The BBC has confirmed that Billie Piper is to be the new Doctor Who assistant.

Ah well, could be worse… could have been Chris Evans….

It looks like Billie Piper (or should that be Evans) is going to be the new assistant in Doctor Who

Bonnie Langford was bad, Billie could be worse. Why? “Because she wants to” .

Save us! Get Maxine Peake (Shameless and Dinnerladies) instead.

Christopher Ecclestone is to play The Doctor in the new TV series of Doctor Who .

Having seen him in lots of film and TV, I think he’ll make an excellent Doctor. He’s previously worked with Russell T. Davies, the new writer/executive producer, on The Second Coming which got very good reviews (though I didn’t see it myself).

I’ve no idea whether I’ll be in the country when the show finally airs, but I think he has the potential to be one of the great Doctors, up there with Tom Baker. Here’s hoping!

Richard mentioned my recent TV post, and covered one of the shows which I didn’t, but which I should have; Little Britain

I wasn’t keen on the previous Rock Profiles” show that Matt Lucas did, but “Little Britain” is wonderful. I’m particularly fond of the narration done by Tom Baker, which is completely off the wall and bizarre.

Tom Baker is an interesting character. For years after finishing his stint as Doctor Who, he’d have nothing to do with the show, but more recently (well, the last 10 or so years) has softened to the love that fans have for his portrayal of the Doctor.

He’s also written a very peculiar book, called The Boy Who Kicked Pigs.It’s styled as a book for children, but has many knowing asides, and as the story proceeds it becomes darker and more twisted, with some very gruesome bits. It’s quite a short book, and every other page is taken up by an illustration.
Very interesting and very, very funny.

He also wrote an autobiography Who On Earth Is Tom Baker (clever title, huh?) which sadly seems to be out of print. I’ve heard that it’s well worth getting hold of so I’ll see if I can hunt a copy down.

I once had the pleasure of meeting Tom, at a signing for a Doctor Who DVD, and he was a very friendly and BIG man. As Richard mentions, he was also in Black Adder, Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) and has probably done more advert voice-overs than anyone else.

A funny, great and interesting man; a national treasure, in fact.

And he’s got his own website – Tom Baker

We watched the first two episodes of C4 new series, ‘Shameless’ last night. I wasn’t expecting much as a lot of recent UK comedy shows have been pretty poor, but this was really quite good.

Maxine Peake (probably best known for playing the part of Twinkle in dinnerladies was in it, along with a few other familiar faces.

Extremely funny, gutsy and full-on; so good, in fact, that we watched the 2nd episode on E4 straight after the first had been shown on C4.

The DVD fairies at Play.com have sent me Devo: The Complete Truth About De-Evolution”. Great compilation of a most of the Devo videos from the 70’s and 80’s, including “Whip It”, “Satisfaction” and “Girl U Want”.

It’s actually a pretty straight-forward transfer of the 1992 Laserdisc, and even includes several segments of the Devo guys talking about Laserdiscs. There are a bunch of extra features including clips from early Devo gigs, memorabilia etc. Not bad for £13.

Anyone want to buy my old VHS tape of Devo videos? Ah well, must get myself set up for selling on Ebay …

Vic and I went to see Lord of the Rings: Return of the King last night at the Barbican Cinema . I really enjoyed the film; I thought it was pretty true to the book and one of the most spectacular films I’ve seen in a long time. Vic wasn’t so keen, and found it a bit cheesey, though I put that down to a lot of the dialogue being close to how it was written. The books are very much an epic creation, with lots of pre-battle speeches etc, and that’s reflected in the film.

Favourite parts of the film: Lighting of the beacons, the attack on Minas Tirith, and the arrival of the men of Rohan.