Eastenders, Christmas Day, BBC1 (well, of course)
Doctor Who, Christmas Day, BBC1
Ballet Shoes, St Stephen’s Day, BBC1
Extras, Thursday 27th, BBC1
"Well, did you have your sad bitch Christmas?" was how I was cordially greeted in the office on returning to slavery on the 27th.
This was a reference to how I had spent the month of December telling all who would listen, and plenty who wouldn’t, that I was planning to spend Christmas Day on my own this year, saved from grim solitude by Eastenders and wine. For some reason people seemed to think this hermit-like happiness was not a happy event at all.
The correct response to this delicate greeting would of course have been a snarl that yes I did, and yes it was great, so feck away off. But I couldn’t, because I ended up not on my tod in the end.
And before everyone goes "Aw, she got invited somewhere after all", I am going to say, ONCE AGAIN, I would have been fine on my own. But at the last minute, while drunk in Lavery’s on Christmas Eve, I realised that going to a mate’s house meant he could do all the cooking, while I could sit on my (rapidly-increasing) arse drinking wine and watching Finding Nemo. It also meant I got to keep my Christmas steak for St Stephen’s Day, even though I had no booze left to go with it (bah).
It was two blokes wot I spent Christmas Day with, so, while I got to watch Doctor Who because they wanted to perve at Kylie, it also meant I got banished another room for Eastenders while they did their male bonding "Ug! Eastenders is rubbish! Ug!" dance.
I cared not a jot. The fire was lit, I had wine, I’d been fed, and I didn’t have to listen to Bill and Ted in the dining room. It was win/win.
I also got slagged off on my return to the office about saying Eastenders had been great on Christmas Day (I honestly don’t know why I bother working here). Ha! the scoff went, and there was you slagging it off for weeks beforehand. But yes, it was rubbish for weeks beforehand, and no doubt will be again. But when Eastenders does Proper Drama, it does it at full steam.
Oh Og, it was brilliant. I came into the dining room from my exile after the first episode, bouncing with excitement at how great it had been. No-one listened to me but I didn’t care. The writers very kindly didn’t end the episode at the DVD just starting to be watched – we got a whole five minutes of fallout to whet our appetites for the next one. Best moment was ginger baldy Max, turning to wife Tanya after she had seen footage of him snogging the face off Stacey in her wedding dress, and saying "It’s not what it looks like." Ha!
And then the second episode! It was even better than my favourite Eastenders fantasy of seeing Deano and Chelsea fed head first into a tree shredder. I sat gawking and gape-mouthed on the sofa, with a glass of wine in hand that I forgot to even drink, and got shouted at by the boys for not noticing the fire going out. Pah.
(It was also fun as another guy turned up in the house for a quick visit, and pointedly declined to join in the "Ug! Eastenders is rubbish! Ug!" dance with the other two. "No thanks," he said as Bill and Ted gruffly told him there was more manly televisual fare on in the dining room, "I’ve been waiting to see Max get what’s coming to him all year." Bless you, Fitzy.)
In between the two episodes was Doctor Who, which as everyone knew was set on the Titanic and had Kylie in it. I don’t know if it was the delayed excitement from Eastenders, or the fact that by that stage I’d had about a bottle and a half of wine, but I was confussed and confuddled for most of it. There was lots of running about, lots of shouting, and lots of flashy things flashing. I had no clue what was happening.
It was still great to watch though, and it was very clever of the makers to cast Kylie in it, as this meant everyone watching had someone to perve at. It certainly kept the boys quiet. The more drunk of the two even got all welled up when Kylie fell into The Pit. You know which one of you it is …
And I have to say, very disappointingly, that was it for the Christmas Day viewing. We watched Catherine Tate at 1030, but after that there was nada, very disappointing when there’s plenty of wine left. Still, I did of course fulfil the usual Christmas Day obligation of falling asleep on the sofa, in all likelihood farting gently while dreaming of Eastenders’ ginger baldy Max. Now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d write…
The next day saw me safely back on my own sofa, settling down to watch Ballet Shoes on BBC1. It was keek. Well, not keek – it was a fairly faithful adaptation of the book and it looked very well, but it was hard to muster sympathy for those cut-glass accents. I remember as a kid after reading years’ worth of Enid Blyton finally getting an audio cassette of The Valley of Adventure and being struck dumb with horror at how the characters sounded (you read in your own accent, of course). This was the same.
Extras was also a bit disappointing, although far better and of course much funnier. Andy Millman was now a successful star with his crappy sitcom When the Whistle Blows, while poor Maggie was slipping further and further down the poverty ladder. Andy dumped his agent and dumped his friend, only to Come To His Senses at the end with a rail against Celebrity Big Brother.
All very predictable, although the interview with the Guardian where he lied his way through it and got poor Maggie to pretend to be his PA, was painfully good. As happens so often with Ricky Gervais’ work, I was honestly so embarrassed at this point I had to cover my ears.
The best scene was with Maggie playing a prostitute in a Clive Owen film, with an incredulous Clive insisting he "would never pay for a prostitute who looked like that."
"Honestly Clive," the hapless producer pleaded, "they sent me a truckload of absolute hogs and this was the best one."
So an up and down Christmas gogglebox experience this year. But, all hails good for 2008, as I have a new house to settle into, WITH CABLE. So many more things to complain about. I can’t wait.
