Last week on The X Factor: People twiddled knobs and walked through corridors and counted down! There was also some singing but frankly the less said about that the better so let’s look at the production crew instead! This week! The term “Best of British” will be misappropriated! I for one am excited to see whether the theme is missed by the usual ( Read more... )

This week's Merlin, “The Dark Tower,” features the Knights of the Round Table going on a quest to a tower that may or may not actually be there, surrounded by a dusty plain filled with bones, led there by riddles. I wasn’t the only one waiting for the deadly killer rabbit to show up, was I? ( Spoilers for ‘The Dark Tower’ )

Madeline Miller's The Song of Achilles has been one of those books everyone seems to be reading and raving about; the Iliad retold from the point of view of Achilles' lover Patroclus. I found the book decent but not spectacular - knowing the story already I was interested to see how having Patroclus as the narrator would pan out for the way the ( Read more... )

This week on my Twitter feed, Twitter continues to be my main way of entertaining myself when in Stratford-upon-Avon and waiting for a play to start ( Read more... )

This week's episode of Merlin is all set up by the tragic death of Sir Ranulph. No, you totally remember him, right, Arthur's known him since childhood so he's bound to have cropped up at some point in the last four-and-a-bit series. It's just eluding me right now for some mysterious reason.

( Spoilers for 'The Disir' )

Just a snippet of a dream from last night, but slightly too long to tweet: One of those third-person dreams that's like watching a film, this one was a story about a criminal gang who'd never heard of an electric kettle before. On finally hearing that such a thing exists, they began planning an elaborate heist to break into the house of someone who ( Read more... )

So, this thing’s still going on. We’re halfway through this year’s X Factor - where has the time gone? asks Dermot. I don’t know, but wherever it’s gone it’s gone slowly. Dermot hasn’t bothered with the dance of heterosexuality this week, and is going straight to the sports mimes - I dunno, it’s squash, maybe? Obviously I won’t be doing jokes about ( Read more... )

This week on my Twitter feed I conform to stereotype by almost exclusively tweeting about theatre news. In the unlikely event that any non-theatre geeks follow me, I can only apologise ( Read more... )

It’s Fright Night! Oh god, are scary things in store? Is this week’s X Factor going to consist entirely of close-ups of Christopher’s face? No, it’s the annual Halloween “special,” and Dermot’s Dance of Heterosexuality features “Thriller” and devil-horns on him and the dancers. It looks like a hen night in Taunton. Dermot’s the bride. Apparently ( Read more... )

Well, we had three half-decent Merlin episodes in a row I guess, ( Spoilers for 'Another's Sorrow' )