What will you be watching on TV tonight?

[HCZ_Reborn]

Watched the Despatches documentary on Russell Brand


My feeling is when you have more than one complainant that tends to make allegations more credible. Of course because they are relatively anonymous I don’t know whether these people know each other, whether they’ve come forward with information or whether they’ve simply been approached as per this undercover investigation.

So as to whether these allegations are coming out now because of his conspiracy theory stuff? I mean Brand come out early to try and pre-emptively make that accusation, and it speaks to how self important he is that he thinks that anyone gives a shit about his so called “truth seeking” apart from those who subscribe and listen to him for the purpose of confirmation bias

The investigation has gone on longer than this career Brand has made for himself, and it’s actually far more about the mentality in the entertainment industry doing more to protect someone like Brand because of their ability to make money for them than a responsibility of care to those they end up hurting.

Whether this will go anywhere, probably not…the ratio of women he’s fucked to rapey behaviour is probably not high enough. Whether these individuals will waive anonymity to take out civil suits against him I don’t know. And his current audience will believe that he’s a victim of an establishment smear so it won’t affect his popularity there.

[HCZ_Reborn]

I’m a massive hypocrite because I see absolutely no purpose to a program being made, but started watching the Reckoning last night. I’m not going to pretend it was motivated by anything high minded like I wanted to see if this was more than just a titillating look at the life of someone who was once celebrated but is now controversial (it wasn’t by the way) but I was curious as to how Steve Coogan would do the role.

With the accent spot on, it’s an impersonation but in fairness that’s not all it is…the mannerisms and the personality (overbearing, bullying and manipulative - the things that everyone who saw Louis Theroux’s documentary would have seen)

But really it’s just a case of really not reading the room. Interview clips with actual victims much like the weaving of victims into the narrative feels like an afterthought, and it is little more than a crude biopic…..that is highly speculative of the kind of relationship between him and his mother (The Duchess). With the impression being that she’s little more than another decoy like his charity work to provide cover for his true nature, his claims to idolise her are superficial (although he always treats her well) and on her part she looks on him as her cross to bear, suggesting that she knows deep down there’s something wrong with him and feels a sense of guilt both for this and that she doesn’t love him as she should a son (deeply religious, and the nearest thing she feels to genuine pride for his career is him presenting an episode of Songs of Praise)

On the whole although there’s a lot of dramatic licence, you do suspect that it’s more accurate than not. But it still just raises the question….why?. Why would the BBC compound its own wrongdoing in such a way

[Letters]

I do kinda want to watch it out of a morbid curiosity. I'm a fan of Coogan and he's generally good in everything he does.

[Mac76]

Why would the BBC compound its own wrongdoing in such a way

The BBC loves to give itself a kicking, it thinks it shows how objective it is but there's not need for it to do it - i always hated W1A for the way it lent itself into that stereotype people already have about it - it was like a big in-joke paid for by the licence fee payer.

[HCZ_Reborn]

The BBC loves to give itself a kicking, it thinks it shows how objective it is but there's not need for it to do it - i always hated W1A for the way it lent itself into that stereotype people already have about it - it was like a big in-joke paid for by the licence fee payer.

I’d not heard of this program

I don’t mind the organisation being self critical and analytical, but yeah The Reckoning is simply dubious titillation dressed up as mea culpa

[HCZ_Reborn]

I do kinda want to watch it out of a morbid curiosity. I'm a fan of Coogan and he's generally good in everything he does.

Coogan with the exception of looking nothing like Saville is uncanny, with anyone else you’d call it an exaggerated impersonation but Saville of course was a self-pastiche. I think the only thing he was honest about was that he was being himself in his numerous eccentric tv appearances.

[The Wengerbabies]

Yellowstone

8/10

[Letters]

I’d not heard of this program

I don’t mind the organisation being self critical and analytical, but yeah The Reckoning is simply dubious titillation dressed up as mea culpa

I did watch it. I wouldn't go so far as to say I wish I hadn't but I'm not sure what the point of it is. It's well done and everything I'm just not sure what value it adds to anything.
We all know what he did now, I'm not sure what it adds.

[HCZ_Reborn]

Been watching The Enfield Poltergeist on Apple TV

It’s an exercise in revisiting the things that scared you shitless as a child and finding them amusing


For those of around 40 odd, they’ll remember Strange but True with Michael Aspel…and this incident was one of the episodes on there and watching it as a kid it scared the shit out of me, but subsequent revisiting of it just makes it seem like an obvious hoax

The documentary is original in that it makes direct use of the over 200 hours of recording made by investigator Maurice Grosse and gets the actors playing the roles in the docudrama format to lip sync.

The only thing that has changed in my view is that Grosse has gone from being an amiable, well meaning crank who despite his claim to scientific rigour at no point ever approaches his investigation with any rational skepticism to an overbearing bully who puts unbelievable pressure on the young girl Janet to perform (as she is the epicentre of all the activity, which is to say she’s the one doing all the tricks which people who should know better have decided to believe is evidence of paranormal phenomena)

The documentary shows Grosse’s sulking resentment towards those who doubt the veracity of what he is claiming, even when they’ve taken up the invitation to witness it for themselves. And seems to turn very nasty towards Janet and her older sister when his own integrity feels at stake (a famous ventriloquist claims that the girls admitted to him that it was all faked by them).

It’s sad in a way as I think these girls are unconsciously looking to Grosse to be a father figure in the absence of their own estranged father. But what at first seems a genuine compassion and concern for the Hodgson family, just becomes all about their reputation for him and his investigative partner Guy Lyon Playfair.

Granted I haven’t watched it all yet, but so far no mention of the fact that Grosse lost his daughter in a car accident and was strongly motivated by a desire to prove the existence of the spirit world and wanted to try and contact his dead daughter.

Nor has the moans coming from the girls bedroom been correctly identified as one of them masturbating as they were both going through puberty at the time (the dead man Bill, who’s voice is reproduced by Janet and doesn’t at all sound like an 11 year old girl putting on a gruff voice seems inordinately preoccupied with menstruation…another thing the documentary which really wants to try and push the idea that anything about this was genuine, conveniently omits.

The members of the Hodgson family left alive still claim with great earnest that everything that happened was genuine. But when you’re being interviewed about a story that is being retold to capture the public imagination there is motivation to maintain the pretence.

[HCZ_Reborn]

Mr Bates vs The Post Office

I’d heard of the Horizon scandal a few years back, when the court of appeals quashed the convictions of a number of Sub Postmasters. And it was bad enough then, even though the sheer callous dishonesty and spitefulness of the Post Office wasn’t widely reported, and it was largely put down to an unwieldy and cumbersome bureaucracy.

This drama has re-shone the torch on this disgraceful incident (to put it plainly, postmasters were often forced to fork out thousands of pounds from their own savings to make up non existent shortfalls created by a system unfit for purpose…often ruining them financially, some were charged with theft and fraud and some even went to prison. Others had their lives destroyed, four committed suicide…others died from ill health before ever having the chance to be exonerated)

It has pulled no punches in accusing the Post Office of deliberate malfeasance, using the law to cudgel people into silence and punish those who would not be silent. To the point now where the police believe that Post office officials may have a criminal case to answer.

I think this is probably the biggest influence that a piece of television drama has had on the public consciousness since Threads (look it up)