Paul Ireland talks to us about being a young actor in The Bill and an older actor in Outland.

There’s One Thing and Pork and News and what else do you need to know?

Notes

One Thing

• Outland: 9:30pm, Wednesday 8 Feb, 2012 on ABC1
• Outland: 10:30pm, Thursday 9 Feb, 2012 on ABC2
• Outland: ABC iView.

Our SXSW Fund

Go to our Pozible page. There are still Crumpler bags and other goodies to be found. Donate and help us show the world how great Australian podcasting can be.

Notes

One Thing

• The Straits: 8:30pm Thursday, ABC1
• The Office – BBC version: DVD

Raywatch

You can play along at home with these videos:

There’s a whole heap of news and some great Trotters thanks to Toby Halligan.

Don’t forget there are still Crumpler bags and other rewards up for grabs by supporting our SXSW efforts on Pozible.

Notes

One Thing

• The Office – Tuesday 9pm on Eleven

So here’s a funny thing. We recorded a One Thing for you all to enjoy but it somehow fell out of the episode. Still, there it is, just above us, for you to see and watch or not.

See John Richards Live!

Talking Outland

Friday January 27th 8:00pm
Melbourne Science Fiction Club
St. David‘s Uniting Church Hall
74 Melville Road, West Brunswick

Queer Nerd – Spoken Word

Thursday February 2nd 7.30pm
Bar Nancy
61 High St, Northcote

Sex, Lies and Television Screens: Live in the Studio

Australian Centre for the Moving Image
Thursday February 23rd, 7pm

Also, Josh spent some time in New York and discovered just how intrusive television can be in daily life.

Courteney Hocking is our co-host for this one and Brett uses his best reading voice for news and letters.

Notes

Errata

There’s a point, during “If You Watch One Thing”, in which we discuss the new series of Absolutely Fabulous and talk about it like that’s the one that’s on Wednesday nights on ABC1. It’s not. Those are repeats.

The new 20th anniversary episodes of Absolutely Fabulous will air on ABC1 in February.

One Thing

• The Thick of It Season 3 – 9pm Wednesday, ABC1
• Nigella’s Kitchen – 8pm Tuesday, ABC1
• Movie: Coffee and Cigarettes – 11:05pm Wednesday, SBS One/SBS HD

SXSW Funding

Also, marvel at Lee Zachariah’s excellent knowledge of film makers who have crossed over into television.

There’s also a taste of what to expect from this year on Boxcutters

Notes

One Thing

• Psychoville, Thursday 12 January. 2012. ABC2
• Commercial Kings, Tues ABC2 9pm

*It might not be the best we’ve ever done.

We’re not concentrating on the bad stuff. We do that all year ’round. Nope, this is just the stuff we enjoyed so maybe you can enjoy it too.

It’s hopefully less messy than our previous end of year shows, but who knows?

Sit back and listen to Dave Lawson, John Richards, Glenn Peters, Brett Cropley and me talk until we get bored and go home.

Notes

You May Have Missed

Glenn really just sped past this one so you might have missed him mentioning Appropriate Adult in his highlights for the year.

Stocking Stuffers

Looking for a last minute gift for that someone special? Well, check out our recommended stocking stuffers:

• The Almighty Johnsons: Series 1
• Cloudstreet, the miniseries
• The original Twilight Zone series
• or get in early for next year’s with Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror

Special Treat

As a special treat, why not check out episode 2 of Dave Lawson’s chat show, Dave’s Shed Show?

Also, Courteney Hocking is in to talk about those guilty pleasures we think we shouldn’t watch.

Then, Nelly Thomas tells us about the passion and drama that goes on in her head when she watches Lost.

Listen and enjoy.

It sold out very quickly and chances are you missed it. Never fear, though. Through the magic of modern technology we’re able to bring you an edited audio version of night that most people have already forgotten.

It becomes episode 286 of our little show and you can listen along and pretend like you were actually there.

In the show notes we’ll include a bunch of clips that we played so you can listen and watch at the same time. Enjoy.

Videos

Play these videos along with the audio to help you pretend like you were really there!

Some Backstage Shenanigans

Alan Arkin and the Bun Bun Bros.

What Kermit was doing before the Muppet Show

Pitching The Muppet Show

A Pilot: “Sex and Violence”

Over-thinking the Muppet Show I

Over-thinking the Muppet Show II

Warning: This clip contains a lot of blackface

Puppeteers and their favourite Muppet Show characters

An Example of Muppets Tonight

The Legacy of the Muppet Show

embedding is not available but you can see it on YouTube.

