Duncan, aka Dad, was away this week, so Jane and Alex had the pod all to themselves. They took advantage of the freedom and drank a bottle of delicious Lindauer rosé while watching Wednesday’s dynamite episode. Then they talked about kissing, sushi protocol, ziplines, dress recycling and the week’s Bachelor news – but essentially just … Read more
Live from beautiful Melbourne, Nic and Joseph are guestless as they download an illegal copy of this week’s episode, watch it during the day time, and spend longer talking about Thirsty Merc, drivers licenses and nap-ettiquitte than they ever thought they would on this trip. They also start a new movement. #JustBeard. Let’s go viral, … Read more
The Spinoff’s Alex Casey and Duncan Greive discuss the week’s TV ‘happenings’, including the return of Jono and Ben, now longer and earlier, Campbell Live‘s 10th anniversary, MediaWorks’ Dancing with the Stars‘ (!) takeover plus Lightbox’s big drop of new shows including Wolf Hall, The Lizzie Borden Chronicles and DAYS OF OUR LIVES!! Listen below, … Read more
The Spinoff knights meet at the television roundtable to discuss week seven on X Factor NZ: Streets Fruttare Sounds of Summer edition.// Robyn Gallagher on the Spooky Haunted Forest One of the big differences between X Factor and other TV talent shows is the staging. X Factor doesn’t just give its performers a few smooth moves and a microphone. Instead there’s … Read more
This is the second episode of The Fantasy Suite, our podcast dedicated to all things The Bachelor NZ. Hosted by world renowned Bachelor expert Jane Yee, with support from The Spinoff’s Alex Casey and Duncan Greive. We discuss Danielle L’s shocking self-elimination, Poppy’s masterful power play, the ‘poo’ date, Chrystal and Lisa’s hot war and … Read more
Inside the Lightbox is a new sponsored feature where we mine the extensive Lightbox catalogue for cool shows you might like to watch. This week, after the nail biting CWC semi final last night, we gathered together some sporty shows to tide you over before Sunday. Friday Night Lights Friday Night Lights is the Canterbury of … Read more
The Spinoff knights meet at the television roundtable to discuss week six on X Factor NZ, and our new additions to the judging panel. Eli Mathewson on the Tough Calls The toughest criticism so far came for a completely unexpected victim… “You disgust me. You make me sick. You ruin everything I love about the world. I want … Read more
Brand new judges. The same old singers. Slightly different podcast guests. With Joseph Moore fleeing our smiley and sanitised bully-free country to the mean streets of Melbourne, Nic Sampson is joined by Spinoff staff writer Alex Casey and Perlina Lau, soon to be social media presenter on the new Paul Henry breakfast show. Together they … Read more
After the most climactic 24 hours in X Factor NZ history, Joseph Moore and Nic Sampson were joined by The Spinoff editor Duncan Greive to discuss the double judge elimination, the first live show and the debut of our sworn enemy, X Factor NZ analysis show Xtra Factor. The episode also features Alex Casey’s excellent … Read more
Inside the Lightbox is a sponsored feature, mining the extensive Lightbox catalogue for the very best shows on a given theme. This time we took a look at the brand new haul of great British shows, fresh to Lightbox this week. / Moone Boy Created by Chris O’Dowd (the lovably Irish man from Bridesmaids), Moone … Read more
The Spinoff knights sprint to the television roundtable to pitch new judges they think should step in for Natalia Kills and Willy Moon after their sacking this afternoon. // Who will be the first scabs to cross the X Factor NZ picket line and take up pen, paper and listening face in place of those martyrs … Read more
On Tuesday our intrepid podcasters, Joseph Moore and Nic Sampson, dutifully watched the 12th episode of X Factor NZ and recorded the finest installment yet of our smash hit pod, ‘After the Factor’. They then went to sleep, as humans often do in the nighttime. The following morning Moore was awoken by news he was … Read more
The Spinoff knights meet at the television roundtable to discuss Judges’ Retreat Week on X Factor NZ, and look towards our Top 12 contestants. // Eli Mathewson on Lili’s Lockdown Lili stands inside a Bangkok hotel when a sudden realisation seeps over her. With all the excitement of a beach holiday, a chance to plan some cheap dental and tough … Read more
Joseph Moore and Nic Sampson’s X Factor-centric After the Factor podcast is joined by Guy Williams, star of Jono and Ben, voice of The Edge and (most importantly) prolific X Factor live-tweeter. Together they break down the third week of X Factor. Topics include boot camp happenings, Avatar sex and Dom Bowden’s meadow apology. They also rerank … Read more
The Spinoff knights meet at the television roundtable to discuss boot camp week of The X Factor NZ.// Robyn Gallagher on The Forgotten Four During the first boot camp episode, we were very quickly introduced to the 48 contestants who were going on to the merciless six-seat challenge. They were all familiar faces from the audition shows, but … Read more
