Election ’70

One of the absolute TV highlights of last year was BBC Parliament’s screening of the BBC 1979 General Election results coverage. With the minimum of publicity and in a resolutely low-key fashion, the entire service was repeated minute by minute in real time. Read more

Little Britain

At last! BBC3 finally presents its miniscule audience with a programme that’s worth watching. Read more

Dick and Dom in da Bungalow

It’s a fact that a rather large percentage of the audience for Saturday morning television is still trying to overcome the effects of the previous evening. Read more

The Games

Who wants to read another word on the glut of reality TV shows currently stinking up the schedules? Yet, how can you write a review on a reality show without dipping a toe into the now stagnant waters of this debate? Read more

Overnite Express

A low-rent The High Life on wheels – that would be the kindest way of describing this utterly dreadful comedy from BBC Scotland. Read more

dinnerladies

Invariably, when the epithet “gentle” is thrown at a television programme, it is meant as a criticism. Unsophisticated, they mean. Without depth. For the masses. No class. Read more

The West Wing

President Bartlet’s White House isn’t quite the alluring and mysterious realm it once was. It used to play host to one of the most unmissable, unforgettable series on television. Read more

That’ll Teach ‘em

That’ll Teach ‘em has a one-sentence pitch – make a class of today’s 16-year-olds experience a month of a 1950s O Level education – that belies its huge scope and its capacity for entertainment. Read more

Emmerdale

Standing head and shoulders above its contemporaries, Emmerdale continues to forge a lonely path as it manages to stand alone as the sole soap to juggle quality acting, quality dialogue, identifiable realism and good old fashioned entertainment without diluting the product or insulting its viewers. Read more

TRL

There can’t have been such a large number of people outside the Hawley Crescent studios since the union picket line was set up during the 1987 TV-am strike. “Monday to Thursday, TRL is live on your screens!” Read more

Fame Academy

If you adhere to the philosophy that the universe is infinite and, ergo, full of infinite possibilities then you must, by default, be of the opinion that somewhere out there is a world in which Patrick Kielty is actually entertaining, humorous and a good presenter. Read more

24

As far as the extras who stood by knew, the President would collapse, then recover, get back in the car and drive off. So they would have been somewhat surprised when they watched the actual episode on television as Palmer lay on the ground gasping for breath, his heartbeat ticking out the final moments of this season of 24. Read more

Fame Academy

There’s something odd about television this summer. A few years back, your normal evening’s viewing in mid-August would consist of back-to-back repeats, mostly from the previous Christmas, with the odd new programme that seemed to be too bad to show at any other time of the year. Read more

The Terry and Gaby Show

Right from its very first edition, the best thing about The Terry and Gaby Show has been the opening titles. Read more

My Wrongs #8425 – 8249 & 117

Outside represents Channel 4′s umpteenth attempt to create a late night “strand” devoted to cerebral, provocative or simply non-mainstream programming. Read more

Big Brother

When Graham Norton turned up at the final night of BB3 last year to give the pro-Jade camp a further fill-up, he told Davina McCall: “The public have played a very good game this year, because they’ve kept the interesting ones in.” And he was absolutely right. Read more

Rule the School

It’s a tribute to the remarkable scope and ambition of the BBC’s children’s output at present that nowhere else would you find, at any time of the year let alone the height of summer, a new seven week series that allows pupils to swap places with teachers then expects them to implement their own curriculum – coursework assessments and all. Read more

Big Brother

Information has become the true currency in the Big Brother house. Whoever has the most information wields the most power, and with that power the ability to control the outcome. It’s ironic then that within the house the most powerful voice isn’t actually going to be allowed to win. Read more

The Way We Travelled

Alan Whicker is endeavouring to conduct an interview with a finely preened continental heiress, sitting almost in her lap while the pair roar across a lake in a luxury vessel. Read more

Big Brother

Jon Tickle is scrubbing the floor of the kitchen in the Big Brother house. Anyone who had been away on holiday for a few weeks and tuned in could have assumed that a technical fault had led to E4 showing footage from an earlier week. Read more

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