Statler and Waldorf at the movies

Muppets TV

A Little Bit of Kylie

Courteney joins Brett and Josh to discuss what it’s like when we watch TV with our parents. Which shows survive the intergenerational divide?

Then John and Glenn, proving they are different people, discuss the concept of abandoning TV shows.

We’d love to hear your experiences with these issues in the comments.

Since recording this episode, radio station MTR has faced closure and it looks like Sam Newman might loose his job there.

So the lesson is: don’t mess with Courteney Hocking.

John Richards is cohost and he tells us tales of his journey to Seattle where Outland premiered.

We finally get around to your letters and Toby Halligan brings us some fascinating and frightening news from China.

Notes

• Download and read the whole Screen Australia Drama Report.

One Thing

• Bazura Project, Ep 6 – ABC2, Thursday, 9:30pm
• Q&A on Twitter – ABC1 & Twitter, Monday, 9:30pm
• The books John has to read for his appearance on the Writer and the Critic podcast.

Also, with Glenn Peters in the co-host seat, we discuss the new Showtime drama, Homeland.

Notes

One Thing

• Jeopardy! – 6pm weeknights, One HD
• Holy Flying Circus – Channel Internets
• Unforgettable – 9:30pm & 10:30pm Wednesday, 8:30pm Thursday, Nine

Today Tonight

The host of Today Tonight on the East coast is, indeed, Matt White.

Star Trek

See John and Josh at ACMI, Live In The Studio, talking about Star Trek.

Also, John and Brett speak to Christos Tsiolkas about the TV adaptation of his controversial novel, The Slap.

Notes

Update

This episode has been updated to fix the interruption during the interview with Christos Tsiolkas. Thanks to everybody who alerted us to the issue. Unfortunately it happened while John was away but thankfully he had enough raw files with him to get us a fix. Feel free to download the episode again if you want a “clean” version. (It will still have the swearing.)

One Thing

• Gruen Planet
• The Slap
• The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson

See the Outland premiere in Seattle, WA

You’ve waited a long time to see John Richards’s writing on Australian screens in the form of Outland, a sitcom about gay and lesbian science fiction fans, co-created with Adam Richard. Well, now you have your chance.

The 16th Annual Seattle Lesbian and Gay Film Festival will screen the world premiere of Outland.

On Tuesday the 18th October you can see episodes 1-3. And then, the following evening, see eps 4-6!

John will be there and he will let you touch him.

Glenn Peters is in the co-host seat and we talk about the Boxcutters Rule of Three and question its validity. That segment may also constitute a review of Hart of Dixie, although I wouldn’t bank on it.

Notes

One Thing

• Compass: Christos Tsiolkas: on iView
• The Slap “Anouk”: 8:30pm, Thu 13 Oct on ABC1
• Happy Days “Hot Stuff”: 1:30am, Wed 12 Oct on Eleven

In further investigation of How We Watch, John went into a cinema to watch some Doctor Who.

Notes

One Thing

• The Bazura Project – Thursday, 9pm, ABC2
• The Hamster Wheel – Wednesday, 9:35pm, ABC1
• Episodes 2 of all the shows downloaded last week.

See Toby Halligan’s Comedy Show

Don’t forget that Toby Halligan’s show in the Melbourne Fringe is currently on. You can see his show for free by sending him an email and being one of the lucky ones.

We preview some shows in the new US Fall season, go through some Letters to Boxcutters and give you all the News you want.

Notes

One Thing

• The Bazura Project – 9:00pm Thu 29 Sep, ABC2
• Later with Jools Holland – 1:00am(ish) Mon-Fri, ABC2
• United States of Tara, Series 3 – 9:30pm Tue 27 Sep, ABC1

Shekilda

Find out more about the Australian Women’s Crime Writers’ Convention and go along to learn more about women in the craft.

Adding Ads to Shows

You can find out more about the technology Channel 7 has licensed and see all the ways they plan to possibly ruin every single memory you have and your very understanding of reality. Remember, technology is never evil, only the people who use it can be evil.

We brought everyone into the studio to help celebrate. We take a trip down memory lane to when we were six years old. What are our great childhood television memories? How has that shaped our viewing today?

It’s a very special episode of Boxcutters that no person who was ever a child should miss.

Notes

One Thing

• At Home With Julia, “Date night” – 9:30pm Wed 7 Sep, ABC1
• The Shield on DVD
• Wild Boys – 7:30pm Sun 11 Sep, Seven
• How Not To Live Your Life – 9:00pm Thu 8 Sep, ABC2

How We Watch

Here’s an easy link to all the posts involving comments about how we watch.

