VP The Slice: Most Anticipated TV Shows of 2013

Check out the first of hopefully many, Virtual Pizza: The Slice.

In this Slice we take a look at 5 of the most anticipated shows coming to your screens in 2013.

Read Full Post »

Virtual Pizza: Episode 9!

 

Welcome to Episode 09 of Virtual Pizza, devouring the digital world, one slice at a time.

 

In this TV Special episode, we look at great TV you may have missed and new shows on their way for 2013:

• the first episode of Virtual Pizza: The Slice on YouTube, looking at the most anticipated new shows of 2013
• Jim and Clarkson bring us “5 minutes with The Film Thugs” and their view on Breaking Bad (The Film Thugs)
• Jon delivers another Awesome Sauce (The PlayVault)
• Chinny tells us about his love of YouTube (Overseas Connection and Veteran Gamers)
• Duke Skath recommends The Wire and Downton Abbey (Didactic Syncast and Veteran Gamers)

Our question of the week is: what non-US TV show would you recommend?

You can contact Virtual Pizza at virtualpizza.podcast@gmail.com , follow us on Twitter @virtualpizza, like us on Facebook and subscribe to our YouTube channel!

Enjoy the show and tell your friends!

Download |Embeddable Player

Read Full Post »

The Newsroom: TV Review

The Newsroom is the latest HBO TV offering from Aaron Sorkin (A Few Good Men, The American President, The West Wing, The Social Network, Moneyball) and stars an ensemble cast including Jeff Daniels, Emily Mortimer, Dev Patel, Olivia Munn, Jane Fonda and Sam Waterston.

Daniels plays anchor Will McAvoy, who, together with his staff set out to put on a news show “in the face of corporate and commercial obstacles and their own personal entanglements.” 

Sorkin described The Newsroom as

an idealistic, romantic, swashbuckling, sometimes comedic but very optimistic, upward-looking look at a group of people who are often looked at cynically. The same as with The West Wing, where ordinarily in popular culture our leaders are portrayed either as Machiavellian or dumb; I wanted to do something different and show a highly competent group of people.

Each episode is built around a major news event from the recent past, such as the Deepwater Horizon oil spill or the killing of Osama Bin Laden. This reality acts as a background for the interpersonal drama, as well as providing a sense of familiarity, as we’re more likely to know what’s going on and therefore the show doesn’t need to spend time explaining sometimes complex plots. 

If you loved the West Wing, I’m pretty sure you’re going to love this.  The chemistry between the cast is superb, especially with Daniels and Mortimer, playing ex-lovers, now colleagues.  The ensemble brought together works well, with characterisations being formed pretty rapidly. 

Using past, real news stories works so well.  It gives you a familiarity with the world, a foot already in the door to their world.  A position of power of the characters where you know whats going to happen (at least in the news story) but are eager to find out how the team deal with it.  The show sometimes does fall on the side of sentimentality, but this is quickly forgiven with strong dialogue and fantastic performances.

By the end of episode 1 I was hooked, and now with only 3 more to go to the finale, I’m feeling that bittersweet pleasure of needing to watch more but knowing that the ned is in sight and I’ll have to wait until next year for more.

Here’s one of the standout scenes from episode 4,  the shooting of Gabrielle Gifford, and how the team hold off calling the Congresswoman’s death (unlike many of the other stations) until they receive full confirmation (contains strong language).  Stunning TV.

 

I can’t recommend this show enough.  Season 1 consisted of 1o episodes, with a second season being commissioned shortly after the first episode was aired.  Season 2 is due in 2013 and will more than likely cover the 2012 US Presidential Election. 

The Newsroom has been shown on Sky Atlantic in the UK, HBO in the US and SoHo in Australia.

