Sleep Interrupted

The show I wish was available on DVD would have to be Danger Theatre. This was cult viewing while I was at university. My favourite section was The Searcher. If the opening titles aren’t silly enough for you, how about “Golfers! Hold your balls!”

Yes, that was Robert Vaughn. Hmmm.

And so it ends. After two and a bit years of watching I have finished re-watching all five seasons of Babylon 5. Well, I say “I” but that should really be “we” because somewhere during the second season Louise joined me in the marathon. I hope she enjoyed rather than endured (as was often the case in the past but that’s her story to tell).

What tickles me is that my original estimate of how long it would take was right on the button. I don’t think Ben’s quite old enough to begin watching it yet, perhaps in a couple of years. I’m conscious that I don’t want to spoil or devalue the experience of Babylon 5 or other things I cherished when I was younger like Star Wars by showing them to him before he’ll appreciate them. I was about to say that he currently thinks that Transformers: Cybertron is the height of entertainment but then I probably would have thought exactly the same at his age. So perhaps I should stop being so precious… my preciousss…

Ahem.

I don’t think I’ll be doing a retrospective review of all of B5 either. I will say this, though: The effects still serve the story well and hardly ever take you out of the experience. The main story arc is still one of the best in television but the character arcs are even better. The fifth season is a lot better than I remembered it and the final episode, Sleeping In Light, still brings a lump to my throat.

My timing is pretty good, too, because I can roll right through and watch Babylon 5: The Lost Tales, which has only just been released.

Today I have watched no television whatsoever. Wednesday’s are generally pretty dead, but this is an exception for me, so I thought it worth noting. Maybe I should try it more often. Well, my MP3 player has finished uploading the latest Babylon Podcast, so I’m off to bed; analysis of this momentous occasion will have to wait for another day.

Louise and I have just finished watching the final episode of season two of Desperate Housewives. Enjoyable but the reason I mention it here is because we couldn’t help but laugh out loud at the truely blatant product placement by a certain car manufacturer who will remain nameless. Usually I’m fairly oblivious to this sort of thing but… wow. It left me expecting one of the characters to say, “I’d just like to take this opportunity to say how great the ride in my Pissan Nathfinder is!”.