I'm lost in the ozone again (Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen)

God bless the invention of the DVD box set.

It is so great not to be at the mercy of TV schedulers. Box sets mean that you can watch a TV show whenever you want to and without lots of pesky advertising wrecking the internal flow.

Watching a TV show on a TV network means a certain level of obsequious organisation on the viewer's part - being slavishly available at the same time each week and then waiting another week for the next episode. There's a power imbalance there. This often creates a dire situation for SWBO and me. If we miss an episode the continuity is... lost.

Which is why we never watched 24 on TV - every episode always ended with an impossible cliffhanger and we couldn't wait to see what happened next.

Living in the UAE has meant a steady succession of box sets to fit in with our restless and impatient lifestyle (Jacky's horse riding, our walks in the evening, live Arsenal games, books to read, long baths to take, you know the drill).

We have finished a couple of sets lately - Bones Season 6 was poor poor poor. Only a few episodes were up to their earlier standard. It truely was their Pam's Dream season.

Hustle Season 1 from the BBC got better and better along the way and in the end was more than just okay. There were only 6 episodes but they were well written and kept our attention (something Bones couldn't manage).

When we come to the end of a set we always cast around for the next thing to watch.

I put a J J Abrams TED talks address on the Baggy Trousers blog a while ago. It piqued my interest in the TV series Lost big time. J J directed the first episode and wrote it with others and is a hot shot producer as well.

In case you missed it on Baggy - here it is on Wozza's Place.



I hope you watched it all the way through - he's a cool dude and he had me at Grandfather! I know it's quite long but don't cheat yourself by glossing over it.

Based on this we have embarked on  Season One of Lost. It's a show that my daughters loved watching in the middle of the noughties but I lost track of the plot and characters pretty quickly and then gave up.

I must admit that I wasn't even that impressed with the early episodes when I watched them in 2005 but I guess this is coloured heavily by the fact that a plane crash is the central plot device and I'm a nervous flyer.

I am trying to stay with it this time but it didn't help that episode two had recurring, heart stopping, flashbacks of the crash, the famous polar bear scene and various severly injured people (amputations, impailments) that just need some panadol and they'll be fine!

J J's talk has definitely opened me up to stay with the series at least throughout Season One and there are only five others if this one hooks me. SWMBO seems to be hooked already!

Love and peace - Wozza

You shouldn't let other people get your kicks for you (Roberty Bob)

We recently said, 'Halas' to for a while.

Season Six was excellent and a real come back from the shuck an' jive weirdness of Season Five. Unfortunately Season Seven is still a month or so away from release in the UAE (this according to the shopgirl in Mall of the Emirates' Virgin Megatore last week so who knows).

So we've moved ontoSeason Six.

Now - you need to understand that Bones is definitely a SWMBO series. I think she watched some episodes a few years ago with Sallie and really liked it so we started watching Season One on hire from the local Video Ezy store in Stratford or New Plymouth. I forget which one. This was a few years back.

It was enjoyable enough in a way and we kept watching it while in Stratford. Zac Addy was a great character and I watched it often for his scenes alone. He was a really disfunctional nerd (or 'squint' to use the show's own jargon) who had little conception of social phatic communion. He was brilliant during the first three seasons and so, of course, he was written out of the show via a preposterous storyline. Uh Oh daddio I thought.

The next season without Zac had a revolving supporting cast in his role. Some of the new characters were aces but we could have killed Nigel-Murray and Daisy quite cheerfully. We hate them, and not in a good way.

[You'll need to go back to my recent post on Grey's Anatomy Season Five - the Pam's Dream Season of the Grey's Anatomy series for a sec to understand my comments on Bones Season Six]

Season Six is a major disappointment thus far (we've watched 8 episodes so far). The season started with the most inept plot strangulation to get characters back into place that I've EVER seen. I WISH they'd used a Pam's dream device!!

Anyway...this has made us even more desperate to find Grey's Anatomy Season 7 when we hit the Dubai Mall tomorrow (haircuts and Burgerfuel here we come).

In the meantime here are two of my favourite scenes from Grey's so far.

This first one is the very affecting scene after George learns of his father's death. Yes - I found it very emotional too.



The second is Bailey's advice to Derek. Like everything about Bailey (yes Jacky - it's only a show) it is honest and bang on.



Love and peace - Wozza