Downton Abbey.

[pachapapa]

The first 3 installments of the 7 episode season will be shown tonite starting at 20:45 on TMC, Monte Carlo Television.

Clashes with the handball-football on france 4 starting at 20:35.

DA will be repeated on Sunday afternoon.

[cooperlola]

Am I the only one who finds this series somewhat cringe-making?  I'm afraid I gave up after a few episodes as the plots got increasingly unlikely and the relationships between the staff and the family less and less realistic.  A real shame as I just loved Gosford Park and thought that Fellowes was bang on that time.

As for team sports well, you can keep them, especially when they involve people chasing balls around the place! 

The Ozzie V8 season comes to an end in Sydney on Motors from 19.55 so that's what the Coops will be glued to tonight.[:P]

[LEO]

[quote user="cooperlola"]

Am I the only one who finds this series somewhat cringe-making?  I'm afraid I gave up after a few episodes as the plots got increasingly unlikely and the relationships between the staff and the family less and less realistic.  A real shame as I just loved Gosford Park and thought that Fellowes was bang on that time.

As for team sports well, you can keep them, especially when they involve people chasing balls around the place! 

The Ozzie V8 season comes to an end in Sydney on Motors from 19.55 so that's what the Coops will be glued to tonight.[:P]

[/quote]

Probably!

[DerekJ]

I quite enjoyed the first series but the second series went downhill IMO. The plots more and more improbable ... I can see it turning into a kind of "Upstairs Downstairs" with multiple series as long as the £££££s keep rolling in.

[pachapapa]

Watching the rugby on france 4 but at half time hopped to TMC to have a quick look. Pleasantly surprised by the excellent quality of the dubbing into french.

[Chancer]

I watched over an hour of it before the UFC cage fighting on RTL9, as Pachapapa said the dubbing was excellent, I then switched to the VO soundtrack and it was so pleasureable to hear English spoken correctly/properly without any of the modern clichés or likes, innits, nowotimeans, a bit like listening to the BBC world service, I  would recommend the program (in VO) to any French that want to improve their English, not that I know of any!!!

[Salty Sam]

[quote user="Chancer"]I watched over an hour of it before the UFC cage fighting on RTL9, as Pachapapa said the dubbing was excellent, I then switched to the VO soundtrack and it was so pleasureable to hear English spoken correctly/properly without any of the modern clichés or likes, innits, nowotimeans, a bit like listening to the BBC world service, I  would recommend the program (in VO) to any French that want to improve their English, not that I know of any!!![/quote]

Keep watching Chancer, in this series there were a number of questionable use of phrases which wouldn't have featured at the time.

ITV have played a blinder in an attempt to grab peak viewer figures for Christmas Day, with the final episode of series 2, episode 8, being shown at 21:00 hrs within the UK.

[amos]

heard somewhere on the radio the other day that the beeb are in the process of doing another upstairs/downstairs, they are obviously anxious to get in on the nostalgia act as well.

[woolybanana]

Well, I hope the Beeb do not do the same cliché ridden, sensationalist job as ITV are doing with Downton Abbey.

[pachapapa]

...in this series there were a number of questionable use of phrases which wouldn't have featured at the time....

It is interesting how Fowler has been cast aside in the modern age; it must be very difficult to balance historical accuracy and current cognitive perception.

Oh! Yes!

When I was at Hillcrest Preparatory School in Swanage in 1940's it would have been regarded as being correct to write " a number of questionable USES of phrases". How things have changed!

[Salty Sam]

[quote user="pachapapa"]

When I was at Hillcrest Preparatory School in Swanage in 1940's it would have been regarded as being correct to write " a number of questionable USES of phrases". How things have changed!

[/quote]

Alright smarta**e,

[quote]The first 3 installments of the 7 episode season will be shown tonite ....[/quote]

At least I learnt how to spell "tonight".

Get a life man.

[Chancer]

You two always brighten my day, its like having Statler and Waldorf on the forum [:D]

[DerekJ]

[quote user="Chancer"]You two always brighten my day, its like having Statler and Waldorf on the forum [/quote]

[:D][:D][:D][:D][:D]

[cooperlola]

[quote user="Salty Sam"]

[ITV have played a blinder in an attempt to grab peak viewer figures for Christmas Day, with the final episode of series 2, episode 8, being shown at 21:00 hrs within the UK.

