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BOXING DAY ’Tis the season for DVDs so Henry Northmore unwraps some boxsets hitting the market this Christmas STAYING IN
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‘It’s just wholly original, and how often can you say that?’
A perennial favourite has to be The Simpsons: Season 17 (20th Century Fox Home Entertainment) ● ● ● ● ● and even if it no longer feels like essential viewing, the show is still reliably entertaining. Season 17 dates from 2005 (there’s always a big delay between broadcast and retail release) including the enticing ‘Homer Simpson This is Your Wife’, written by and starring Ricky Gervais. Despite his involvement, it’s a slightly underwhelming episode but you can always rely on The Simpsons as the perfect time-waster and you’ll find yourself whizzing through five or six shows before you know it.
The world’s favourite period drama Downton Abbey: Series 5 (Universal Pictures UK) ● ● ● ● ● continues down its own gentle path. As per usual, nothing really happens – there’s a minor scuffle with Richard E Grant, a kerfuffle over a war memorial and the constant threat of scandal – but it’s all very calming and mildly diverting. Dame Maggie Smith is still on top form.
Moving away from drama to fantasy with Doctor Who: The Complete Series 8 (2entertain)
● ● ● ● ● , the opening episode is a bit of a duff start but Peter Capaldi completely owns the character by giving it a darker edge. His superior attitude and withering wit are more in line with the Tom Baker era and serve him well as he battles Daleks, two-dimensional aliens and the first female incarnation of The Master (Michelle Gomez). Brilliantly written and perfectly pitched, introducing high-concept sci-fi to a mass audience.
Stephen King’s Under the Dome: Season 2 (Paramount Home Entertainment) ● ● ● ● ● finds the inhabitants of Chester’s Mill trapped under a seemingly sentient impregnable bubble. Unsurprisingly tempers are fraying but we’ve now left the source material far behind as they try and squeeze out a second series. Seemingly random things happen every episode with no logical explanation, the actors babbling about glowing eggs and what the Dome wants. Utter hogwash. The Strain: Season 1 (20th Century Fox Home Entertainment) ● ● ● ● ● is based on a trilogy
of books by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan as vampires invade New York. Don’t expect suave, enigmatic bloodsuckers: these are hideous ravenous abominations sporting slathering tongues. Del Toro directs the first episode but it's no Pan’s Labyrinth; this is more cheesy but with enough monsters and action to keep most horror fans happy. Terror aficionados will enjoy Six Gothic Tales (Arrow Video) ● ● ● ● ● even more. Vincent Price
mugs his way through this collection of classic Poe adaptations from Roger Corman, including The Fall of the House of Usher and The Pit and the Pendulum. Packed with a handsome selection of new extras, shorts, featurettes and a 200-page book, it’s strictly limited to just 2000 copies. For a complete change of pace, The Inbetweeners Movie 1 & 2 (Channel 4 DVD) ● ● ● ● ● manages to avoid the pitfalls of taking TV to the big screen. Wickedly funny and cringeworthy in all the best ways, our hapless teens find themselves in Spain and Australia.
11 Dec 2014–5 Feb 2015 THE LIST 49
Fans of Brooker’s acerbic wit should enjoy the black comedy but this is a world away from the topical humour of Screenwipe. At heart, Black Mirror is a satire but it also takes the drama and sci-i very seriously. ‘It comes through the Channel 4 comedy department,’ adds Spall, ‘but it’s dei nitely very dark, and there’s lots of emotional stuff in it as well. It takes you to all sorts of depths. But I think anything worth its weight has got some humour in it, no matter how serious it is.’ Black Mirror and Christmas might seem unlikely bedfellows. Especially when you consider that opening episode – 2011’s ‘The National Anthem’ – memorably had the Prime Minister (played by Rory Kinnear) forced into unnatural congress with a pig. ‘I think Charlie was inspired to write it by the idea of “spooky Christmases”,’ explains Spall. ‘He grew up with A Christmas Carol and things like that. When you see it, you’ll realise what it has to do with Christmas.’
Black Mirror, Channel 4, Tue 16 Dec, 9pm.