Gone is 3News and in it’s place is the gleaming fresh Newshub. Mediaworks has released a 360 degree video tour of the new studio hosted by Hilary Barry and Mike McRoberts. We took it, had a poke around and can now expose the inconvenient truths behind the new studio. (Original video can be found here.)
Inside the Lightbox is a sponsored feature where we mine the extensive Lightbox category for shows you might want to watch. This week we present the new offerings in February, including the exclusive return of Better Call Saul and Suits. Suits (S5 arrives express every Thursday) Returning from last year’s hiatus, season five of legal … Read more
Welcome to TV Mum. Every week Brendon will try and get his mum Dianne to remember the details of a TV show she’s recently watched. The resulting discussion is a journey through Dianne’s shaky memory and never ends up where you’d expect. This week mother and son discuss the Showtime drama Masters of Sex. It’s … Read more
Aaron Yap watches Louis C.K.’s new online series Horace and Pete, and asks if the off-putting, experimental style is what lies beyond the “peak TV” age. Did Louis C.K. hear us grumbling? Just a few weeks ago when FX chief John Landgraf spoke at the Television Critics Association press tour in California, he addressed the future of … Read more
Tara Ward brings you her Shortland Street Power Rankings for last week, including a disgusting sex couch, Harper’s detective work and Virginia’s full evolution into a Disney villain. 1) Shortland Street’s mystery hand job Just when you think you’ve got the shooting case sorted, a random arm enters the frame to stir things up. Who does … Read more
On Friday the 2016 Billy T nominees all played a showcase at Auckland’s Q Theatre. In the crowd, somewhere near the back, Duncan Greive watched and judged. The Billy T award is probably the coolest award in New Zealand. There’s just one given out each year – if you miss out, suck it up. It … Read more
It’s been a good couple of years for Māori filmmakers. There’s been a solid stream of strong, popular films (Mt Zion, Boy, Maori Boy Genius) and several have torn it up overseas (Deadlands, What We Do In the Shadows). A new documentary, Hautoa Ma, interviews key filmmakers about the rise of Māori film. José Barbosa … Read more
Sam Brooks watches Grease Live, and applauds the live TV musical genre for finally producing something that isn’t entirely terrible. Somewhere in an NBC Conference Room circa 2013: Executive 1: We’re losing ratings because we cancelled 30 Rock! How do we fix this? Executive 2: A Tina Fey show about a girl who got kidnapped … Read more
Locked in the media bunker (actually The Spinoff’s shed) José Barbosa watched days of tapes to bring you this examination of the way TV news covered the recent anti-TPP protests in Auckland.
Inside the Lightbox is a sponsored post where we mine their extensive catalogue for shows that you might want to watch. This week we plate up some cooking shows full of tips and tricks to have you cooking like a celebrity chef in just one long weekend. How to Cook like Heston What’s the vibe? Heston … Read more
Alex Casey discovers the legendary stony-faced female detectives in Scandinavian thrillers The Bridge and The Killing, who swap the pantsuits for chunky knit jumpers and the smiles for scowls. It’s a pretty grim state of affairs when one simple Google search for “woman cop” yields these sort of results: Now that is just unrealistic. There’s not … Read more
Alex Casey revisits the 1998 Hero parade coverage on NZ On Screen with a little help from parade highlight, international model and TV legend Colin Mathura-Jeffree. It’s no secret that most parades are pretty terrible. The Santa parade is a hot mess of Farmers flyers, sticky children and begrudging Shortland Street cast members. The All Blacks … Read more
Welcome to the first episode of TV Mum, a weekly podcast starring Brendon Green and his Mum, Dianne. Every week Brendon will try and get Dianne to remember the details of a TV show she’s recently watched. The resulting discussion is a journey through Dianne’s shaky memory and never ends up where you’d expect. This … Read more
Don’t let the shiny new desk distract you – there is something very bleak going on in the background of NewsHub Live at 6. Hayden Donnell investigates. As the Herald reported last month, 3News is dead. A completely new programme called NewsHub Live at 6 replaced it on air last night, shamelessly dancing on the … Read more
Tara Ward brings you her Shortland Street Power Rankings for last week, including Lucy’s evil twin, TK’s vile virility and Drew’s detective nose. 1) Wendy sails into the west Grab the tissues and the smelling salts, peeps, as we say a final farewell to Wendy and Len. A bumper crowd of approximately fifteen people gathered at … Read more
