Wrong Door Reviews...

-- which are pretty mixed so far, reflecting comment here and elsewhere on the net.

Broadcast reports that The Wrong Door attracted 546,000 (3.5%) at 10.30pm last night, the highest ever audience for the launch of a comedy on the channel. Reviews have been mixed, though:

"The show is hit and miss – Superhero Tryouts, an X Factor for wannabe superheroes, was laboured and directionless – but the writers Ben Wheatley and Jack Cheshire (who also direct and produce) have at least originated a novel and bizarre show."
- The Times (http://tinyurl.com/672jvd)

"Congratulations to BBC3 for bagging Non-Terrestrial Channel of the Year at the Edinburgh Festival TV Awards. I was going to say it was hard to begrudge the spiritual home of Gavin & Stacey the odd gong but that was before I had to sit through The Wrong Door, the latest in a rapidly growing list of BBC3 comedy turkeys... fancy monsters and floaty fairies can't carry a show where eating dogs and peeing on people are substitutes for punchlines. Or am I missing something?"
- Metro (http://tinyurl.com/63vzpr)

"Dismayed screaming is also the sentient adult's only possible reaction to The Wrong Door, a new BBC3 comedy series whose USP is CGI, OK? Eh? ... The Wrong Door: show us the right one so we can all get outta here."
- The Herald "Please Close the Door behind You" (http://tinyurl.com/5o7mb9)

"This ambitious new sketch show mixes CGI with live action but scores more misses than hits. Witness running gag The Most Annoying Creature On Earth, which itself is rather irritating."
- The Mirror (http://tinyurl.com/6c4xcc)

"This inventive, exhilarating, rude and sometimes astonishing sketch show combines sharp writing and performing with sci-fi standard special effects to create a whole new breed of futuristic comedy... Funny and clever."
- Daily Record (http://tinyurl.com/5pcw4x)

As I said earlier, I think I'll give it a couple of episodes...

• Check out reaction from the Blogoshper via this Google search link

Wrong Door Day

It's Wrong Door day -- the launch of BBC3's new comedy show written by Ben Wheatley whose credits also include work for web, TV such as Time Trumpet and advrtising such as Pot Noodle Crumlin and more.

Anyone who likes comics will, we think, enjoy the show which debuts on BBC3 at 10.30pm tonight.

• The Wrong Door Official web site
• Watch The Wrong Door on the BBC3 web site
• Read an interview with Mr Wheatley here on b3ta

New Blake’s 7 Designer Speaks

(with thanks to Jeremy Briggs for the link): Scottish newspaper the Queensferry Gazette has just interviewed designer David Carey about his work for the new Blake’s 7 show in development for Sky One.

The British broadcaster revealed back in April that it had commissioned two 60-minute scripts for a potential series, working with Blake’s 7 Productions.

Carey, who works as marketing manager and graphic designer for a global software company in Edinburgh was commissioned by Blake’s 7 Productions and has been working on the branding for the last couple of years. In consultation with the scriptwriters, the producer and all those involved in the story, he has designed illustrations and graphics for the show

“Blake’s 7 had been a passion of mine when I was younger,” he told the paper, “and it has been great fun getting involved.”

Hinting at the style of the new take on the classic BBC show, Carey says the look “is an art nouveau, dark Blake’s 7. I try to come up with a good concept and be original.”

There's no news yet on whether there will be any new Blake's 7 comics concurent with the release of the new show, although producer Andrew Sewell does have a long association with comics.

• Read the full new item
• Visit the Blake’s 7 Productions web site

The Ten Doctors

(with thanks to Paul Eldridge for the link): Talk about your labours of love: in March last year Doctor Who fan Richard Morris began his epic fan story The Ten Doctors, now at one hundred pages and counting -- a complex but beautifully drawn cartoon-styled Doctor Who story, with snappy dialogue and a skilled script that sees every Doctor encountering the other, along with a host of companions to boot.

"The Ten Doctors is a geeky little thing I’ve been wanting to do for a long, long time," says Richard, aka "Captain Shipsinker", who hails from Nova Scotia and describes himself as "a director, gamer, and medievalist".

