Seasonal Canadian humour

22.11.2019/08.16

My thanks to Sydney-based photographer Robert Catto for linking me to this one, especially near the festive season. It is funnier than the one I took in Sweden many years ago, which in pun-land could be racist: The sad thing is, at some point, the majority will not get […]

The 1970s: when TV shows were New

12.11.2019/09.16

As a child of the 1970s, I was exposed to this English word: new. Now, before you say that that isn’t anything special, for some reason, in the ’70s, there was an obsession with newness. It wasn’t like the news (by this I mean the plural of new) of Amsterdam or Zealand, but an adjective […]

Facebook: no change, business as usual

24.10.2019/11.49

I would have loved to have seen this go to trial, but Facebook and the plaintiffs—a group of advertising agencies alleging they had been swindled by the social network—settled. Excerpted from The Hollywood Reporter, ‘The suit accused Facebook of acknowledging miscalculations in metrics upon press reports, but still not taking responsibility for the breadth […]

Where the internet tends to be wrong on The Love Boat

07.09.2019/08.30

There are a few TV shows I get anorak about. Alarm für Cobra 11 is probably the one most people have seen me post about. I probably have some claim over The Persuaders, The Professionals, The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Pointman. But there was one that was a staple for us as a family, […]

Spoiler alert: The Avengers’ endgame

24.04.2019/09.13

I’m hearing the young people talk about this lately. But we already know how The Avengers ends. Then they come back with some new cast members years later. John Steed (Patrick Macnee) and Tara King (Linda Thorson) on board a rocket. You may also like Is your favourite 1980s’ celeb here? Not quite a […]

Tumblr is dead, long live NewTumbl

23.04.2019/10.00

Postscripts: click here to read why I’m considering ceasing to post on NewTumbl, in November 2020. Click here to read about NewTumbl’s encouraging response in December 2020. And, just over a week later, how the site really has become too puritanical for its own good. Tumblr is dead, long live NewTumbl. I […]

When the writers don’t check the Cobra 11 universe

10.04.2019/13.03

This is how big an Alarm für Cobra 11: die Autobahnpolizei nerd I am. Three years ago (April 7, 2016), we were introduced to Daniel Roesner as Paul Renner in ‘Cobra, übernehmen Sie’. There is a flashback scene dated April 7, 1996 when Paul and Semir meet for the first time, with Paul as […]

Alarm für Cobra 11: why the inconsistent season numbering?

29.03.2019/12.25

RTL Above: From the first episode after the half-season break, ‘Endstation’. All three men have, at some point, played the sidekick on Alarm für Cobra 11: die Autobahnpolizei: Erdoğan Atalay, who was hired to play second banana in the third episode but has since become the star of the show; Rainer Strecker, the man whom […]

YouTube tracks you even when you’ve signed out and blocked their cookies

03.12.2018/12.49

Of course YouTube lies. Say you’ve paused your search and watch history on YouTube. And you block all youtube.com cookies. YouTube won’t track you, right? You’ve made it quite clear you don’t want a record of what you’ve done, so YouTube shouldn’t keep one. Wrong. As with Big Tech, what you expect given […]

Remakes: Widows joins other Euston Films series

04.11.2018/10.22

I see British filmmaker Steve McQueen has remade Lynda La Plante’s Widows. I was younger than he was when it aired, and didn’t appreciate the storylines to the same extent, though I have recollections of it. What I did recall was a Smith and Jones sketch, which had a voiceover along these lines: […]