Buy Some Stuff

Feeling nostalgic? You might want to pick up a copy of the complete series of Family Affair and enjoy the way things were.

Or, if you want to see some good guys and bad guys, why not get yourself The Shield on DVD?

Every time you buy from Amazon using our links, we get a little bit of money and you get to enjoy your life.

Courteney Hocking is our co-host and she tells us how she watches TV with more updates from listeners.

Josh gives us his first impressions of life with Fetch TV.

Keep sending in your examples of How You Watch or maybe tell us something you enjoyed watching when you were six by sending us an email.

Notes

One Thing

• Quantum Leap ‘Lee Harvey Oswald Pt 1’ – 2am Wed, 31 Aug, 7mate
• Australian Story ‘David Hicks’ – 8:30pm Tue, 30 Aug, ABC1
• Louie – Thu 10:30pm FX (in the USA)

It’s quite possible that we answer that question in this week’s episode and there’s only one way to find out.

Also, John went to ACMI to (s)talk David & Margaret. He made a recording of his (s)talking and shares it with us.

There’s more about How We Watch and an absolutely great bit of Trotters.

Notes

One Thing

• The Brady Bunch, “Kelly’s Kids” – 5:30pm Wed, 24 Aug 2011, Eleven
• Insight, “Tampa” – 7:30pm Tue, 23 Aug 2011, SBS ONE (repeated on SBS TWO on Friday)

Can’t Stop The Serenity

The Melbourne Browncoats host their annual charity event this Saturday. They promise “heaps of prizes to give away”” plus see Serenity and Dr Horrible’s Sing-along Blog on the big screen! Tix are $18 online or $20 at the door.

For more info, see the facebook page or the Melbourne Browncoats wesbite.

Also, we take the opportunity, with the chatty Dave Lawson as our cohost, to talk about our television watching habits and the effects our friends have on us.

If you want to subscribe to 3RRR and be in the running for all those great prizes, give them a call on +61 3 9388 1027.

Notes

If You Watch One Thing

• Judith Lucy’s Spiritual Journey – 9:30pm 17 Aug, on ABC1
• The Thick of It – 10pm Thursday 18 Aug, ABC2
• Wallander: The Joker – 11:30pm Sunday 21 Aug, SBS2

Audience Participation

How do you watch TV?

We want to hear from you about your television watching habits. Do you watch alone or with friends? Do you have more than one television set? Do you watch on your computer? Do you read email or make macramé belts while viewing?

Please send us an email via the form (or to “hooray” at this domain) and let us know.

Things We Forgot To Mention

• The Young Talent Time judge we think Dave was referring to was Evie Hayes or maybe someone else entirely different about whom we could find no record.

News Items

• Bert and Ernie will not get married to each other because they are puppets.
• Good News Week might become Good News World and nobody cares.
• Ten’s ill-conceived The Renovators is going to cost it heaps of bucks.
• Young Talent Time might be coming back.
• Shaun Micallef might leave Talkin’ ‘Bout Your Generation and Amanda Keller might be in charge.

Twitter

We mentioned our Twitter handles last night on the show but in case you missed them:

• Josh is @sealfur
• Brett is @bbox
• Courteney is @courteneyh
• Toby is @toby_halligan
• Dave is @davewlawson
• John is shouting random comments out of his window onto the street
• Glenn is @nightwatchman.
• Nelly is @MsNellyThomas

Franklin & Bash is a show from the US about frat-style lawyers.

We take a deeper look at last week’s announcements of ABC cuts and discuss the positives and negatives.

John wants you to come up with a punny and more memorable title for Franklin & Bash.

If you think that Winners & Losers isn’t as bad as we found in the first three episodes, convince us.

If You Watch One Thing

• Suits, 9:40pm Monday, 15 August, Seven
• SLiDE, 7:35pm Tuesday, 16 August, Fox 8
• Man Fixes John’s Television, sometime this week at John’s House

Courteney’s been watching some Australian classic television. She talks about Phoenix in Things You May Have Missed and it causes us to reminisce a bit about the good Australian TV of the past.

Then, while we’re in the mood, we take a look back at Angry Boys and try to work out whether or not it was successful.

You can watch Falling Skies on Fox 8, Thursday nights at 8:30pm.

If You Watch One Thing

• Breaking Bad, 10pm Sunday, 7 August, AMC (in the USA)
• Gruen Transfer 9pm Wednesday, 3 August, ABC1 (in Australia)
• Malcolm Turnbull addressing the National Press Club, 12:30pm Wednesday, 3 August, ABC1 (also in Australia)

In I Don’t Buy It, Brett has problems with McDonald’s.

