I Chose You: Creature Feature

I have not blogged in ages because I have struggled to find the time and because I actually forgot I had a blog. But here is my grand(ish) return to the web. Entries will undoubtedly be irregular but since this one was sitting and waiting to be published here is my second “I Chose you” article!

In my last article in the series, I bashed Pokémon for its weak characters but before I delve further into the franchise flaws, I think it only fair I discuss a topic in which it succeeds. This article will tackle the creatures at the core of both series, the Pokémon and Digimon themselves which are meant to provide the unique clincher to both imaginative world but perhaps for one better than the other.

The world of Pokémon is full of interesting animals and intelligent plant life which at first glance appear childish and cartoonic imaginations but a closer glance will show the large amount of thought that has gone into creating a near fluid and relatable ecosystem. The majority of Pokémon are inspired by the natural world around us and many visibly based on actual animals and plants and the more farfetched (if you’ll pardon the pun) on Japanese culture and folklore. As a compliment to the franchise’s effort, the website ‘Bulbagarden’ runs a readable and highly researched column called ‘On the Origin of Species’ (http://bulbanews.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Category:On_the_Origin_of_Species). In these articles biologist George Hutcheon lays out an educated and informative account of the inspiration behind certain Pokémon and I recommend it to anyone sad enough to be interested. As examples of his writing, he shows how Sandshrew and Sandslash are based on the pangolin, Wooper on axolotl species of salamander and Farfetch’d on a mythical Japanese duck who would appear with leak in hand to provide a tasty supper to the lost and starving. These inspirations make a thoroughly believable collection of creatures that can be imagined as interacting. Where this interaction is concerned, very few hints are provided to the audience however. The principle of carnivorism is never shown in the cartoon but the books and popular handheld games make few but clear references to the practice. For instance, the bird Pokémon Taillow is mentioned to “feed on Wurmple that live in forests” in the Pokémon Sapphire Game Boy Advanced game. Though unwilling to fully portray it, we can see the development of the ecology of the universe that could be taken much further if they didn’t wish to be so PC for a child audience. In other areas, we see theories such as symbiosis in practice between Shellder and Slowpoke and the theory of evolution is core to the franchise if taken with a pinch of salt.

What isn't cool about this guy exactly?

In the case of Digimon I often fear the creatures occupying its universe are a little too outlandish to be taken seriously but when dealing with this franchise we must accept the premise that it is set in a digital world and not a realistic one. The fact that environment and animals are all constructs of data and therefore less predictable and free to form how they wish allows flexibility to the designers but perhaps flexibility run wild. The franchise does look far and wide for its inspiration to mythology, technology and religion as well as the natural world and in some cases this works. I was always a fan of the Walrus like Zudomon who embodies qualities of both the Norse and Greek gods of thunder Thor and Zeus. But other Digimon like the train inspired Locomon or the bad Elvis Presley impersonating Etemon are a little too much to believe or stomach. The principle of digivolution can often appear random to the audience but the argument of adaptable data supports this. The idea of sustenance is portrayed with the absorption of data but not in a coherent manner. I understand and appreciate the otherliness of the digital world and there is no argument against the choices of the directors but unfortunately I find the world of Pokémon to hold more appeal.

My conclusion I write a long while after the majority of the article and since the release of Pokémon Black & White. I shall award heavy legitimacy to the last four generations of Pokémon games for attempting a realistic ecosystem but with even a first glance at the creatures designed for the fifth generation, I become unimpressed. Somewhere between the Bert & Ernie fighting Pokémon and the living ice creams, I feel the company went wrong, steering in the direction of the Digimon creations without the arguments and excuses mentioned above. Based on the merits of the majority of the Pokémon universe, I Choose You Pokémon but if your future follows this trend further, you may leave me disappointed.

Where did it all go mon?

