It’s 7pm, it’s local content, it starts with a well-presented white guy driving around in a fast car. Joe Nunweek asks – did we get the 7pm show we deserved? Nature hates a void, so let us watch Road Cops reruns forever, and let us enjoy more motoring mayhem and unlawful adventures on New Zealand’s … Read more
Please enjoy this excellent episode of Shorty Street Scandal, wherein James Mustapic recaps the past week of Ferndale hijinks. This week? Harry Warner becomes Harriet the Spy, Damo goes Robert Durst and fruit prices go up the wazoo: Harry-et the Spy has been doing some serious leg work in the snoop department. Watching his druggie neighbours (Paul Williams, probably) … Read more
With Outlander on hiatus this week before the finale, Tara Ward recaps her top ten favourite moments from the series so far from perverse back-licking to the angriest of chins. This series of Outlander has been a cracking adventure, filled with battles, blood, bigamy and bow-chicka-wow-wow – and we’ve still one episode to go! Before … Read more
Duncan Greive awoke early on Sunday to milk the first episode of The Road to the Young Farmer of the Year so that his fellow city slickers could stay sound asleep. Last Sunday, at the farmer-friendly hour of 6.30am, The Road to the Young Farmer of the Year Final debuted on One. Seeing as The … Read more
Tara Ward recaps the gruelling episode 15 of Outlander, wherein Jamie is relegated to the horrific torture house know as Wentworth Prison. Word on the street was that this Outlander episode would be a harrowing and disturbing trip to Bleaksville. To ease the journey I prepared some fine comfort food – Southland Cheese Rolls, made from … Read more
Please enjoy this excellent episode of Shorty Street Scandal, wherein James Mustapic recaps the past week of Ferndale hijinks. This week? The Warners get warned, Pixie lies about poverty and Murray mourns a motorbike mag: After much dilly-dallying around their famed rickety staircase that leads to nowhere, the Warners have finally moved into their new humble $3 million … Read more
Tara Ward recaps episode 13 of Outlander, including the arrival of the Black Watch to Lallybroch, a birth more momentous than the Royals, and Jamie’s incredible sense of smell. We last left Jamie and Claire firmly ensconced in the familial bosom of Lallybroch. But wait, what’s this? A pair of grubby bearded men in the kitchen, … Read more
Calum Henderson takes a television roadie in a car full of poshos through the bleak bartering wilderness of Antiques Roadtrip. What’s it about? After Flog It! proved far from the genuine article, I did what any antiques peddler would do after an auction failure and scrambled to recoup my losses. I MySkyed several episodes of … Read more
Tara Ward recaps episode 12 of Outlander, in which the Fonz comes to Lallybroch, Jamie goes commando and Claire shares some wisdom about meeting the parents. Lallybroch, Lallybroch, oh Lally-lally-lally-lallybroch. For eleven episodes we’ve heard Jamie wax lyrical about Lallybroch. That Scottish Shangri-La, the hallowed Highland haven of Clan Fraser. Whatever could go wrong as … Read more
After the news broke of Paul Henry’s secret feature film The Desk, it is officially coming to New Zealand in the Documentary Edge Festival. Alex Casey went along to a preview screening to see what on earth is going on. Full disclosure: I don’t really know wtf I just watched. I just got home from a … Read more
Alex Casey watched the Sunday special on the escapees of Gloriavale, and explains why you need to don a bonnet and get involved in this bizarre ongoing story. What’s it about? Gloriavale is the name of a small religious community in Haupiri Valley, first established by a man called Hopeful Christian (yep) in 1969. The … Read more
Tara Ward recaps episode 11 of Outlander, in which she introduces the show to her husband, Claire discovers the intricacies of the Scottish legal system, Geillis causes a scene and Jamie seeks The Future. If you missed last week’s recap, click here. We begin with a visit to that ever-popular Highland tourist attraction: the Thieves … Read more
Duncan Greive watches the first episode of Lightbox’s murderous new drama The Lizzie Borden Chronicles, starring Christina Ricci. What’s it about? Lizzie Borden was a real life human animal – a perfect internet-era celebrity who just happened to be born a century or so too soon. She grew up relatively wealthy in a small Massachusetts … Read more
Appointment Viewing is a regular column which features a Spinoff writer watching one or more episodes of a current show and attempting to decode its appeal. Here Tara Ward gets to know the political complexities of sixteenth century Tudor England in Wolf Hall. What’s it all about? Wolf Hall covers Thomas Cromwell’s rise to power in the … Read more