Doctor Who, Christmas Day, BBC1
Ballet Shoes, St Stephen’s Day, BBC1
Extras, Thursday 27th, BBC1
"Well, did you have your sad bitch Christmas?" was how I was cordially greeted in the office on returning to slavery on the 27th.
This was a reference to how I had spent the month of December telling all who would listen, and plenty who wouldn’t, that I was planning to spend Christmas Day on my own this year, saved from grim solitude by Eastenders and wine. For some reason people seemed to think this hermit-like happiness was not a happy event at all.
The correct response to this delicate greeting would of course have been a snarl that yes I did, and yes it was great, so feck away off. But I couldn’t, because I ended up not on my tod in the end.
And before everyone goes "Aw, she got invited somewhere after all", I am going to say, ONCE AGAIN, I would have been fine on my own. But at the last minute, while drunk in Lavery’s on Christmas Eve, I realised that going to a mate’s house meant he could do all the cooking, while I could sit on my (rapidly-increasing) arse drinking wine and watching Finding Nemo. It also meant I got to keep my Christmas steak for St Stephen’s Day, even though I had no booze left to go with it (bah).
It was two blokes wot I spent Christmas Day with, so, while I got to watch Doctor Who because they wanted to perve at Kylie, it also meant I got banished another room for Eastenders while they did their male bonding "Ug! Eastenders is rubbish! Ug!" dance.
I cared not a jot. The fire was lit, I had wine, I’d been fed, and I didn’t have to listen to Bill and Ted in the dining room. It was win/win.
I also got slagged off on my return to the office about saying Eastenders had been great on Christmas Day (I honestly don’t know why I bother working here). Ha! the scoff went, and there was you slagging it off for weeks beforehand. But yes, it was rubbish for weeks beforehand, and no doubt will be again. But when Eastenders does Proper Drama, it does it at full steam.
Oh Og, it was brilliant. I came into the dining room from my exile after the first episode, bouncing with excitement at how great it had been. No-one listened to me but I didn’t care. The writers very kindly didn’t end the episode at the DVD just starting to be watched – we got a whole five minutes of fallout to whet our appetites for the next one. Best moment was ginger baldy Max, turning to wife Tanya after she had seen footage of him snogging the face off Stacey in her wedding dress, and saying "It’s not what it looks like." Ha!
And then the second episode! It was even better than my favourite Eastenders fantasy of seeing Deano and Chelsea fed head first into a tree shredder. I sat gawking and gape-mouthed on the sofa, with a glass of wine in hand that I forgot to even drink, and got shouted at by the boys for not noticing the fire going out. Pah.
(It was also fun as another guy turned up in the house for a quick visit, and pointedly declined to join in the "Ug! Eastenders is rubbish! Ug!" dance with the other two. "No thanks," he said as Bill and Ted gruffly told him there was more manly televisual fare on in the dining room, "I’ve been waiting to see Max get what’s coming to him all year." Bless you, Fitzy.)
In between the two episodes was Doctor Who, which as everyone knew was set on the Titanic and had Kylie in it. I don’t know if it was the delayed excitement from Eastenders, or the fact that by that stage I’d had about a bottle and a half of wine, but I was confussed and confuddled for most of it. There was lots of running about, lots of shouting, and lots of flashy things flashing. I had no clue what was happening.
It was still great to watch though, and it was very clever of the makers to cast Kylie in it, as this meant everyone watching had someone to perve at. It certainly kept the boys quiet. The more drunk of the two even got all welled up when Kylie fell into The Pit. You know which one of you it is …
And I have to say, very disappointingly, that was it for the Christmas Day viewing. We watched Catherine Tate at 1030, but after that there was nada, very disappointing when there’s plenty of wine left. Still, I did of course fulfil the usual Christmas Day obligation of falling asleep on the sofa, in all likelihood farting gently while dreaming of Eastenders’ ginger baldy Max. Now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d write…
The next day saw me safely back on my own sofa, settling down to watch Ballet Shoes on BBC1. It was keek. Well, not keek – it was a fairly faithful adaptation of the book and it looked very well, but it was hard to muster sympathy for those cut-glass accents. I remember as a kid after reading years’ worth of Enid Blyton finally getting an audio cassette of The Valley of Adventure and being struck dumb with horror at how the characters sounded (you read in your own accent, of course). This was the same.
Extras was also a bit disappointing, although far better and of course much funnier. Andy Millman was now a successful star with his crappy sitcom When the Whistle Blows, while poor Maggie was slipping further and further down the poverty ladder. Andy dumped his agent and dumped his friend, only to Come To His Senses at the end with a rail against Celebrity Big Brother.
All very predictable, although the interview with the Guardian where he lied his way through it and got poor Maggie to pretend to be his PA, was painfully good. As happens so often with Ricky Gervais’ work, I was honestly so embarrassed at this point I had to cover my ears.
The best scene was with Maggie playing a prostitute in a Clive Owen film, with an incredulous Clive insisting he "would never pay for a prostitute who looked like that."
"Honestly Clive," the hapless producer pleaded, "they sent me a truckload of absolute hogs and this was the best one."
So an up and down Christmas gogglebox experience this year. But, all hails good for 2008, as I have a new house to settle into, WITH CABLE. So many more things to complain about. I can’t wait.
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