Further ramblings of a self-made pauper

Andy Hallett – Lorne from Angel has died from congestive heart failure aged 33.

Hallett proved himself a fan favourite on the show as the show tune loving, red-horned demon who could read a person's aura when they sang, revealing their problems and futures.

The series, which starred Bones actor David Boreanaz as the brooding vampire Angel, ran for five seasons before it was cancelled in 2004.
Hallett was diagnosed with his heart condition at the end of the show and had been in and out of hospitals for the past five years.

TARDIS in Heroes But probably not...

Courtesy Mr Jenkins sans LJ, the vidcap I could not manage from Heroes season 1 episode 7 as posted a couple of days back. And no, I know it's not really a TARDIS, but it looks like one at this distance. If not a TARDIS certainly a porta potty which is at the very least a US Turdis...

It occurred to me today that the TV show is entirely wrong.

Captain Scarlet is treated as the greatest hero Spectrum ever had, yet no-one has a thing to say for his unsung comrade, Captain Blue.

Captain Blue is dependable, honest as the day is long and fearlessly brave. More to the point, he is not indestructible.

Captain Scarlet on the other hand isn't even human. He is a Mysteron construct who "claims" to have broken free of their influence. Yeah, right. At least Captain Black has the courage of his convictions and has stuck with the Mysterons through thick and thin. He knows that when you rat out the good guys, you stay ratted.

No, Captain Scarlet should be kept in solitary and dissected to see what makes him tick. He'll get better, he's indestructible. There's no bravery involved if you know you're going to get better - and he's turned traitor once, what's to say he won't do it again?

Captain Blue's the man. Let's settle this once and for all:

[Poll #765395]

Poll results are purely indicative because I'm right

I have just watched episodes 5-6-7 of LOST season 2.

I was only going to watch two episodes, but I had to know what happened after the end of episode 6.

( Extremely minor spoiler )

It is now too late to watch episode 8.

B*st*rds!

I remember years ago, reading an interview with Patrick McGoohan in which he told the interviewer that he had arranged to be out of the country the day that ITV showed the last episode of The Prisoner.

They didn't have an ending, see? Didn't know how to finish an increasingly surreal story line to everyone's satisfaction.

Apparently the ITV switchboard was jammed that night, people phoning in and demanding to know what was going on, and if they were ever going to get any payoff for watching 18 episodes of a story that just got odder and odder for no apparent reason. That must have been some series of phone calls, because there was no ITV network in those days, just a loose alliance of regional ITV companies, so depending upon where you lived in the country, Fall Out was transmitted on anyone of a number of dates from 1 February to 1 March inclusive. I think most of the country watched it on Sunday 4 February 1968.

That was my ninth birthday.

I remember thinking it was great, but without understanding what had happened; pretty much in the same way that I thought the Batman TV series was great when I was a kid, but didn't pick up on any of the knowing campness that made my parents laugh until I was older (and boy did it irritate me when they laughed!). I can remember Dad muttering about a 'load of rubbish'. I think Mum just got on with her knitting.

Anyway, 38 years later, The Prisoner is regarded as a classic, even if no-one understands the ending.

I'm not sure that LOST will hold up that long.

But at least they're not making us wait a year for the second season.

Now E4 are being a little naughty. Or more precisely Channel 4, the parent channel are.

I have cheerfully watched every episode of LOST on E4 because they show it one week in advance of Channel 4. I suppose it's meant as an enticement to get people to buy digiboxes as part of Tony Blair's drive to ditch analogue TV, or something.

I now find, having watched the penultimate episode of the season, that E4 are not showing the finale. Instead I have to wait a fortnight, until 11 January, when Channel 4 are showing the final two episodes as a double bill on the same night.

I am officially narked; especially as the story is clearly building up to something in that finale.

Damn them; damn them all.

Bearing in mind that I'm one week ahead of those of you who watch on C4, and a half season behind those of you who hit the torrents (I've decided not to as I can get it on TV) or live the other side of the Pond, but I am getting completely baffled by LOST. More so than I ever was.

As the back stories unravel, they are rapidly becoming more interesting than life on the island, which wanders aimlessly between the banal and the surreal.

Last week we got Hurley's back story. Poor sod.