[/quote]Shouldn't that be ITV has played a blinder?[;-)]

Seriously, I don't really understand the ratings war obsession any more.  Is there any real point in fighting over these slots when people can just record the programme and watch it when they feel like it without all the tedious ads interrupting  every five minutes?  Apart from sporting events when you don't want to learn the result on the news before you've seen it, I see little point in watching programmes as they are broadcast these days, especially on the commercial channels.

[Salty Sam]

Deleted

[cooperlola]

[quote user="Salty Sam"]

Deleted

[/quote]Aw, now go on...  I'll be speculating all day as to what you were going to say.

I'm now allocating muppet personalities to many of our forum regulars.  A great game for all the family!

[Salty Sam]

[quote user="cooperlola"]

Seriously, I don't really understand the ratings war obsession any more.  Is there any real point in fighting over these slots when people can just record the programme and watch it when they feel like it without all the tedious ads interrupting  every five minutes?  Apart from sporting events when you don't want to learn the result on the news before you've seen it, I see little point in watching programmes as they are broadcast these days, especially on the commercial channels.[/quote]

To be able to record, one needs a recorder! Strange as it may seem, there are many who do not possess the means.

Those who keep Sky but refuse to pay the exhorbitant costs are limited to watching the free channels without the ability to record, while others (certainly in my part of the world), are opting for Freeview or a basic Freesat box without a record facility. 

Sign of the times with people being a bit more prudent as to how they spend their money perhaps?

[quote user="cooperlola"][quote user="Salty Sam"]

Deleted

[/quote]Aw, now go on... I'll be speculating all day as to what you were going to say.

I'm now allocating muppet personalities to many of our forum regulars. A great game for all the family![/quote]

Simply a technical hitch with the antiquated software this board runs on, where my post (as above) failed to show.

When it comes to Muppets ............... 

[pachapapa]

Up to date watched downton abbey from 16:30 till 19:30.

Four episodes, not bad, looking forward to three more next weekend.

[cooperlola]

[quote user="Salty Sam"]To be able to record, one needs a recorder! Strange as it may seem, there are many who do not possess the means.

Yes, I get that but I would have thought that those who can't afford a hundred quid or so for a DVD recorder wouldn't be of much interest to the commercial sector anyway.

Those who keep Sky but refuse to pay the exhorbitant costs are limited to watching the free channels without the ability to record,

As above - you don't need anything more than a simple DVD recorder to overcome this problem

while others (certainly in my part of the world), are opting for Freeview or a basic Freesat box without a record facility. 

Same applies - Freeview/sat can be recorded with either a DVD recorder or an old VHS for those who have not updated.

[/quote]

I guess members of this forum are hardly a representative cross section but it would be interesting to see a straw poll to guage how many people don't posess at least the basic means to record tv programmes (although I admit few of them probably have a set up like mine with the ability to record three channels at once and watch a fourth![:-))])

[Chancer]

I dont watch a lot of television and dont really have the time to watch something previously recorded, having only French TV I can assure you that its very rare that there would be 2 programs on at the same time of compelling interest to me. I dont watch soap operas or celeb whatevers so there is no accrochage.

I do have the means to record, my Freebox has a hard drive so it must do so but hand on heart I have never done so.

In fact since the 1980's the times when I wanted to record something while i was absent I would cock up the programming of the VCR every time so it just became a redundant ornament.

I used to question the sanity of every decent (and I use the word advisedly) French program starting at 20.45 but now I can see the reason, I am out  4 or 5 nights a week with various keep fit classes, swimming, clubs etc most of these finish in time for people to return for the evenings viewing, in most cases there is little better on after 20.45 than before though.

I visited one of my sisters in the UK last Saturday evening, she and her husband were glued to some celeb dancing program and he was simultaneously recording Pop Idol or whatever it was called and one other equally nul celeb phone vote arnaque program, they were 1000% in to them all having been completely sucked in to the on screen personas, pretty sad I thought as they have no other life whatsoever.

