available six days a week ... we nearly visited while on honeymoon in Switzerland, except I applied too late - there’s a three or four month waiting list.

CERN, LHC, Torchwood on Radio 4, and a topical (but ultimately poor) joke

While I mentioned it back in March, the traditional media and the blogosphere have probably made quite enough comments on Wednesday’s forthcoming events at CERN.

There has been a definite outbreak of science in the airwaves, with BBC Four showing programmes trailing the grand switch on of the Large Hadron Collider and half of Radio 4’s schedule coming from a bunker near Geneva tomorrow.

One highlight for the science-fiction fans (folk who imagine about science but mostly don’t actually do experiments) is Radio 4’s Afternoon Play is a Torchwood special, with a familiar cast, music by Murray Gold, and even takes place outside Cardiff!

Afternoon Play
Big Bang Day: Torchwood - Lost Souls
By Joseph Lidster.

The Torchwood team go to Geneva, where former time-traveller Martha Jones is now working as a doctor at the world's biggest physics laboratory, CERN. Deep in an underground tunnel, a giant particle accelerator is about to be activated for the first time. But something strange is happening. Scientists are hearing voices and collapsing with a strange illness. Is something lurking in the tunnel?

I’ll leave you with a joke.

Little girl: Daddy. What’s a physicist?

Daddy: Oh, that's the man who uses a straw to put the bubbles into the lemonade bottles.

Thank you. You’ve been a great audience ...

Long time to carry a flame for Torchwood

It'll soon be sci-fi season again. Primeval started a couple of weeks ago on ITV. I haven't got around to watching any of the first few episodes. They're stacked up, gathering dust on the full-to-bulging Tivo. But many of the original reviews suggest it's closer to the team-based Torchwood rather than Doctor Who.

David Tennant's Doctor Who's is due back on the small screen sometime in March, just after Primeval ends.

But back to Torchwood.

According to Podshock episode #67, John Barrowman (Torchwood's Captain Jack)was interviewed a week or so ago on BBC Radio 2, and explained that there will be a twelve month gap between the end of series one (whose finale went out on New Year’s Day) and the next series - which will not now be broadcast until 2008.

Torchwood - series two will be on BBC2

(Was Doctor Who and the runaway bride any good yesterday? I haven't seen it yet. Should I be bovvered!?)

Sometimes it feels a little like a Torchwood tribute blog, part of a Torchwood website ring thingy. And that’s when I’m not yet 100% sure the series is working!

Well the BBC are sure, and they’ve green-lighted a second series, and propose to air it on BBC2 ahead of BBC3 (the other way around from the current, first, series).

And yes, I know that some of you will complain about the use of “green-lighted”, but it’s Christmas!

Roly Keating, Controller of BBC2, spoke at the launch of the channel’s winter/spring schedule, and promised that a second series of Torchwood would begin filming in spring with a view to airing next autumn.

Torchwood vs Lost :: Freeview vs Sky

Media Guardian, a source of overnight viewing figures, reported last week that Torchwood is edging ahead of Lost in the multi-channel viewing stakes.

If you’re new to the terminology—and I’ve been told
off before for being too obtuse—multi-channel refers to TV channels that are available to people watching more than just the five free terrestrial channels in the UK. So it includes Freeview (digital terrestrial), Freesat (free-to-air channels on satellite), Sky and cable.

Since Sky wrestled Lost from the hands of Channel 4, it’s been available only to satellite or cable subscribers with Sky One in their package. As I’ve commented previously, it’s bye bye lost from me. This is a much smaller potential audience than those who can catch Torchwood on BBC Three on Freeview, Cable, Sky as well as a handful on Freesat. Both are no doubt available on BitTorrent!

Last week’s figures:

• BBC3, Torchwood = 971,000 viewers (up from 958,000 the week before)
• Sky One, Lost = 863,000 viewers (down below 1 million for the first time this series)

A Dalek watching over Belfast ... and new Doctor Who

Driving across from East Belfast and onto the M2 on Sunday we noticed a large white Dalek on the face of Cave Hill Divis. Had one finally escaped from Cardiff?