Since its initial publication on Richard's blog, The Ten Doctors has gathered a well deserved, dedicated following. Richard's pencil art -- he does not appear to work in inks on some of his strips, although inked and coloured versions of some pages of The Ten Doctors have been provided by eclecticmuse, aka Stephanie Jackson -- are well drafted, displaying considerable comic storytelling skills, especially considering the number of characters involved.

The story opens with the tenth (and current) Doctor visiting The Eye of Orion (last seen in The Five Doctors) to reflect after the events of The Runaway Bride.

He meets up with his previous incarnations, and an epic adventure, packed with uneasy alliances, acerbic exchanges between Rose and Ace, and all the kind of nastiness you'd expect from Cybermen, Daleks... and the Master.

Richard's studied his Who chronology carefully and skilfully plots a tale spanning many of the show's favourite eras. Well worth checking out - if you haven't already.

Once you've enjoyed The Ten Doctors, I also recommend checking out some of his other strips: 24fps, a delightful jab in the eye at the world of animators, animation and the general public who doesn't understand them; Yet Another Fantasy Gamer Comic - which recently reached its 700th episode -- and The House of Paulus, a strip set in Roman times (no Gauls in sight!).

Knight Rider Car Sold on eBay

A rare version of KITT, the iconic talking black car from the American 80s TV show Knight Rider has just been sold on the internet auction site eBay.

The KITT model, built from a Pontiac Trans Ams -- and most recently used in the third and fourth series of Knight Rider as well as the TV film and also used in 2006 film The Benchwarmers which starred Rob Schneider -- eventually sold for $53,000.

Picture below the cusyom built car is one of the rare 300-mph "Super Pursuit Mode" T/As with additional aero devices, was described as one of the original vehicles from the series. It was initially used in the third season and then re-converted to simulate the 'Super Pursuit Mode' that debuted in the fourth season.

The car, pictured below, was also used in the 1984 Knight Rider made for television movie and, later, for exhibition and promotional purposes.

• KITT stands for Knight Industries Three Thousand. There have been a couple of Knight Rider spin-offs

• Knight Rider has recently been revived in the US to huge ratings on its initial airing back in February on NBC. The Hollywood Reporter recently noted Paul Campbell is set to join the ensemble cast fronted by Justin Bruening. Campbell will play the head research tech at Knight Industries. (More news about the new show can also be found on KittSite).

• The pilot for the new show will be released on Region 1 DVD in September.

• The new KITT dropped the Pontiac design in favour of a Shelby GT500KR.

Web Links

• Knight Rider Online
The oldest Knight Rider fan site

• Knight Rider NBC Official Site

• KittSite
Devoted to the new Knight Rider show

BBC Online Archive Plan Details Announced

The BBC has announced plans to produce a web-page for every episode of every television show it has ever made, as part of an online archive that will span nearly eight decades of broadcasting history.

"From Dixon of Dock Green to David Attenborough's finest, Hancock's Half Hour and Strictly Come Dancing, the BBC has vowed to create a home on the web for all its programmes past and present, in an attempt to exploit the "long tail" of its archive," the Guardian reports. "Spanning 81 years of radio and television, the project will create a web page for every episode of every single programme ever broadcast on the BBC, and be the basis of a future plan to introduce a searchable vault of archived shows."

The Telegraph notes that the BBC has already created more than 160,000 individual web pages over the past three months for the project, with developers looking to create content for shows going back to the 1930s.

The plan would we expect also include SF shows such as A for Andromeda, Day of the Triffids, Doctor Who, Quatermass, Survivors and the many other shows produced by the BBC.

Each web-page will include basic information about each show as well as where it could be seen, either on television, the iPlayer broadband catch-up service or elsewhere on the internet, as well as video or audio clips, but the Daily Mail says the corporation hopes eventually to make whole programmes available.

The BBC does of course hold a huge amount of additional information on the making of many of its programmes, used by researchers such as Andrew Pixley in the writing of his archive pieces for Doctor Who Magazine in the past. Whether any of that would be included - such as details of music used in the show, location shooting details etc. - has not been stated.