Music of Epic Proportions

I love me some epic music. I say this having watched the Doctor Who Proms on Monday night and fully appreciating the composition of the little known but great Murray Gold, namely “I am the Doctor,” “This is Gallifrey” and “Vale Decem.” My love for epic scores stems from age 7 or 8 when my brass band performed “The Gael” by Dougie MacLean, made famous by the 1992 film Last of the Mohicans. The piece began a lifelong love for both Celtic music and dramatic screen music. No matter how familiar or similar they may be, there is still a fine art to producing a score that swells and bowls an audience’s emotions whether it be in time to visuals or in a concert. It is an art within an art and I love it very much.

In the world of silver screen scoring there are two titanic names that will always be remembered. The first is of course Hans Zimmer. He is perhaps most famous for the Pirates of the Caribbean (2003-2006) soundtracks but his talents were already around as early as 1982 working as a junior partner to composer Stanley Meyers. His big break came with Rain Man (1988) for which he received his first of many Oscar nominations. Since then Zimmer’s distinct style and love of rapid and dramatic music has been heard in many successful films such as Gladiator (2000), Pearl Harbour (2001), The Dark Knight (2008) and most recently Inception (2010). He has so far scored near 160 soundtracks meaning few successful and dramatic films are produced without any input by Zimmer. But Zimmer’s success is not unique as before he even began John Williams has achieving similar heights of fame. His powerful trumpet lines that maintain a more traditional music feel can be heard in Star Wars (1977-2005), Superman (1978), Indiana Jones (1980-2008), Jurassic Park (1993) and many others. Although he has reached the age of 78, Williams shows no signs of stopping and continues to produce film soundtracks. Though many other composers do work, it is these two that will go down in history and be studied for the art of soundtrack-ing.

The Black Mages: They may look daft, but they rock

To sink into nerdom for a mere paragraph, we cannot ignore the growing media of gaming and the music that is growing from it. Out of the MIDI sounding tunes has emerged a collection of massive scores that are receiving more and more respect against their movie counterparts. For those who don’t know an American orchestral company called “Video Games Live” (VGL) travel the country raising awareness for the fantastic and epic pieces composed for our games today. Rearrangements of Koji Kondo’s Super Mario and Zelda themes are joined by newer scores intended for full orchestras. Two of my personal favourites would be the One Winged Angel – Sephiroth’s theme from Final Fantasy VII – written and performed by Noduo Uematsu’s “Black Mages” and Martin O’Donnell’s incredible Halo soundtrack that I recommend to all. O’Donnell began his career as concert pianist but when composition became his passion, he was hired to write the soundtrack to Riven, the sequel to the award winning game Myst. It was after this break that he joined a small company called Bungie, becoming lead composer on the Halo series. Of note O’Donnell composed and conducted a full piece orchestra for the live demo of Halo 2 at Electronic Entertainment Expo 2004. Timing the hit points of the music to the unpredictability of the play through to achieve the same desired drama every was “a bit of a struggle” according to O’Donnell though few conductors would wish to undertake such a feat I am sure. And yet even with game composition gaining legitimacy but I feel it is underappreciated still. I bet you didn’t know however that our dear friend Mr. Zimmer composed the music for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

Pathogen is the company's sci-fi album

But where epic music is concerned I cannot neglected one of my favourite composition companies. “Two Steps From Hell” are a California based organisation that produces music specifically designed for trailers. Post composition, a film or game company purchases the rights to use it for a trailer. It is highly likely that you have heard many pieces by them visiting the cinema or watching television and not known it at all. “Moving Mountains” is a favourite of the Twilight Saga (may it burn in hell) and “Freedom Fighters” saw the advertisement of the latest Star Trek film. Even our dear Doctor Who featured “Destiny of Mankind” in the episode“Eleventh Hour.” Of serious note and possibly their greatest success is “Heart of Courage” which I have heard in countless trailers across this year. Used first for the Bioware game Mass Effect 2 it has since graced trailers for Avatar, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and even Sky One’s Must be the Music. Even though I love the piece I am growing a little tired of it as I fear it has not had the same impact since the Mass Effect 2 trailer that employed it so well. While these pieces are incredibly dramatic it is also impressive how much drama they can pack into a short two minute space. Trailers are short and have to capture the audience’s heart quickly. I would go as far as to call that another art even within the art of screen scoring. And yet no one knows where most of this music comes from. I recommend many people look into Two Steps From Hell as for me they are a most unknown success.