It’s been a pretty successful, if exhausting, publicity stunt by Denis Rush of UT Events to advertise the forthcoming Vortex Doctor Who convention being held in Belfast’s Europa Hotel on Sunday 3 May from 9am to 1am. Explaining his actions to the BBC:

“There was meant to be a giant question mark beside the Dalek, but I ran out of bed linen,” said Denis speaking to BBC News.

The giant Dalek took two days to make after Denis had ‘exterminated’ his family’s entire supply of bed sheets.

“The first day it was just myself up there and then on the second day my girlfriend Tory gave me a hand,” he said. “I must have asked every single member of my family for any spare bed sheets they had.”

“It was tough going as it must be a 50 degree slope, but it was definitely worth it.”

Last year, the same organisers held a science fiction event in W5. This year, the prices have been cut down from £35 to £10, but you no longer get a free autograph etc. (Tickets are being sold online.) The convention isn’t profit making, and instead will hold prize draws and a charity auction in aid of the Northern Ireland Children’s Hospice throughout the day.

Look out for the Ood (I can hear Murray Gold’s oooooy music in my head as type), Lady Cassandra (is she stretching herself thinly across conventions?), the TARDIS, a Dalek and K9. At this stage, the guest stars expected to attend is Gareth David Lloyd (who plays Ianto in the Torchwood spin-off), Chipo Chung (acted in a couple of Doctor Who episodes) and Paul Marc Davis (who has appeared in Doctor Who, Torchwood and Sarah Jane Adventure).

So if you’re wandering around the centre of Belfast, expect some strange sounds to emanate from Europa’s new conference room, and the sight of a few fans in fancy dress (they might prefer “dressed up in costume”) wandering around looking like they’ve fallen through the Void.

Will I be there? While a Doctor Who fan, I’m not sure you could pay me to attend a convention! But I will be watching the new episode that will be shown on BBC One and BBC HD on Saturday (11 April) at 6.45pm - Planet of the Dead complete with a cat suited Wonderwoman Michelle Ryan and a London Bus.

(Image from TBSteve/Flickr)

Primeval & Castaway - disappointing damp squibs

Recently I’ve been disappointed with a couple of TV shows that haven’t lived up to their expectation.

ITV’s Primeval was created in a bid to tap into the audience who in their millions had tuned in on Saturday nights to the BBC’s resurrection of Doctor Who. (What a terribly worded sentence—no Clear English awards here!)

But could ITV deliver a distinct sci-fi series, with an emphasis on time anomalies and strange creatures, to compete with the BBC’s time lord?

One the one hand ... it’s been commercially successful, with sales to international broadcasters in Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Spain. The UK viewing figures have been sliding a little since the 6.7 million who watched the opening episode. But they’re still way ahead of the combined BBC3 and BBC2 viewing figures for Torchwood (the Doctor Who spin off).

But on the other hand ... it’s boring and tedious. It’s hard to work up any pathos for the characters, something which Russell Davies has licked over on the other side. And story-wise, it feels less catchy that Crime Traveller. Spiders and centipedes, monsters in lakes and swimming pools. Torchwood was a whole lot more enjoyable to watch. Primeval turns out to be an uncomfortable mix of science fiction and natural history, and I only like the first.

BBC’s Castaway 2007, which I trailed on AiB a few weeks ago, has turned out to be a damp squib too.

They’re a nice bunch of people, though the deliberate absence of the very young and very old is unfortunate. (The participant’s ages are 19, 22, 22, 22, 24, 24, 27, 27, 33, 37, 41, 42, 56, 65.)

Overall, nice people, with fewer squabbles than we’re used to with reality shows set in Australia.
The tasks haven’t been too enthralling: killing chickens and sending people to live in a hut and be battered by the overnight rain didn’t make compulsive viewing. And I don’t seem to be alone.