Read Full Post »

Playing catchup

The Christmas holiday was a great time to catch up with the TV, games and movies I missed out in in 2011 – and I took full advantage of the time off!  Here’s a brief summary:

• Game of Thrones – how did I manage to leave watching this for so long?  Brilliant!
• Captain America – good fun, ended up watching it twice within a couple of nights – enjoyed Thor more though and very excited for Avengers movie!
• Portal 2 – eventually got to play this much-lauded game – it was great fun and almost perfect, but not my game of the year (predictably that goes to Skyrim)
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 – fitting end to the movie series, but without a recap at the start, I had to rely on my hazy year-old memory of what happened in part 1.
• Contagion – I’m a sucker for deadly-disease genre movies/books so was in my element with this.  Director Steven Soderbergh (I loved Traffic) pulls no punches and refuses to glamourise the A-list cast – recommended.
• Cowboys and Aliens – hmmm, the jury is out on this Favreau flick for me – still have the last 30 minutes to watch, so will report back at a future date.
• Rise of The Planet of The Apes – ‘origin’ movies are all rage at the moment and this is a great imaginative rehash of the Planet of the Apes saga.  Ticks all the boxes and is definitely in my top 10 movies of 2011 (even if it doesn have Serkis in it).
• Also managed to get up to date with Fringe, True Blood, Once Upon a Time, Criminal Minds, and Pan Am.  US TV seems to be in a golden age at the moment, so many great shows and not enough time to watch them!

Did you use the Christmas/holiday break to catch up on anything?

Read Full Post »

Comics aren’t just for kids

I have recently discovered Graphic Novels and Comics, a media that I’d heard people rave about, but had never got into.

In my recent review of  the Thor movie I talked about the comics I read as a child, but it was only until I started reading Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead comics on my Kindle (PDF versions work surprisingly well, especially as they were black and white originally) that I realised what a fantastic world I’d been missing out on.

I’ve been a fan of the AMC series and had heard great things about the graphic novels or comics that Frank Darabont had expertly adapted for the screen, so when presented the opportunity to read them I dove right in.

The Walking Dead tells the story of the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse, following a small group of survivors living in the aftermath of the outbreak. The plot is focused primarily on the human element of a post-apocalyptic world and the way the struggling human survives.

Well, the other night I read the first 27 issues! Yes, 27. I just couldn’t stop! At first I was afraid that it would spoil the TV series for me, but as I read more I found that I was more emotionally involved with the characters in the comics than their counterparts on TV.  There are some spoilers, so be warned (but I’m not going to talk about them here) – but there are also some major plot/character differences between the two versions.

I have all 90 issues and will probably read a few more tonight. I’ve now passed the current storyline in the TV series and moving onto probably what will make up the 3rd season – but I don’t care.  I still love the TV show, but the comics are just too good.

It put me in a similar situation to a dilemma I had with True Blood.  I started to listen to the Sookie Stackhouse novels by Charlaine Harris in audiobook form and found that I was starting to move ahead of the TV series.  Again there were some differences between the two, but in that case I decided to stop listening and enjoy the show.

So, with my newly discovered world of comics, I’ve started looking for others. Obviously there are the Marvel and DC Comics estates, and I’m looking forward to getting my hands on the Marvel Civil War series, but I’d like to quickly talk about another publisher, Zenescope.

Founded in 2005 by Philly natives Joe Brusha and Ralph Tedesco, Zenescope Entertainment is quickly becoming one of the most recognized independent comic book and graphic novel publishers in the world. Their flagship title GRIMM FAIRY TALES, which is also written by Joe and Ralph, immediately found a strong audience and has certainly surpassed the expectations set by many industry insiders. At already more than 22 issues on shelves or in post production GRIMM is one of the longest running independent comic book series on the market today. – Zenescope website

The artwork, whilst definitely adult in nature in their depiction of their female characters (saucy, not pornographic), is superb.  It’s not everyone’s cup of tea – the female protagonist is often in a skimpy/tight outfit of some sort, but you could say that this is balanced out by them being very strong characters?  I don’t know.  Maybe I’m grasping at straws here – would appreciate another point of view?

The new take on classic fairy tales and adding a twist has  been very interesting. Their spinoff series about Alice in Wonderland looks great and reads very well.  For those with iPhones/iPads I recommend their free app which will allow you to read a select number of their comics for free.  The navigation of comic books on mobile devices is definitely something I’m going to revisit in the future on this blog.

So, this post has become a rambling mess – apologies for that, but I’d love to hear your thoughts on the graphic novel medium, comics/books you’d recommend, and whether artwork in comics such as those published by Zenescope is still acceptable in 2011?

Read Full Post »