So to conclude, dramatic and epic music will always be one of my loves from Beethoven to Zimmer. I am sorry I included no link but I know all the pieces mentioned are available on ‘youtube’ so go check them out by my recommendation. Feel free to comment away and leave your much appreciated opinions.

I Chose You: Characterisation

As term drew to an end last year and my assessment period ended within only three days, my friends challenged me to write an essay to amuse me while they continued to slave away over exam revision. The proposed topic was a literary comparison between the Pokémon and Digimon television shows and while I did not attempt the essay in the remaining term time, I decided I would aim to complete it, at least in part, this summer. When the initial essay plan reached 2,500 words I realised it would be a monumental task and thus decided the best possible way to present it would be through a series in my blog. This allows those interested to read more easily and also for me to entertain each topic individually starting now with the characterisation of human characters (I will entertain the creatures in a later segment). Yes I recognise who sad this idea sounds but hopefully you will start to see the same interest in the analyses I have found. It is a huge topic and I doubt I can compress all I have to say into the space of a single blog entry but will try my best.

The first thing to note is that each show contains casts fulfilling different archetypical roles. Pokémon has restricted itself from the start to a small cast of archetypes which you would hope allowed it to build upon each character over their long seasons. This effect is not achieved for continuity is a concept lost on the franchise writers, a point I will return to on many occasions. The size of Digimon’s core cast and variation between different sagas has allowed it to explore more archetypes and even though less time was spent on each – an average of only 52 episodes – they have gone into deeper depth of each character’s personal story and emotions. For me, Digimon triumphed here and while the two Digimon Adventure series kept the characters and relationships somewhat basic, the franchise came into its own with the third series Digimon Tamers. I think it fair to say that over that latter series alone, consisting of only 51 episodes, we discovered more depth and connection with characters than we have ever had with Ash over his 659 episodes and 15 movies. But let us do closer analyses of these characters and their archetypical positions.

This was the only series that ever showed continuity! 1 out of 13!

The common feature of most children’s cartoons is of course a young novice on a journey of discovery and growth, a Christian on their Pilgrim’s Progress. With Pokémon this is Ash Ketchum, a perpetual 10-year-old – the age a Pokémon trainer begins their journey – which a young male audience can project onto. The boy stumbles along his path to destined glory and through his eyes we learn of a world he hardly knows either. Across each series we would hope to watch Ash’s character grow but unfortunately the franchise never forwards his character to show evolution and improvement, resetting him to amateur status with each successive story arc. In each season Ash is also joined by a female counter part whether it is the bossy Misty, excitable May or shy Dawn on whom a female audience can project. In the case of Pokémon, the female characters always feel rather token and stereotypical with May and Dawn perusing careers in the feminine world of Pokémon choreography while the competitive fighting is left predominantly to the male cast. The female character is of course placed there to provide Ash with a romantic interest but the idea is rarely hinted at after Misty’s departure in the Jhoto saga. Both archetypes are two dimensional and characterisation is perhaps not the right word for analysing them as neither has much character at all.

The dark, gritty and adult third series. Don't mock it till you have seen it!

