It’s a title one expects to find in a ghost story, but there are no ghosts. This isn’t a horror story or anything of the kind. We only lose a single crewman, so it doesn’t even come close to falling into that realm. I’d barely say there’s even a séance, although the chief villains do sit around holding hands and chanting. But there’s no evil entity of any sort short of the one guy, Sanderson, who is part of a team who explore the surface of the moon. So let’s ask the Ouija board if this is a good episode… Continue reading
In the first episode of The Andromeda Breakthrough, Fleming was very much the master of his own destiny, on the run with Andromeda and successfully evading capture, even foiling the plans of gunmen who arrived at the hermit’s cottage where they were hiding out. Gale Warning is quite a contrast, because Fleming and Andromeda are swept up by events, captured twice and at the mercy of two different factions. 
The idea for this film takes some believing. John Thaw plays David Jones, a young journalist who decides to fake a murder in order to generate a hoax story to make headlines. He is after “interviews, syndicated rights, television”. It’s a very warped idea, and one wonders how anyone would think they could get away with something like that and then make money out of it. Taking on the role of his victim is Johnnie Gordon, played by John Meillon, who has to be concealed in a large wooden chest. It all goes horribly wrong when the car Jones is driving gets stolen by the entertainingly-named Knocker (Jack Rodney), a member of a criminal gang that also includes characters played by John Abineri and Peter Bowles (the cast of this one is amazing), and the box is dumped in a dusty corner of a shed and forgotten about. 
Faith, Hope and Trick. Let’s deal with those three in reverse order, as that approach will take us on a journey from least to most interesting. Mr Trick is presumably going to be around for a while, so it’s too early to stand in judgement over him too much, but first impressions would suggest that he’s a sort of watered down version of Spike. He’s a vampire who embraces the modern world and survives, in comparison to “Kissing Toast”, an ancient relic with a grudge who doesn’t make it to the end of the episode. I would think Mr Trick is an excellent character… if I hadn’t just watched Spike for a year. Instead, he just makes me want the real deal to return soon, instead of having to watch the tribute act. 
The Western has never been my thing. Barring Tombstone, which was excellent despite being very true to form, most Westerns have some good scenes but are usually all about violence and revenge. I don’t mind a good revenge movie, but I like them as occasional action movies, not an entire genre being about it. The whole of the Western genre is about little more than cowboy justice. Oh, I know some Western fans are going to tell me there’s more to it than that, and maybe there is, but Dust is a prime example that proves the rule. Sure, it’s got a surprise ending but it’s a Twilight Zone episode, so what do you expect? 
I typically like everyone. My wife often makes fun of me for that. It’s like I’m a golden retriever who is just happy to talk to people. But when I started watching The Golden Pince-Nez, I couldn’t stand The Professor. It was that utterly disgusting habit of smoking one cigarette after another. “The cold air won’t help my bronchial condition!” You think that’s what’s causing your condition, do you?
Right from the start this episode had my attention, with a courtyard full of Roman statues and ivy growing around the walls. It’s a great setting for a story, but then I do have to admit that I share Sir Bruno Luca’s fascination with Roman art and architecture. I certainly don’t share his sad dream of the Roman Empire existing once more, and I’m not sure Sir Bruno entirely believed in his own weird ambitions either. I’ll explain. 
Happy Halloween, and what better time of year to take a look at an anime series about a ghost, a demon-slaying ninja, a psychic who fights evil spirits and a bunch of girls who regularly expose their naked bodies to the main character. Oh, that last bit isn’t particularly scary, is it (except in the case of predatory, drunken, anatomically-unlikely pervert Nonko), but this is what you get when ghostly tropes are combined with the laziest excesses of anime fanservice. Welcome to the Yuragi Inn, where nobody’s clothes stay on for very long. 
If you’re a fan of classic Doctor Who, you’ll probably love the two Patrick Troughton stories featuring the Yeti, from 1967 and 1968. It’s not hard to see why Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln might have been inspired to write stories about Abominable Snowmen, which were often the subject of fevered news reports in the 1960s in particular. Earlier the same decade, Sir Edmund Hillary had brought back a scalp from a Himalayan monastery, purportedly evidence of a Yeti. Actual sightings are far rarer than most people probably realise, and the first I can find is from the 1832 Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, which included an article written by Brian Houghton Hodgson. 
Ok at this point, I think it’s got to be a joke. The universe is having a laugh at my expense. Everything I’ve been watching has been chock full of terrible characters! What happened to the 
I couldn’t let the days before Halloween go without one more side-step into the alternate realms of Sherlock Holmes. This is, simply put, a work of genius and one of the best collection of pastiches I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. (Twice.) Lead Writers
Roger Pocock
Mike Loschiavo-
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