The project, set in motion last year under director general Mark Thompson's plan to overhaul the BBC for the digital age, was outlined in detail by the director of BBC Vision, Jana Bennett (pictured here at a Media Masterclass she gave at Bournemouth University on "Changing Media"), at the Banff Television Festival in Canada, where Thompson also talked about the BBC's future after the broadcaster received an Outstanding Achivement Award.

• Read the full Guardian article

• Read the Daily Telegraph article

• Read the Daily Mail article (which includes an image from Doctor Who: The Aztecs)

Torchwood Sigining News

Gareth David-Lloyd, best known to a legion of Who-iniverse fans for his portrayal of the super-efficient Ianto Jones in Torchwood, will be making not one but two personal appearances on Saturday 28th of June. The first will be at Nostalgia & Comics store in Birmingham from 11.00am to 1.00pm, followed later in the day with a highly appropriate visit to Torchwood’s home turf in Cardiff from 4.00pm to 6.00pm.

Monkey Nuts Breakfast Cereal!

Here's on for those early risers among you!

Word reaches us from the Blink Twice studio (creators of Monkey Nuts! for the new DFC comic) that Lawrence Etherington ("Lorenzo" to some) will be appearing on BBC Breakfast tomorrow (Wednesday 4 June) drawing a comic strip, live from 7.00 am (ish).

"There will be no preparation," his brother Robin told downthetubes, "Just him, a pencil, a biro, and a lot of sweat!

"If you wish to giggle at his funny face - and, fingers crossed, get a look at some of our artwork for our new series Monkey Nuts! - turn on, tune in and hopefully be amazed!"

BBC’s Comedy Map Of Britain – Newcastle

The BBC2 programme The Comedy Map of Britain turned its attention to the North East of England for the third programme of the second series.

Having previously been to the impressive century old headquarters of D C Thomson in Dundee to cover the Beano, this time they went to a terraced house in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne's Jesmond district.

Not just any terraced house of course but the one owned by the parents of Simon and Chris Donald - parents who were blissfully unaware of their off-spring creating Viz in their front bedroom. There, the brothers reveal that the way they avoided showing their parents a copy of the comic was to keep telling them that it had sold out.

Selected clips are available on the programme’s website. To view the clip from Jesmond, select the Newcastle To Leeds programme and The Viz Boys Return To Jesmond clip.

BBC’s Comedy Map Of Britain – Dundee

The BBC2 programme The Comedy Map Of Britain turned its attention to Scotland for the second programme of the second series. As well as taking Johnny Vegas back to the ruins of the Gilded Balloon in Edinburgh and Doon Mackichan to Fife, the programme also visited the hallowed, and very shiny, halls of D C Thomson in Dundee.

Beano editor Alan Digby takes the camera into the Beano office where the late Ian Gray talks about writing for the comic and his creation of Dennis The Menace’s dog Gnasher.

Selected clips are available on the programme’s website. To view the clip from the Beano office select the Aviemore To Edinburgh programme and The Home Of The Beano clip.

Missing Believed Wiped

I don’t know if anyone caught ITV3’s affectionate documentary Those Were The Days about the Apollo 11 Moon Landing last night, with interviews and footage about the momentous event. (It's currently available on ITV's CatchUp service and to be repeated on 27 April).

The documentary was interspersed with interviews with others in the news at the time, including marathon runner Reg Hill, Miss British Isles beauty competition Pat Wheeldon, members of one hit wonder band Thunderclap Newman and Portsmouth's Leigh Park Six activists, who fought for the right to keep their local park’s admission free and were sent to prison for their protest.

Anyway, I just received a newsletter in which an anonymous poster relates that a lovely old chap at the BBC who'd been in charge of covering the first moon landing once told them that if the NASA mission had gone wrong, the only tape the Corporation had lined up to cut to was a Warner Bros Porky Pig cartoon!