If You Watch One Thing

• Judith Lucy’s Spiritual Journey, 9:30pm 27 July, on ABC1
• Guerilla Garderners, 5pm Weekdays on One HD
• Hot Docs: The Confessions, 10pm Tuesday on SBS

Also, you can catch up on the previous episodes of Wilfred on Eleven’s website.

Double jeopardy laws are being reworked in Victoria. Brett was right.

Toby Halligan has provided us with more information about very large numbers and information about the television popularity of AFL vs NRL.

Sue Spencer is the Executive Producer of the long-running investigative journalism programme, Four Corners. Josh spoke her to find out if people still want investigative reporting. Do they? You’ll find out by listening to the episode. That’s how this thing works.

There’s some news in which we’re flippant about death, there’s some hating on MasterChef and religious figures, there’s some things to watch if you were going to.

Why don’t you spend some time finding out what else is a prime number?

In memory of Sherwood Schwartz, here’s a nice little article of appreciation from the LA Times.

If you are interested in applying for the next series of the Amazing Race, don’t forget to read the terms and conditions.

John’s done a special Just Don’t Bother about the late 70s failure, Supertrain.

There’s an Amazing Race Minute, an I Don’t Buy It, some Quotes and more mentions of Channel 11 than ever before in any other episode.
What else could you want? Nothing. It’s perfect. Don’t touch it. Just listen.

Want to tell us about some outrageous thing we said but shouldn’t have on the show? Go ahead and send us an email.

Bruce Jenner won a gold medal for the decathlon at the 1976 Olympic games.

John and Josh wanted to investigate the reasons behind Australia makes so much acclaimed television science fiction and fantasy for children but never attempts to do anything for families or adults.

Sitting on the panel were: Chris Gist, ABC Commissioning Editor in Melbourne;
Philip Dalkin, writer on Sea Patrol and Stingers, amongst others; David Napier, director of K9; and Mark Shirrefs, co-creator of Spellbinder and The Girl from Tomorrow.

It’s an interesting conversation about budgets, audiences, networks and risk taking.

The goose drank wine:

• Listen to episode 269
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed
• Subscribe using iTunes

Want to tell us about some outrageous thing we said but shouldn’t have on the show? Go ahead and send us an email.

Photo courtesy of Nalini Haynes, editor of Dark Matter

Thanks to David Ashton.

Part of this episode was recorded at Outland Studios (John’s Loungeroom).

This is a massive show with Lawrence Leung telling us all about his new show Unbelievable.

For the last few months, Channel 7 has had a new show on air called Winners & Losers. We thought it was about time we reviewed it. So we do that. We also watched it.

In news we talk about homophobia and ask who is looking after the children. There’s some Crap TV, One Thing and Toby Halligan is back with Trotters.

It’s a good one and you’ll kick yourself for missing it.

• Listen to episode 268
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed
• Subscribe using iTunes

Want to tell us about some outrageous thing we said but shouldn’t have on the show? Go ahead and send us an email.Here’s a sneak peak at Lawrence’s new show. You can see the whole thing on ABC1 at 9:30pm on Wednesday or pick it up on iView.

Remember ages ago when John told us that in New Zealand they were making a show about Norse gods who all lived in modern day Auckland? Well he did and it’s called the Almighty Johnsons and we review it for your pleasure.

John and Josh went to a Channel 9 event where they pretended they wanted to buy some advertising. It’s our first ever undercover investigation. We’re just like 4 Corners or A Current Affair now, aren’t we?

We launch a new segment called Amazing Race in a Minute where Josh has exactly a minute to talk about the Amazing Race.

All that plus News, One Thing, Letters to Boxcutters. What more could you want?

Listen to it:

• Listen to episode 266267
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed
• Subscribe using iTunes

Also come and see Josh and John speaking at Continuum this weekend.

If you missed out on our last session at ACMI your not going to want to miss us talking about The Muppet Show. You can book tickets now.

Update 09 June 2011

Okay, so we messed up. We originally published this as Ep 277. Clearly a series of oversights that lead to confusion in Martin English and maybe some other observant people. Those of us who travel around the world not noticing a thing will not care.

That being said, if you’re really concerned you can always go into the metadata of your audio player and change the title of the episode yourself.

Sorry for the confusion.

We review the AMC remake of the Danish drama The Killing.

In Good Die Young we look at Terriers.

Our cohost this week is the ever-pleasant and totally ROCKING, Courteney Hocking.

