Still thinking about Saturday night’s TV

The other night, I made a reference to the Battle of Santiago because I walked in, switched on TV and there were Portugal and Holland squaring up to each other, Figo sticking the head in one of the Dutch players, stuff like that.

Well, I just walked in again, having had a long, hot bath (one of only two things which reliably relieves the muscle pain), just in time to see the BBC show some footage of that Chile-Italy match. In fact, they showed more footage than I had previously seen. Sanchez’s slug — as Coleman said, a perfect hook — which felled one of the Italian players, that I had seen. I had never seen the sequel, a few minutes later, when the victim took his revenge and was sent off. As bad as the blood was at times on Saturday, it was nothing to the events in Santiago in 1962, when at one point police (or the army, it was difficult to tell) went on to the pitch, and when ultimately the match was abandoned. As the referee headed for his changing room, the players were still trying to knock lumps off each other.

Anyway, while simmering in the bath, I was thinking about Saturday’s Who. (It is less stressful than thinking about my parents, who are driving me up the wall. Neither of them seem to pay adequate attention to their health, and will they listen...?) It was so bad; I am still a little taken aback that such a pathetic episode got made. (Well, made now; in the mid-Eighties, it would very likely have seemed at worst average.) Also, I am a little worried at the commissioning of an episode like this and what it might mean for the future of the series.

The big problem was that the unfolding of the story was handled so simplistically, with no suspense whatever. Kids are going missing... little girl is drawing them... the drawings are moving... so the kids are trapped in the drawings — and all of that was before the titles! Doctor & Rose turn up, find out kids are missing, see the little girl... Oooh, it must be something to do with her. The Doctor says the mother is frightened, which was just as well, since the actress wasn’t going to tip us off about that. Oh, bugger this, it isn’t worth going on.

I am not entirely sure that I would not rather watch “The Gunfighters” — or even, maybe, “Mark of the Rani.” I would sooner see “Fear Her” than “Time and the Rani” or “The Happiness Patrol,” but if you have to resort to comparisons with unmitigatedly dire offerings like those, there is not a lot to be said in favour of an episode. Damn it, some of The Tomorrow People was better than this!

Ah, well, it is only a TV show. ;o)

He’s a record-breaker!

At the start of the competition, Ronaldo was being written off. Too slow, they said. Too many pies. Past it. Within the past ten minutes, he became the player who has scored the most goals in World Cup finals.