Played by Gabriel Macht, Harvey Specter of Suits once saved Tim Lambourne during a tenancy dispute. Years later, Tim rings Gabriel for a chat about the success of the show, and the mystery surrounding the returning season (arriving express to Lightbox weekly). Suits is a show about lawyers, fancy ass New York lawyers, lawyers that make … Read more
Tonight the X-Files returns to our screens with the first new episodes since the original series – now streaming in its entirety on Lightbox – bowed out in 2002. In celebration of this momentous occasion, Ellen Moorhead picks her most ridiculous ‘monster of the week’ episodes of all time. Fox Mulder and Dana Scully AKA … Read more
Nothing delivers authority or menace like a deep, rumbly voice. Join José Barbosa on a journey of discovery, from Black Sails to CSI: Miami, as he celebrates TV’s deepest, most sonorous voices. Click below to enjoy the brand new, extra gravelly season of Black Sails, coming express to Lightbox every Sunday This content, like all … Read more
From Beverly Hills 90210 and Sex and the City to American Horror Story and Glee, showrunners Darren Star and Ryan Murphy are behind some of the last quarter-century’s most fun television. As Murphy’s The People vs OJ Simpson hits screens and Star’s Younger returns for its second season, Laura Vincent looks back at two of … Read more
With MediaWorks continuing to spiral down a strange rabbit hole full of new shubs, Joanna McLeod calls upon a hero that could help CEO Mark Weldon rediscover his path to greatness: 30 Rock‘s fictional network boss Jack Donaghy. As Mark Weldon continues to make a series of more and more…interesting choices for MediaWorks, it’s become clear … Read more
Aaron Yap digs up gold in Detectorists, the award winning comedy written by The Office’s Mackenzie Crook that went straight-to-DVD in New Zealand. We have several copies to give away, see the end of the piece for more details. The fact that last year Detectorists completely slipped the radars of local TV (broadcast and otherwise) is prime … Read more
Nigella’s here in New Zealand promoting her latest book, simply titled Simply Nigella. She’s too busy to be interviewed by The Spinoff, sadly. Instead, Calum Henderson lined up in Newmarket and bought a $65 book – one our cheapskate organisation definitely could not afford – just to spend five seconds in the presence of the culinary legend. … Read more
Tara Ward brings you the first Shortland Street Power Rankings for the year, including Drew’s iron heart, TK’s confused return and Wendy’s tragic passing. 1. Wendy rages against the machine This week’s Shortland Street experience was like riding the Main Trunk Line down the Raurimu Spiral. It was a steep, twisting descent into a dark valley … Read more
TVNZ announced they will be launching an all-new “male-skewed” channel. Alex Casey asks CEO Kevin Kenrik why. Hey guys! Big news! Men got something else today! A nice big roomy TVNZ channel especially for them. A lad’s night channel. A Dad bod channel. A man cave channel. A “male skewed” channel that, if it had … Read more
Alex Casey chats to Quentin Tarantino about dipping his toes in television, and asks if will ever see him commit to the small screen. He’ll never watch it again, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have to. Click below to watch Quentin Tarantino’s episode of CSI, available on Lightbox (S05E24) This content, like all our television … Read more
This week a “technical glitch” affected the usual smooth running of TVNZ’s One News, delaying the broadcast by several minutes. It might be rare for TV news to go off the rails and head in unexpected directions, but it has happened before. José Barbosa unpacks some of New Zealand’s most notable TV disruptions with help … Read more
Alex Casey talks to Carly Chaikin, star of Golden Globe-winning cyber-drama Mr Robot, about fake hacking, Fight Club and predicting the grim future. Warning: contains spoilers. One of the most exciting new television shows of last year, Mr Robot introduced a world to us full of corporate greed, social media slaves and vigilante hacker groups. … Read more
Alex Casey watches the return episode of Shortland Street for 2016, following the harrowing cliffhanger that left many Ferndale lives hanging in the balance. To ease myself into the return of Shortland Street, I rewatched the last jaw-dropping five minutes of the dramatic Christmas finale. It all came back. Hairs on end, eyes prickling with tears, SOL3 … Read more
With Shortland Street returning tonight to answer the questions of last year’s bloody cliffhanger, Tara Ward predicts ten potential plotlines. It’s been four long weeks since the Shortland Street Christmas cliffhanger. When the automatic doors of our favourite state-funded hospital closed last December, we witnessed scenes of great drama and terror. Drew lay dying on … Read more