• Listen to episode 266
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed
• Subscribe using iTunes

We review the HBO series Game of Thrones.

In Good Die Young we look at Freaks and Geeks.

Our cohost this week is copywriter and man-about-town, Glenn Peters.

• Listen to episode 265
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed
• Subscribe using iTunes

Television is getting a lot more complicated as new technologies come forward. Last week we tried to cover the AFL rights issue but it’s really complicated. That why we brought in the big guns. Lucy Battersby from the Age and Sydney Morning Herald comes in to explain it to us properly.

In the Good Die Young we look at the very short-lived Lone Star.

There are some letters to Boxcutters as well as If You Watch One Thing.

Also, just in case you missed it, we do a brief run down of this year’s Eurovision final.

• Listen to episode 264
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed
• Subscribe using iTunes

You want the truth? You can probably handle the truth. But can you handle our review of the BBC2 series, The Trip?

Okay, you can probably handle that. In fact, we recommend that you handle that. We also recommend that you handle our new segment already changing its name. Now it’s called “The Good Die Young” and it’s about shows that were cancelled before their time. This week we discuss American Gothic

Brett gives us a rundown of the the distribution of AFL rights and John mentions Doctor Who at least twice.

• Listen to episode 263
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed
• Subscribe using iTunes

Send us your thoughts in the form of an email or some such.

Don’t forget to come to our 2011 Eurovision party.

UPDATE: 10 May

ABC confirms that it has The Trip but is yet to schedule an air date for it.

Due to popular demand and direct from her tour of North East Melbourne, Nelly Thomas is back to tell us all about the latest season of Survivor and why it’s still one of the best shows on television.

We talk about some of the new technology involved in broadcasting the Royal Wedding and discuss the changes to AFL broadcast rights.

There are some letters to Boxcutters as well as If You Watch One Thing and Trotters with Toby Halligan

Should we mention Osama bin Laden’s death or Karl’s Gold Logie win just to try to get more hits on Google? What about Cialis, Viagra or girls in *insert your suburb* who want to talk to you now?

• Listen to episode 262
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed
• Subscribe using iTunes

Pat Mastroianni played the celebrated Joey Jeremiah on the classic late-80s / early-90s Canadian teen drama, Degrassi Junior High (and its subsequent series). He joined us live via Skype to discuss his involvement in the series.

For the rest of the show, John and Josh (heretofore as ‘We’ or ‘Us’) talk through the intricacies and complexities of both Degrassi and the excellent UK teen drama, Press Gang.

This show was recorded live at ACMI in Studio 1 as part of their monthly Live in the Studio sessions. Every month, ACMI uses their own television studio to host a discussion of all things television and that’s an idea we can all get behind. It’s fun and informative.

Meanwhile, enjoy this display of in-depth discussion and frivolity. It goes for a little over 90 minutes, so strap in. Also, there’s a list of videos and links to those videos after the jump.

• RSS feed
• iTunes
• or listen to it now in your browser

We used a whole bunch of videos to entertain the crowd and give them a break from our shouty voices. They’re conveniently ordered for you here.

1. Degrassi Junior High title sequence
2. Press Gang title sequence
3. Press Gang example clip
4. Degrassi High example clip
5. people shared their own stories about how Press Gang changed their lives
6. we used this Joey Jeremiah montage to introduce Pat Mastroianni
7. to give us a little break, we played this cover of the Zit Remedy classic, “Everybody Wants Something”
8. Press Gang, apparently, was all about telephones
9. Degrassi dealt with child abuse with a creepy teacher
10. while Press Gang chose to make a special child abuse edition
11. and then we discovered that lesbianism is nothing more than subconscious fantasy in the world of Degrassi
12. This is how Degrassi ended their run
13. and Press Gang chose to end like this

Marc Fennell, star of Hungry Beast and the Circle talks to us about the not so surprise third season of Hungry Beast.

Sophie Geffros gives us an insider’s view of what the whole controversy over non-disabled actors playing disabled characters on TV. She fails to mention Ironside but we don’t hold that against her.

Then there’s Toby Halligan’s Trotters and a whole bunch of news and a wonderful email that will bring tears to your throat, or something.

Eat it with your hands:

• RSS feed
• iTunesiTunes
• or listen to 261 in your browser

Boxcutters Episode 261 by Boxcutters is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Enjoy responsibly:

• RSS feed
• iTunes
• or listen to 260 in your browser

Toby Halligan is doing a trial show for his Comedy Festival season this Saturday at the Brunswick Green in Sydney Road at 3pm. Go along. It’s free and funny. Find out more details on the Facebook Event Page.

