Had a quick look in the Radio Times earlier to see if I'd be able to watch the England match in HD. No- even though Virgin apparently own about 20% of ITV they still don't transmit the ITV HD channel, even though they now have 4HD and a couple of other HD channels. Bunch of arse if you ask me. If I didn't hate Rupert Murdoch so much I'd be forced to go to Sky HD.
But anyway- while looking for the footy I noticed that there was a new Jonathan Meades series on BBC4. But not on BBC HD- WTF?
I set the V+ box to record it anyway.
And it was well worth it. I've been a fan of Jonathan Meades for well over 10 years. As someone who can go weeks without watching any telly at all, and who as a result rarely consults the schedules, I daresay I've missed a bunch of his stuff over the years. More fool me. The man makes quite wonderful programmes.
It's a bit hard to categorise- ostensibly he's an architecture critic, but his programs combine humour, social commentary, satire, and history into a unique and quite wonderful whole. I very strongly recommend it. I checked, and it's on the Iplayer catchup on Virgin, and it looks like it's here too:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...ter_Episode_1/
The new age of on demand, pausable live TV etc. suits his programs perfectly IMO- they're full on, and I'm not at all ashamed to admit to pausing and rewinding multiple times during a viewing to make sure I've understood a point or a subtle joke, or visual sight gag.
I'm constantly depressed by the fact that our mainstream media seem to celebrate dumbing down and stupidity. When someone as obviously clever, well informed and opinionated as Meades is given a whole hour of airtime, that's something to shout from the rooftops.
Albeit that he used to be on BBC2, and now he's on BBC4. The battle is far from won.


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