Joseph Moore and Nic Sampson’s X Factor-centric After the Factor podcast is joined by Spinoff’s staff writer Alex Casey to break down the second and final week of X Factor auditions. Topics include the latest semi-painful-but-much-improved batch of auditions. We also rank the judges, hypothesise about the Simon Cowell/Fuller relationship and Nic and Joseph interview … Read more
The Spinoff knights meet at the television roundtable to discuss from the much-improved second week of X Factor NZ. // Jack Riddell on Darren Smyth This is Darren Smyth, 36 from Point England. He’s one of many who you won’t see on X Factor this year. He was accepted into the audition round, cameras followed him back … Read more
The Spinoff knights meet at television roundtable to reveal their hopes, dreams and insights from the first week of The X Factor NZ. // Joseph Harper on TrendPrince Holy shit Trend Prince dot com is a real thing. There are no jokes anymore. Just real things that are kind of fucking terrifying. Trend Prince doing a rap is … Read more
Joseph Moore and Nic Sampson’s After the Factor podcast is joined by The Spinoff’s editor, Duncan Greive, to break down the opening trio of episodes. Topics approached include the drudge of wading through the bad-but-not-terrible contestants, the early backstories, the arrival of Fare Thee Well, aka #KiwiHaim and the shocking decision to deny Trend Prince more … Read more
The Spinoff knights meet at television roundtable to reveal their hopes, dreams and insights before the new season of The X Factor NZ. // Nic Sampson on the Sponsored Car: Let’s face it, the entire X Factor competition is just a way to get around not paying actors to be in various commercials. Why cough up for an … Read more
The Spinoff is aroused to announce our first ever podcast. ‘After the Factor’ features in depth X Factor NZ analysis from Joseph Moore and Nic Sampson. // X Factor NZ hasn’t started yet, but we’re talking about it anyway. In episode zero of their weekly recaps, Joseph and Nic look at back on last season fondly, and preview the new … Read more
Each month we bring you the latest arrival to streaming service Lightbox, the good people who sponsor The Spinoff. This month features some HBO classics and a brilliant pair of ‘00s dramas. // News broke today that Lightbox will be free to all Spark broadband customers, an extremely fortuitous turn of events for everyone in … Read more
We polled our esteemed writers and painstakingly tallied the votes. Now the results are in: here are what we judge to be 2014’s ten finest New Zealand shows. 1. The Late Night Big Breakfast Undoubtedly the best TV made in New Zealand this year, The Late Night Big Breakfast is an insane furniture store-based breakfast-style show. The … Read more
We polled the Spinoff writing team and hauled out the ol’ abacus to tally the results. The results are in: these are the ten best international shows of 2014. Broad City This surrealist journey following two twenty-somethings stumbling through life in New York City is like Girls dipped in optimism, Dorito-dust and pure hilarity. Despite … Read more
Unlike her Catch Up Club colleague Joseph Moore, Alex Casey has never seen a single second of Breaking Bad. With its spin-off Better Call Saul arriving on Lightbox in February, she’s going to watch the whole thing and bring season-by-season reports on the way.// Alex: I’m screaming my butt off basically. I can’t believe I waited this long … Read more
Alex Casey and Duncan Greive went on separate field trips to The X Factor auditions at Sky City and compared their findings, trying to imagine how the show would play out in 2015. // Alex: Well, the first thing I saw was a lot of leather panelling worn by the judges. Duncan: They all have a vibe … Read more
Two key Spinoff writers Alex Casey and Joseph Moore share a dirty little secret: they’ve never seen any of the defining ‘important’ TV shows of our time, and are trying desperately to catch up. During this week of Ferndale appreciation, there is no more ‘important’ viewing than the first ever episode of Shortland Street. // Alex: Kia ora, … Read more
Two key Spinoff writers Alex Casey and Joseph Moore share a dirty little secret: they’ve never seen any of the defining ‘important’ TV shows of our time. They launched Catch Up Club to save them (and possibly you). On this day of Vikings celebrations, they sailed to a land of non-fiction ghosts and boating-related pranks. // Alex: Ves … Read more
After a week of receiving pitches far more groundbreaking than anything on Dragon’s Den, our Spunoff competition has closed. After much deliberation, here are the results. // We asked you, dear readers, to write us the very best spinoff pitch ideas from your favourite Lightbox show. In return, you had the rare chance to win a Samsung GALAXY S … Read more