This week we got more of Locke's. Poor sod.

I am losing patience with the semi mystical nature of life on the island; the 'clues' and 'leads' keep piling up intriguingly, but do not lead anywhere. I detect the beginnings of mid series staleness, which, considering we are on season 1, is not encouraging. The tantalising almost-revelations about what may or may not be happening on the island are starting to feel like Mulder and Scully's never-ending attempts to break the conspiracy in the X-Files. It started out fun, but just dragged on and on with no sign of a payoff. That's where we seem to be going with LOST. I am willing to stick with it for now, but it's the characters' back stories that are keeping me interested, not the island mumbo jumbo.

The title only has the feeblest of connections with the post, but it's a pun and it demanded to be written down.

It being a Sunday afternoon with precious little on telly, and having little inclination do do anything else, Beastie and I decided it was time to wade back into the House DVDs kindly loaned to us by itsjustaname. With the possibility of an episode later in the season that we forgot to tape, and which we will have to sort through the episode recaps for, I think we are now caught up. So time to get on with the much-delayed torrenting of season 2, I guess.

One of the catch-up episodes we watched involved a woman who appeared to be schizophrenic, but who in the end was diagnosed with, and treated for some unpronounceably rare condition involving copper. And she wasn't even a Vulcan, but she was an alcoholic (maybe she'd been eating the ring pulls or something).

As the treatment took hold, she stopped hearing the voices and having the visual hallucinations that had convinced everyone (pace Dr House, of course) that she was a schizophrenic. This led us to wonder whether different changes in symptoms might also indicate that treatment was slowly taking effect. Take Harvey, the eponymous giant, invisible rabbit that haunted and spoke to Jimmy Stewart's alcoholic Elwood P Dowd in the movie.

Could Elwood be said to be in recovery if Harvey had stopped talking to him, and started signing?

The Lea mood is much improved; lulled to an impromtu kip, slumped on the bed to the sounds of Lennon on the hi-fi has restored my customary good nature. That and kicking the servants.

I have just watched the latest offering of Lost on E4, which is precisely 1 week ahead of Channel 4, so I shan't say anything specific to ruin it for those of you without digital telly (and anyone on t'other side of The Pond who is interested will have seen it months ago anyway), but it is getting rather odd even by its own standards. Tonight we got Michael and Walt's back story. Passing strange in places, and Walt's comic book seems to have been more important than we previously realised.

On to other matters: I have picked up a copy of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Suzanna Clarke. Wandering around Books Etc this evening before coming back to the Athenaeum Club, I noticed that it has been released in a three-volume edition in a slip case. Very handsome, and priced at £12.99. Even better, however, was the same story in a single volume (a mere 1,006 pages)with a cover price of £7.99. Better still, the latter was being sold at half price. Hmm... £3.98 or £12.99? That took less time to decide than it did to type.

I really don't know that much about the background to the story, other than the adverts that appeared around various Tube stations over the summer, but it is some months - or in fact some years now, since I read a fantasy meisterwerk, so I am looking forward to it. The prose of the first 20 or so pages apes a pleasantly Victorian ornate style, but without the stodgy blandness of so many of the so-called "greats".

I have probably mentioned before that there are very few of the 19th century classics I actually like; they are literature to build an Empire to, which is precisely what happened. No telly, no radio, few organised sports, little entertainment for the common bloke, beyond addling his brains on beer and gin. No wonder we ended up ruling a third of the planet. There was bugger all else to do for entertainment.

And yet it wasn't always that way: read Walter Scott, or even Richardson's Pamela, epics literature from the 18th century and it proves that it wasn't always the way with classic English Literature that it could only be enjoyed by people with broom handles up their arse, and collars starched up to their ears. The 19th century has much to answer for.

Anyway, as I type it is nearly half past the Pumpkin hour, so I shall love you and leave you, one and all. I'm off for a shower and then some proper kip (provided the early evening nap didn't ruin it for me, on which occurrence I shall probably be back here whinging about something inconsequential.

It's a hobby.

And before I forget, pleasant as it is to watch Evangeline Lily swimming around in the skimpiest of thongs, this TV show better start paying back soon with some answers or it will be losing an audience member.