On the plus side, I assume the BBC probably still have a copy of the cartoon, unlike the recordings of the studio coverage of the first moon landing, which, much to Sir Patrick Moore’s chagrin in the documentary, are lost! (Missing, Presumed Wiped?). How stupid is that...

BBC Seeks New Writers

The next generation of TV writers are being sought by the BBC for its Drama Writers Academy, a unique course that equips writers with the skills to work on BBC flagship continuing drama programmes.

The Academy is the only course in the world that guarantees writers the opportunity to work on prime time television.

Established by BBC Controller of Drama Production John Yorke, its aim is to create a pool of writing talent to work on some of BBC One's major shows – EastEnders, Casualty, Holby City and Doctors.

Students that secure a place will enjoy masterclasses from the best in the business including genre writers of interest to regular downthetubes readers such as Tony Jordan (Life On Mars), Dominic Minghella (Robin Hood), Jed Mercurio (Frankenstein), Ashley Pharoah (Life On Mars, Ashes To Ashes), as well as leading directors such as Bharat Nalluri (Spooks, Life On Mars).

Alongside training on all aspects of drama production from editing to scheduling, students will receive direct writing experience on continuing dramas, with the aim of transmitting their finished scripts on BBC One.

Since its inauguration three years ago, 22 out of 24 graduates have gone on to gain full-time work in writing for TV, with nine of the graduates now established as core writers on continuing drama shows. In addition, many writers have graduated onto other shows.

Creativity, talent and a passion for telling stories are essential criteria for those applying.

Applicants must have had at least one professional commission in either television, theatre, radio or film.

John Yorke, BBC Controller of Drama Production and Course Tutor, says: "Whilst you can't teach writing, you can create a framework for new and emerging talent to find its voice.

"Over the last three years, with the help of some of the best people in the industry, we've been able to give new writers the space, time and tools to allow them to develop strong, individual work.

"It's fantastic that in the current climate the BBC is still able to make such a major investment in new talent.

• Applications are open from Monday 14 April until Monday 12 May 2008. Details on how to apply can be found at bbc.co.uk/jobs

More Moore

Ronald D. Moore, that is - not Alan. US broadcaster Fox has ordered a two-hour sci-fi pilot, Virtuality from Ronald D. Moore (Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica) and produced by Universal Media Studios. Gail Berman, Lloyd Braun along with Ronald and Michael Taylor are executive producers.

The plot centres on 12 astronauts on a ten-year journey aboard the Earth's first starship, the Phaeton. Also on board are virtual-reality modules giving the crew members a chance to be adventurous and take on different personas - which all works fine until the virtual system is invaded by a mysterious bug.

Production on Virtuality begins in July. Sounds to us like Moore's chance to wreak revenge on all those often tiresome Star Trek holodeck stories...

In Memoriam: Johnny Byrne

downthetubes is sad to report the death of writer and script editor Johnny Byrne.

Byrne, born in Dublin in 1935, worked on many British television shows including Heartbeat, Tales of the Unexpected and the two BBC One vets series All Creatures Great And Small and One By One.

For us, he will be best remembered as the script editor during the first season of Gerry Anderson's Space:1999 and as the writer of the Doctor Who stories Arc of Infinity, Warriors of the Deep and The Keeper of Traken.

In writing The Keeper of Traken for Doctor Who he reintroduced The Master, played by the late Anthony Ainley, to the series and created the Doctor's companion Nyssa, played by Sarah Sutton. For Space:1999 he wrote eight of the first season episodes and another three in the second season including The Metamorph which introduced the regular alien character Maya, played by Catherine Schell.

Fanderson chairman Nick Williams said, "Although we didn't get the chance to have Johnny along to many events, everyone who got a chance to meet him quickly learned what a warm, intelligent and humourous man he was. He was always very supportive of Space:1999 and the club's activities and will be greatly missed."

Heroes Webisodes Scheduled

Digital Media Wire and other news services report NBC has announced plans to launch original webisodes in July for some of its most popular TV shows, including Heroes, The Office, 30 Rock and Chuck.