Viewers have been turning off in their millions, so much so that the weekly hour-long show has been pulled off the Sunday night BBC1 schedule, and will now go out as three half hour shows at 7pm on Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday evenings.

And the nightly BBC3 catch up shows have failed to excite the multi-channel audience, with just 58,000 tuning in.

The public poll currently running the BBC’s Castaway website is fairly damning. Think I’d vote for a surf board to allow them to escape (though in truth, they’re in a nature reserve and there’s a big road leading out to nearly civilisation).

Doctor Who takes a gap year to go travelling? And turns into Doctor When?

The third “new” series of Doctor Who finished at the end of June with Martha staying behind, leaving the Doctor to head off towards his Christmas adventure and an appointment with the Kylie Minogue and the Titanic.

They’re currently filming the fourth series, with Martha Jones (played by Freema Agyeman, originally known for her fiery character in the revamped but short-lived Crossroads) swapping into the spin-off Torchwood production, before returning to the cast for the second half of the main series. Donna, the runaway bride from Christmas 2006 (played by Catherine Tate) will accompany the Doctor throughout the entire fourth series.

Airing in 2008, the fourth series was expected to be Russell T Davies last. There was speculation that Steven Moffat (who already writes several episo des a season) would take over executive producer/show runner responsibilities, leaving Davies free to work on other shows. Moffat was rumoured to be partnering up with recent colleague James Nesbitt, who would play the new Doctor.

However, a different compromise seems to have been reached with Russell T Davies signing up to write and produce three Doctor Who specials during 2008 (for transmission in 2009), significantly reducing his commitment down from the current 9 months it takes to produce a full series, and leaving him free to pursue some other projects during the slack. He’s promised to return (though not necessarily with David Tennant as the Doctor) to run series five.

So what will the Doctor do while we’re not following him?

Update: In fact, at last night’s TV Quick and TV Choice Awards ceremony, Doctor Two scooped the Best Loved Drama plaudit, while David Tennant won Best Actor. Oh, and Torchwood picked up the gong for Best New Drama.

Search gems - and a few stats

The strangest google search that ended up on this blog for quite some time:

• methodist college belfast nappy

While we're in statistics overload, of the last 100 visitors to Alan in Belfast:

• 47% used Internet Explorer (27% on IE 6.*, 20% on IE 7.0)
• 41% used Firefox (or Mozilla)
• 11% used Safari
• 1% Opera

And in terms of operating systems:

• 84% Windows XP
• 11% Mac OS X
• 2% Microsoft Vista
• 1% Linux
• 1% Windows 98
• 1% other

Oh, and the monitor resolutions of the snapshot of 100 visitors ranged from 800x600 (10%) up to a massive 1680x1050 (4%).

Before you get worried about your privacy, these stats are sent out every time you request to download a page from a webserver. (Some browsers will allow you to spoof some of the data. Opera is usually underreported as people set it to pretend to be IE to increase compatibility.)

As well a flood of seasonal hits looking for GPS devices, some of the other search terms include:

• youtube mouse belfast (the guy who bit the head of a mouse)
• flashmob belfast (I don't think there is one planned)
• jobs at ikea belfast (don't think there's anything listed yet)
• knocknagoney tesco jobs (bit late for a Christmas job!)

as well as a flood for

• torchwood series 2 and torchwood series two.

books.google.co.uk

I'd never come across books.google.co.uk until tonight.

It uses Google's usual core capabilities of pattern matching and collating disparate sources together about a subject (or search topic), offering a window onto books, their (table of) contents, reviews and references from other websites.

I stumbled across it since AiB reviews feature in the references lists of various books that I've posted about and I've started to get hits from those webpages.