Update: 15 March, 2011

For those pics of GTV9 we mentioned this week, simply go to the Outland Institute blog.

Boxcutters Episode 260 by Boxcutters is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

We review the new show from Shaun Ryan, the creator of the Shield, The Chicago Code.

If you want more there’s some Pork, some Crap TV, some dumb anecdotes that should never have gone to air and a bunch of other stuff that is probably not work mentioning like breathing and stuff.

Breathe with this:

• RSS feed
• iTunes
• or listen to 259 in your browser

Also, we mentioned a few excellent radio shows on Radio National.

We think you should check out:

• Future Tense – A show all about the roads we’re making towards a better, or at least more interesting future.
• This American Life – This is the excellent USA radio show that we’ve been telling you to listen to for years.
• The Lonely Hearts Club – Dave Lawson thinks it’s good and so does Tony Martin. That should be good enough for you. Listen to it

Twitter feeds for:

• Dave Lawson
• Josh Kinal
• Brett Cropley
• Boxcutters as a whole

UPDATE: 10 March

Oh hi there. I found some news items we wanted to mention in the show but didn’t because we got so engrossed in that conversation that seemed to go on forever (but an interesting forever):

• Automatic profanity checker to be used in US network television (from Variety)

Actually, it turns out that was the only one. Enjoy.

UPDATE: 16 March

Chris Kennett, one of the former writers on The Bounce tells me on Twitter that Ray Matsen was not a writer on the show. Sorry for the error.

Boxcutters Episode 259 by Boxcutters is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Which opinions? Well, we tell you exactly what we think of Bob’s Burgers, the new animated series that airs on Eleven in Australia.

Not enough? We also try to place the blame for the end of Ben Elton: Live from Planet Earth. We use that as a segue into discussing the trend of British shows coming to Australia (if 35 years can be considered a trend).

News, Pork, Trotters, a bit of Crap TV, we have it all in this episode. Oh yeah, and Letters too.

• RSS feed
• iTunes
• or listen to 258 in your browser

Please send us your comments and queries.

You can read a summary of the Boxcutters Live in the Studio event on the ACMI blog. There’s a lovely little video on there too.

You can buy tickets for Toby Halligan’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival show. You can also read his funny words at Diary Leaks.

Boxcutters Episode 258 by Boxcutters is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

We take a look at the new sketch comedy from the Independent Film Channel in the US, Portlandia.

Toby Halligan’s Trotters brings us home and there’s the week’s TV news and what you should watch this week.

• RSS feed
• iTunes
• or listen to 257 in your browser

Courteney and our very own Toby Halligan have a special Comedy Festival edition of Political Asylum. It will be funny.

Boxcutters Episode 257 by Boxcutters is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

ACMA Chair, Chris Chapman, talks to us about the crazy things that those whacky regulators at the Communications and Media Authority get up to. He also goes into the details behind last week’s controversial David Campbell / Channel 7 decision.

Then we talk to author and artist turned TV animation writer/director, Emma Magenta. Her new show starts on ABC1 on Tuesday night at 10pm. It’s called The Gradual Demise of Phillipa Finch. It’s a two minute cartoon for grown-ups.

Toby Halligan is our co-host this week. He has a Melbourne International Comedy Festival show coming up. Also, you can read some of the funny stuff he writes.

• RSS feed
• iTunes
• or listen to 256 in your browser

This week’s question is the same as last week’s: Are you coming to our exciting event at ACMI? Let us know by email.

This is a screenshot of the judgement from the ACMA report, as referred to in the interview with Chris Chapman. As always, though, we encourage you to read the full report to be as completely informed as possible.

Boxcutters Episode 256 by Boxcutters is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

We discuss recent news coverage and the secret lives of journalists with James Talia.

Also we review Harry’s Law, the new David E Kelley drama.

Expect, as well, the usual fare of news and pork with trotters.

Smell the audio treats:

• RSS feed
• iTunes
• or listen to 255 in your browser

This week’s question: Are you coming to our exciting event at ACMI? Let us know by email.

This week we talk about the UK/US co-production Episodes starring Matt LeBlanc, Steven Mangan and Tamsin Greig.

We also take a look at some of the shows we hope to watch this year on the television, talk about international controversies in television and tell you the best DVD player to buy.

Really, though, we know that everybody just goes through the whole show just waiting for Toby Halligan’s Trotters. You won’t be disappointed this time.

It’s good to be back. We hope you enjoy it. Have a listen.