A webisode is an episode of a television show that airs initially as an Internet download or stream as opposed to first airing on broadcast or cable television. As yet, there is no "set" standard for length, but most webisodes are relatively short, ranging from 4-15 minutes in length. TV series that have already experimented with the format include Battlestar Galactica and Doctor Who (TARDISODEs have been made for mobile download by the BBC). Wikipedia carries a growing list of internet TV shows here.

Vivi Zigler, EVP of NBC Digital Entertainment, says the webisodes will "continue to weave online with on-air creative to give fans a deeper entertainment experience."

Variety reports that the new deal agreed between recently striking US writers and producers helped pave the way for the new foray into webisodes and the reaction to NBC's new shows will no doubt something other US and UK networks will be monitoring closely, for both web and mobile, with the mobile equivalent of webisodes, mobisodes, growing in popularity. (Both Lost and 24 have experimented with this mobile form).

Missing Believed Wiped

Still on the subject of Doctor Who -- sort of -- the Missing Believed Wiped team are trying to drum up new members for their Facebook group.

Missing Believed Wiped is a team dedicated to seeking out episodes of TV shows, including Doctor Who, missing from the official archives at the BBC, ITV and other UK YV producers. A considerable amount of our TV heritage was destroyed in the 1970s, black and white episodes (as well as some colour) apparently to make room for more recent productions in the vaults.

Although it's likely many shows are irrevocably now the stuff of mere memory, often programmes were transferred to film for sale overseas and it is this that gives the MBW team hope that one day the shows will live again. While foreign broadcasters were supposed to either return the prints to be destroyed or destroy them themselves once they had been shown, this often did not happen and were filed away and forgotten in the vaults of TV stations worldwide. Films also 'escaped' destruction, onto the collector circuit .

Episodes have been recovered from both these sources many times throughout the years and hopefully will continue to be for many years to come.

The MBW Facebook group complements the work of the MBW web site, aiming to group to spread the word about the 'lost' classics of television, film and radio and maybe even find a way of plugging some of the gaps. Have you, or your parents or grandparents, got a collection of Film Reels tucked away in an attic or shed somewhere, gathering dust? Did someone in your family have one of the earliest video recorders in the late 1960s?

Despite interest in the missing material, which includes episodes of shows such as Ace of Wands, Doctor Who (such as Marco Polo, pictured above, which currently exists only as telesnaps), Dad's Army, Timeslip and more, "We seem to have hit a bit of a glass ceiling with members," says Cliff Chapman, "hovering around the 290 mark or thereabouts for quite a while, dropping off a couple of people every time another couple join."

Cliff hopes a renewed appeal for members might spur someone to come froward with missing material - or leads to it.

"One of the remits of this group is simply to make people aware of the situation, and get them to check if they're sitting on anything useful without realising it," he explains. "We must thrive on getting a message out... otherwise it's just preaching to the converted, grandmothers, sucking eggs etc...!"

• Click here for the Missing Believed Wiped Facebook Group (Facebook membership required)
• Missing Beleived Wiped web site
• Missing Episodes Overview List

Stranded gets TV pilot

Mike Carey (X-Men, Ultimate Fantastic Four, Voodoo Child) and creator of Virgin Comics series The Stranded will be developing the story into a television series for SCI FI Channel.

“One of the purposes of our SCI FI partnership is to create television and film writing opportunities for the best talents in the comic industry. Having Mike write the television pilot for The Stranded, a comic book he created, is exactly what we had hoped for,” commented Virgin CEO Sharad Devarajan.

Mike Carey’s stunning work has earned him fans worldwide. With The Stranded, Mike challenges ordinary people to face the extraordinary – their lives are lies. Every memory is false. Startling events cause them to confront the truth, that they are, in fact, “stranded” on Earth after a horrific genocide in another galaxy.

“From day one,” Carey says, “working on The Stranded has felt like being at a nexus point of creativity. Virgin and SCI FI created the perfect platform, and then supported the book and the creative team through all the stages of development. This feels like something we all own, and we all love. I can't wait to take it forward into its next incarnation.”

"It’s all very cool," he says on his blog. "I love the core premise of The Stranded, and the cast we’ve built up. I really want to carry on telling their story, in as many different formats as I can - including semaphor where appropriate."