 I really felt that I was intruding on their precious leisure time yet we have only seen each other once this year, it would not have mattered if I had visited on another day or time, that is all I have ever seen them do for decades.

So you can put me down as not having the basic means to record a Tv program, being the patience and expertise needed to program the damn thing and the envie to do so.

[cooperlola]

As a watcher of neither reality shows (although I will admit to being a closet Come Dine fan, for Dave Lamb's pithy commentary alone) nor soaps, I can attest to the fact that there is more on the tv than just those sorts of shows.  I guess I'm at the opposite end of the spectrum from you Chancer a) because my o/h watches no tv except motor racing and the occasional golf and horse racing when I have them on, so I don't ever watch TV at peak times as we do other stuff like eat and talk and b) I'm in a lot more than I once was so do use it to pass the time during the day - especially in the winter - so that I do need decent recorded stuff from the evening before as daytime TV is largely cr*p. 

However, I do find the broadcaster's obsession with time slots somewhat annoying and thus I don't know how people cope without the means to record.  The example you cite of your sister (whom I suspect, with all due respect to you, is much more likely to be a rampant consumer than you are, by the sound of it) is surely pretty typical of today's average household, where family members compete for the TV at certain times of day and thus tend to be equipped with the means and the "skills" (recording's a cinch these days for anybody with a brain larger than a pea so I know you'd cope easily with your Freebox were you so inclined) to record programmes and thus skip over the ads.

As an example of the kind of annoying and pointlessly competitive scheduling that winds me up, I'll cite Thursday nights.  Now, I know that my tastes are not necessarily the same as anybody else's but why is ALL the decent drama (and the majority of it the same genre to boot) on on the same day?  Why not move at least one or two to another evening?  As of now, we've got The Killing, Southlands, The Closer, The Mentalist, The Slap, Without You and Californication, not to mention the nightly helpings of Law and Order and Chuck all on the same day.  Now, even I can't watch that much drama all in one go so how is anybody without recording equipment expected to?  Why can't at least one of the channels figure out the fact that you are thus forced to record at least some of these shows if they interest you and thus knock out the advertising which funds them in the first place?  I'm still puzzled!

[Chancer]

Hey not one of those names means anything to me [:D] No wonder I cannot hold a conversation with my family any more!

I agree with you,  I suspect my sister is a fairly typical watcher of UK television.

Re the programming do all these programs start within 5 minutes of each other and are they preceded by mind numbing game shows where the audience obediently clap, sing and dance at the beckoning of the host, and are they followed by home shopping programs.

If you can answer yes to the above you are watching French TV!

If ever I get Sky TV again and were to have the extra channels that I once subscribed to I think that I would learn how to record, especially if Judge Judy was on at the same time as Jeremy Kyle and Norman Abraham.

I do see the odd bit of UK tv when I return but that will stop in April when it switches to digital.

[cooperlola]

The stuff I watch probably doesn't mean much to many people!

I admit that I don't have French TV at present as I cancelled my Canal + sub once Motors went free to air via the Sky box, intending to replace it with TNT Sat but I got the dreaded desease the week after my sub' ran out and really don't want the Pulsat man about the place at the moment so have left it.  As I pop in to Le Monde on line regularly and get a lot of polical stuff e-mailed to me direct by the PS now, I haven't missed it much apart from some of the documentary and travel programmes.  All in all, I still think that British TV has more choice and is rather better, especially when edited for the ads!

[Loiseau]

Apparently there are traffic jams on Saturday afternoons in big cities in the UK, as people rush home to sit down in front of Strictly Come Dancing.   Unlike most other programmes that people are happy to record or watch on iPlayer,  this is one that everyone wants to watch  live for fear of someone telling them the result before they've viewed it.

I have never understood how the programme (and all its weekday snippets) works myself, so a combination of that and not being able to abide BForsyth means I appear to be the only person in the country who thinks of telephoning their friends and relatives at just that certain time of a Sat evg - which is making me very upopular!  [:D]

Angela

[NuBeginnings]

I never saw season 1 but downloaded the whole of season 2 for a friend in Australia ended up watching the lot and like it ;-)

Now for those that like something different The walking dead is mustard !

Well worth searching for on a torrent site.