• RSS feed
• iTunes
• or listen to 254 in your browser

This week’s question: Did you know that we secretly do have a quiz question this week? Let us know by email.

Also, if you’re wondering where we are on Facebook and Twitter, just click on those words back there.

Here’s a puff piece from the Guardian or the Observer or something, with the three stars of Episodes.

We received a couple of great tips from milhouseaus who told us that he read that Nine have the rights to air Episodes. I checked with them this morning and they confirmed it but have no date.

He also sent us this handy link to BluRay international codes.

3 Feb 2011 UPDATE: Nine has just confirmed that Episodes will probably appear in the second half of the year.

Geraldine Hickey joins us with her special comments on her selection of the best show of 2010 and like a fantastic meeting of all the Big Chiefs, we have drawn in Josh Kinal, Brett Cropley, Nelly Thomas and John Richards for a pants-down, bare-knuckle brawl on momentous developments in Australian TV, the crap that should never have happened and the best show and our favourite characters of this, the first year of the second decade of the second millennium. Or is that the final year of the first decade of the new millenuim? Either way, it’s a BIG FREAKING CALL but we like to call it our Merry Episodic Echo – part 5 in our occasional annual wrapups.

We’ve put our picks out there so now it’s up to you to get busy in the comments to let us know who is right and what we completely missed that you were barraking for.

The comments are below – listen through the links up here:

• Aim your podcatcher or feed reader at our 24 hours accessible RSS feed to get all the shows right up to now.
• Sign up in iTunes while you’re writing our 5 star review.
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While we can’t bring you any information about Assange, you can bet that Nelly and Brett both have opinions, information and a whole world of words to say about that Oprah lady.

If you’re sick of hearing about Oprah‘s tour to Australia then we’ve got some other news and an I Don’t Buy It for you.

Come on a journey with us. We promise there’ll be fun and games and arguments and sighing.

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This week’s question: Do you have anything to say to us? Let us know by email.

Also, if you’re wondering where we are on Facebook and Twitter, just click on those words back there.
A follow-up to last week’s German tv documentary news comes from Variety this week:

With broadcasters paying less and demanding more rights, it’s all the more necessary to secure film subsidy financing. But commissioning editors, needing product they can show immediately, are getting less involved in theatrical docs.

One commissioning editor acknowledges the dilemma, saying, “When you take the programs that are made for TV, you just get typical TV product. And that’s not what we want.”

Regional film subsidy funds like Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg remain supportive of theatrical docs, both in production and distribution, but competition for screens and a decline of programming strands makes the endgame difficult.

But industryites believe the fact that docs get screen time and are taken seriously, regardless of mass appeal, makes the fight worthwhile.

Whether AG Dokumentarfilm can shout loudly enough to change the situation remains to be seen.

After many requests from listeners we finally have a look at the comic book adaptation, The Walking Dead. I still wish it was called “They Shoot Zombies, Don’t They?”

In News we look at what’s happening in Germany and Japan as well as some important local stuff.

There’s also an I Don’t Buy It, some great Letters to Boxcutters, and a whole helping of Pork with Trotters

Oh yeah, and Carrie Bickmore sold us out to Oprah.

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This week’s question: What do you think of Actual Chad’s new single,”The Man from Boxcutters”? Let us know by email.

Also, if you’re wondering where we are on Facebook and Twitter, just click on those words back there.

Show Notes

If you want to speak to Peter Hitchener and Peter Overton via the interwebs, then you first need to “like” the Channel 9 news Facebook page. Then follow the instructions for how to leave questions and watch their replies.

Peter Hitchener is @phitchener9 on Twitter and he genuinely tries to follow and respond to everybody who follows him.

You can see the reception fees for NHK on their translated website. Wikipedia has a great page detailing NHK.

The Australian wrote all about the Oprah, Carrie Bickmore and the McDonald’s scandal that rocked Australia. Also, our own Jess McGuire wrote some commentary in Defamer Australia.

Josh (me or I, depending on the context) went to the ACMI Twin Peaks special Live in the Studio. He (I) spoke to members of the audience about what makes Twin Peaks so special. You can read all the tweets from the day as well.

Brett doesn’t buy some bad screen ratio business and Toby Halligan has some very poignant Trotters.

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This week’s question: Do you love Twin Peaks? Let us know by email.

Keep up to date with all the goings on at ACMI.

Did you follow that? Well, can you follow a whole review of the new ABC show, Rake? I’m sure you can.

Also, Toby Halligan starts us off on our look at the specifics of how television affects us as actual humans in his interview with Dr Janet Hall, following up her piece in news.com.au last week.