• 26a (Diana Evans) [Google Books]
• Anthony Blair Captain of School (John Morrison) [Google Books]
• As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela ... (Mark Thomas) [Google Books]
• The Colour of a Dog Running Away (Richard Gwyn) [Google Books]
• Death and the Penguin (Andrey Kurkov) [Google Books]
• Diplomatic Baggage: The Adventures of a Trailing Spouse (Brigid Keenan) [Google Books]
• Explorers of the New Century (Magnus Mills) [Google Books]
• In Your Dreams (Tom Holt) [Google Books]
• Jim and Casper Go to Church (Jim Henderson & Matt Casper) [Google Books]
• JPod (Douglas Coupland) [Google Books]
• Lapsed Protestant (Glenn Patterson) [Google Books]
• A New Kind of Christian (Brian McLaren) [Google Books]
• Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (Paul Torday) [Google Books]
• Savage Shepherds (Adam Harbinson) [Google Books]
• Speak for England (James Hawes) [Google Books]
• Spies (Michael Frayn) [Google Books]
• Take This Bread (Sara Miles) [Google Books]
• Torchwood - Another Life (Peter Anghelides) [Google Books]
• Thura's Diary, a young girl's life in a war-torn Baghdad (Thura Al-Windawi) [Google Books]
• A Wayne in a Manger (Gervase Phinn) [Google Books]

TV update ...

ITV have recaptured The Prisoner, and are planning six hour-long episodes for transmission in 2009. The cast will include James Caviezel (Number 6) and Sir Ian McKellen (Number 2 - fixed this time, not alternating). Mark Goodacre has some analysis and comment.

Having missed The Prisoner on TV first time around, I did read a few of the books in my early teens. While Portmerrion (Penrhyndeudraeth) is unlikely to feature in the filming of the new version, I’m looking forward to seeing what they can do with it.

During the last season of Torchwood, I speculated that it now had stronger storylines than the main Doctor Who show it was spun of from. But the last four or five Saturday evenings have proved that wrong. If anything, it’s moved on from being a 7pm Saturday night family entertainment show to serious (well, thrilling) drama. Quite dark and sinister. And will there actually be a regeneration or not? Will they drag it out over the next year? Or will Donna's death somehow cancel the regeneration that's started?

Spooks: Code 9 is still filming. The shows fan blog had an intriguing post title a few weeks ago ...

Timelord dates cute Spook

... referring to the speculation that David Tennant is dating Georgia Moffett (who played his daughter in the recent The Doctor's Daughter episode, and is in fact the real life daughter of Peter Davidson who played the fifth Doctor - the one with the cricket outfit and red question marks on his collar).

Georgia’s also one of the edgy newly recruited spies in the Spooks spin-off looking at life in the UK as the power base shifts north when a nuclear bomb triggers the evacuation of London.

Here endeth the tabloid gossip ...

Doctor Who finale - prayer, forgiveness and grace

I've heard worse sermons than tonight's final episode of the third (new) series of Doctor Who.

Russell T. Davies isn't known for his apologetics for the Christian faith. Yet there were insights into the state of the human soul to be grasped.

The grotesque inhumanity of human kind - the human orbs from the future getting pleasure out of killing the present day humans.

And the ability of humans across the world to unite for a good cause - thinking/praying the Doctor back to health and youth - admittedly with the help of a 15-satellite telepathy network!

The Doctor - a God-like character - willing to forgive the Master who had tried to kill him and the population of the Earth. To paraphrase "What am I going to do with you? (pause) I forgive you." Not able or willing to eliminate the last of his type - the only other living timelord .

And yet the Master unwilling to accept the the Doctor's offer of grace - and the prospect of living with the Doctor in the Tardis. Salvation refused, won't regenerate, won't change.

There's the pain of the Doctor as the Master dies and is cremated on the pyre. An evil man laid to rest, yet still his kith and kin. No pleasure.

Season two ended with a runaway bride running through the Tardis doors. Season three ends with the Titanic slicing through the Tardis walls like an ice berg, heralding the theme of the Christmas special, which will no doubt end with Martha calling in the Doctor and reuniting for Season four. And we got the nod for the next season of Torchwood on BBC Two - either in the Autumn or as previously reported in early 2008.