A confession: Sometimes when I sit staring uncomprehendingly at the blinking cursor, trying to figure out how something which once brought me so much joy came to be such a chore, I lean back and think of the winter of 2013. It was very cold, my wife very pregnant and our house a building site. … Read more
Appointment Viewing is a regular column which features a Spinoff writer watching one or more episodes of a current show and attempting to decode its appeal. This week: Duncan Greive watches the finale of Two and a Half Men. What’s it about? The most successful sitcom of this millennium was literally crushed under a grand … Read more
After three long weeks the original gang is back together. Alex is back from Melbourne and Duncan back from dinner with his mum, while Jane’s busily raising her babies, as always. We drank a bottle of Lindauer Fraise – not our favourite – and ate a lot of lollies, then talked about this week’s Bachelor … Read more
Please enjoy this excellent episode of Shorty Street Scandal, wherein James Mustapic recaps the past week of Ferndale hijinks. This week? Holiday madness goes completely awry, Chris Warner dresses like a Playboy bunny and TK says no to violence against women: Terrifyingly, Vinny’s son Michael walked around backwards this week wearing a paper mask, like some mash-up of … Read more
Appointment Viewing is a regular column which features a Spinoff writer watching one or more episodes of a current show and attempting to decode its appeal. This week: Calum Henderson watches Flog It!, a sub-par Antiques Roadshow with bizarre new wave beats. What’s it about? I first became aware of Flog It! via an ad which … Read more
Chris Bell tuned in to a National Geographic special called Hitler the Junkie, intrigued to find out the dictator’s penchant for unusual recreational remedies. It wasn’t cocaine, barbiturates or crystal meth that got me hooked. It was Bulgarian peasant faeces. Since it was Adolf Hitler who supposedly ingested them, wouldn’t Aryan faeces have been safer? I … Read more
Tara Ward recaps episode 10 of Outlander, in which there are bad omens aplenty, Colum is surrounded by fools and idiots, and Claire knows best. // We begin with a bang, with world traveller Jamie going downtown to Chinatown. For the love of all things tartan, I may need to light a cigarette after that … Read more
Alex Casey recaps the finale episode, of Lightbox’s much-anticipated Breaking Bad spinoff Better Call Saul. Contains spoilers, obviously. // This is it, we’ve come to the end of our time with Slippin’ Jimmy McGill, for now at least. It makes sense to open where he has treaded the con artist boards for so many years – … Read more
Tara Ward celebrates the return of Outlander to Lightbox with a recap of episode nine: The Reckoning. // We open with Jamie on a riverbank, skimming stones and contemplating the meaning of life. Listen, Jamie: if you’re not skimming stones on still water, you’re wasting both your time and mine. Shouldn’t you be saving your … Read more
Alex Casey recaps the ninth episode of Lightbox’s much anticipated Breaking Bad spinoff Better Call Saul. I have been hanging out all week to see if Chuck has beat his electro-magnetic condition. It really is the damning condition of our times, thank goodness he’s only in 2002 and not 2015. He wouldn’t last three seconds with … Read more
Appointment viewing… is a regular column which features a Spinoff writer watching one or more episodes of a current show and attempting to decode its appeal. This week: Calum Henderson watches Louie, the surrealist baby cartoon not unlike its adult counterpart. // Episodes Consumed: I don’t know. I can’t even begin to count the number of times … Read more
Dan Clist watched all four hours of 2015’s Wrestlemania extravaganza, and argues that wrestling remains one of the greatest forms of television entertainment on offer.. // Something weird happened to me about 18 months ago. I still cannot explain it to this day, but I had an inkling and I began to – once again … Read more
Dom wore shorts! That was the biggest revelation and bombshell of the night, one which was both better than last week and also cemented the sense that this new look X Factor is going to be mostly drama-free. It’s not a disaster. There were a handful of great performances, and Dom, Mel and Stan have … Read more
Alex Casey recaps the eighth episode of Lightbox’s much anticipated Breaking Bad spinoff Better Call Saul. Ah, to open with Breaking Bad style flashback. Jimmy’s working his butt off as a trolley dolly at Hamlin & Hamlin. It’s a fancy and impressive space, amazingly well lit – the exact opposite of Jimmy, and the majority of … Read more
Alex Casey recaps the seventh episode of Lightbox’s much anticipated Breaking Bad spinoff Better Call Saul. After last week’s slam dunk of an episode, I am feeling pretty confident in saying that Better Call Saul is one of the most interesting and unique telly shows on offer at the moment. Take the wonderful opening credits, for … Read more