Courteney Hocking is our very special guest cohost because she’s just wonderful.

Don’t forget about being a part of John Richard’s Outland finale shoot this Friday.

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This week’s question: Have you listened to all 250 episodes of Boxcutters? Is this actually the 250th? Send us an email..

We review the new US comedy Mike & Molly.

Geraldine Hickey is our very special guest host.

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This week’s question: What other animals can be associated with toilet paper? Let us know in an email.

There’s not really much more I can add. Have you seen the title of the episode? Tony Freakin’ Martin calls us up to talk about A Quiet Word with Carrie Fisher. We end up talking about all sorts of things but it’s Tony Freakin’ Martin so you’ll listen because he’s a genius.

In case that’s not enough genius for you, Tim Ferguson joins us as cohost and tells us all about his new book. We get into a fight about what’s wrong with Australian screen-based story-telling.

What? You want more? Then we’ve got Tom Elliott telling us all about how James Packer and Lachlan Murdoch are trying to get their mitts into Channel 10.

Really, we pack all of that into one episode.

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This week’s question: Can we have any more guests whose name starts with “T” next week? Let us know in an email.

Are you looking for us somewhere else? Maybe Facebook or Twitter?

Further to Tom Elliott’s discussion of the changes with the Channel Ten board, comes this news about Packer and Murdoch accepting their seats.

Tony Martin has A Quiet Word with Carrie Fisher at 10:05 on Tuesday Night on ABC1 and it’s repeated on ABC2 on Sunday, November 14 @ 6.30PM. It will also be available on iView.

One way you could deal with it is by enjoying this wonderful episode in which Riley Boxcutter gives us an exclusive report on the Rally to Restore Sanity (aka the March to Keep Fear Alive). For the first time ever there is a video podcast (which will come to this very website shortly at some stage).

Also, there’s discussion of Weeds, androgynous 4 year olds and the excellent Courteney Hocking sits in the Nelly Thomas chair for a night to recreate scenes from Single White Female.

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This week’s question: Does Courteney or Toby do a better Nelly impersonation? Let us know in an email.

Are you looking for us somewhere else? Maybe Facebook or Twitter?

Read how the Stewart/Colbert Rally had far reaching effects for the coming US election.

Here’s Riley Boxcutter’s report from Washington DC: Boxcutters Listener-at-Large

Gasp at the New York Times article about “flock” comedies and then shake your head in ambivalence at the follow up in the Atlantic.

The Rally to Restore Sanity on Boxcutters

Riley Boxcutter reports for us from the depths of the American ironic rally heartland.

UPDATE: 5 Nov
Here’s the New York Times article about Denise Borino-Quinn, who played Ginny Sacramoni on The Sopranos.

You can feel like you were actually there by listening to this episode. You will miss all the visual jokes but you’ll be able to hear the audience laugh and then you can laugh at the same time and just imagine what’s happening on the stage.

We talk to them about what it means to write for such an iconic TV show, how it’s affected them and I’m sure someone mentions Daleks at some point.

Enjoy it:

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Share your memories of AussieCon, Doctor Who or meeting John Richards by sending us a friendly email.

Next week: We’re still on a break and don’t have anything planned so just listen to this episode again.

In the meantime, you can find us on twitter and facebook. Also, Paul Cornell is on twitter.

Special thanks to David Ashton from Sample and Hold for all of his wonderful audio engineering help on this episode. Very special thanks to Danny Oz for the use of his photo.

Kim Evey and Greg Benson are two of the people behind the very successful web series, the Guild, but they also produce their own stuff with Mediocre Films and LKG Productions.

We had a great time and then they kicked me out.

All by myself:

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Feel free to complain about the sound quality by sending us an angry letter.

Next week: It’s our Dr Who AussieCon WorldCon Constravaganzwho!

Also, reaching into the bucket, I pull out some very brief descriptions of new shows with bad titles from the US Fall Season including Blue Bloods, Raising Hope and The Whole Truth.

John Richards arrives right near the end of the show (retrospective spoiler alert) and tells us what it means to have a show in “pre-production”.

Then Brett spends some time trying to cut 10 minutes out of the show because we can see no reason for anyone to listen to us reach into the Bucket of TV for almost an hour and a half. You won’t hear that bit in the show because we cut it out.  One thing Brett can tell you is that no one is going to hear about Grand Final after parties nor the suggestion that the L in AFL stands for Libel.

Enjoy the fruits of our waffle.:

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And then, please, let us know what you think and should we change the title?