• The Stranded Issue # 1 was released in January 2008 and #3 goes on sale at comic shops and via available at www.virgincomicsstore.com is on sale from 26th March 26th, 2008. The first volume of collected stories will be released in July.

Alan Moore Interviewed for Inside Out

Alan Moore has been interviewed for BBC East's The Inside Out show, to be broadcast on tonight (Friday 21 March). The interview can also be viewed on the Inside Out website.

Alan talks candidly about his work, revealing he was expelled from school for drug dealing and talks about his first ever comics work, Maxwell the Magic Cat, as an "antidote to Garfield."

He's also forthright about his views on seeing his work adapted for film, saying he believes most modern films are not only artistic failures but "probably detrimental to modern culture".

His next two major projects are his second novel, Jerusalem, and the third and probably final book of the League of Extraordinary Gentleman.

Jerusalem is his Northampton novel and as he walks through his home town in the programme, he displays a vast knowledge of its history and its role in the history of Britain.

• Sky viewers outside the BBC East of England region will be able to watch Inside Out on the BBC1 East of England channel which will be in the 970 - 980 block of channels.

Tin Man to premiere in May in UK

The UK Sci Fi Channel has announcded the top-rated mini series Tin Man, inspired by The Wizard of Oz and screened on SciFi Channel US last year, will air in May.

As we reported last month and last year, the fantasy adventure, produced by RHI Entertainment, earned the miniseries "most watched miniseries in Sci Fi history" status with 6.3 million viewers over the three nights in the US.

Starring Eric Johnson of Smallville fame in the title role, the series has already aired on the SCI FI channel in Poland, and Tin Man will premiere on Sundays at 8.00pm from 11th May in the UK.

The Saint Returns - Again!

Gentleman criminal and adventurer The Saint is to make a comeback as a two-hour TV film, reportedly starring James Purefoy (pictured), that could lead to the production of a new show.

Media reports picked up by saint.org indicate Sir Roger Moore, who played the suave international thief Simon Templar in the 1960s British series, has teamed up with US producers Barry (Homicide: Life on the Street) Levinson and Tom (Homicide: Life on the Street, St. Elsewhere) Fontana, writer Jorge (Witchblade, Millennium) Zamacona, feature producer Bill Macdonald and Geoffrey Moore, his son.

Levinson is reported to be directing the pilot, which will be produced independently by the Macdonald, Moore and Zamacona's Templar Entertainment Group, who acquired the TV rights to Charteris' novels in 2004. The pilot will then be sold to US networks.

Filming on the one-off movie is set to begin next month (April 2008), with sets in Budapest, Hungary and Puerto Rico.

James Purefoy, who played Mark Antony in HBO's Rome, is to play Templar, with casting under way for the other key parts in the pilot: Inspector Claud Eustace Teal, the Interpol agent in charge of tracking Templar; Templar's romantic interest/assistant, Patricia Holm; and his enemy-turned-partner in crime, Baldwin Aleppo.

The Saint was originally the literary creation of Leslie Charteris, who wrote some 100 Saint stories, including 50 novels, in his lifetime and was never adverse to the many updatings of his character during his lifetime.

The most memorable media version of the character is undoubtedly Roger Moore's portrayal in the 1960s made for ITV, but The Saint was also the star of several films between 1938 and 1953 (and, most recently, in the disappointing 1997 film starring Val Kilmer), on radio and in comics such as Britain's TV Tornado in the 1960s (right) and in a newspaper strip syndicated wordlwide by the New York Herald Tribune between 1948 and 1961, written by Charteris himself and later collected and reprinted as comic books. The Saint even had his own series of bubblegum cards...

Ian Ogilvy played the Saint in the late 1970s and Simon Dutton took over the Saint's famous halo in the late 1980s for six two-hour films.

Related Links
• The Saint.org
• Jame Purefoy web site
• Buy The Saint: A Complete History in Print, Radio, Film and Television of Leslie Charteris' Robin Hood of Modern Crime, Simon Templar, 1928-1992