To give Digimon equivalents is not straight forward as each season has its own novices and often many at once. Take for instance the first series of Digimon in which every human character was new to the world while come series two, the returning characters adopted the role of mentor leaving the novice archetype to Davis, Cody and Yolei. Digimon Tamers was more or less a reset and thus the role needed filling anew by a young bumbling Takato in many ways similar to Ash. But Digimon never left its characters as two dimensional as Ash and his leading ladies with each character owning their own emotions, interests and back story. In each series we have the enthusiastic novices (Tai, Davis and Takato) and emotionally troubled novices (Matt, Cody, Ken and Rika) but each is clearly and uniquely outlined and evolves over the series. For example, the tomboyish and headstrong female Rika from Digimon Tamers became hard, forceful and troubled because of an unsatisfactory relationship with her mother. She tried hard to make her successful mother proud, never receiving the love she was owed, and has thus become a harsh and pushy tamer to her partner Renamon. As the series goes by and she befriends the other tamers she softens and mends her relationship with her mother. Characterisation in Digimon has continuity so as a viewer we can appreciate each more powerfully than ever with Pokémon. Digimon did stereotypes males and females but not as narrowly or harshly. We have sporty and geeky guys as well as tomboyish and glitzy girls. I suppose each character is a form of stereotype but the franchise never seemed as sexist as Pokémon always did since the absence of Misty.

Where there is a novice there is also a mentor figure that can guide and nurture them. The character is an essential addition to the cast in order to provide a knowledgeable guide, a role absent from the first Digimon series but deemed necessary in later on. In all Pokémon series this role is filled by ex-gym leader turn breeder Brock bar the Orange Island saga which featured artist Tracy instead. These characters also suffered from being two dimensional but that has been said enough before. In Digimon Adventure this role was, as said, never fully fulfilled as even the returning characters to the second series encountered new experiences that reduced their role again to novice. It was the Digimon themselves who had to teach us about their world which sufficed. For Digimon Tamers however the role is clearly fulfilled by Henry. The mentor is of course as important to the audience as well as to the characters within the plot as they offer experience and cohesion in a world we cannot understand at all. Without them we would be lost and a certain spark to the series with it.

I could go on, delving deeper into each individual character and if I ever write this essay in full I might well do so. I may even have to dedicate an entire essay to the characters of both franchises as there is so much to say about them. I will not however subject you to that but finish with my closing statements. I am obviously favouring Digimon where characterisation is concerned but that is because Digimon treated its characters with much more respect. The writers also treated the audience with more respect as with Pokémon’s case I often fear they underestimate the intelligence of their viewership. So for characterisation, Digimon, I chose you!

Space-ial Awareness

The eternal struggle

When people consider the Sci-Fi Space genre they no doubt instantly think of the eternal struggle between Trekkies and Jedi, a conflict possibly stirred but not shaken by the rising Na’vi popular movement and its leader James Cameron. But while these successful though imperfect titans do war I fear that some incredible space franchise have been forgotten or lost to the popular audience. Here I hope to give some of my favourites a voice and perhaps persuade some people to give them ago.

Of course I am a fan of both Star Wars and Star Trek but we cannot appreciate them without also recognising their faults. Anything George Lucas has touched since Return of the Jedi has been a mixed bag of good, bad and ugly but those authors and writers loyal to the original concept still produce great material. The novelisation sequels to the original three films were really good and successful long before The Phantom Menace was released providing all fans with enough juice to feed on. Unfortunately I feel everything since 1999 has lost the franchise some of its shine. Star Trek is quite a bit larger than its adversary where screen time is concerned and produced just as much high and low quality stuff. An amazing cast across each of its series who prove successful still today were sometimes let down by poor writing. I love Star Trek more now and then for its originality or canny transfer of classic plots into a different setting. Over all I would consider Star Trek the better franchise but less successful in recent years. Star Wars has ridden the tide of successive much better but with lower quality material, relying more on its visuals than writing.

Now let us take a look at some of the successful but less well known space franchise out there starting with Stargate. The franchise has achieved moderate success but perhaps its near-modern military setting proves unpopular with the larger audience. The core to the series are the eponymous “stargates” that provide instantaneous travel to distant planets through a complex and ancient network, exploited by an American Military wing called the SGC. These were placed on planets by a species referred to as the ‘Ancients’ from whom most species, including humans, evolved. The use of a pseudo-Von Daniken theory of cultural expansion allows the series to drop the prosthetic aliens for the most part but the few non-human creatures that do appear are outlandish enough to suffice. I personally loved the past series of the franchise Stargate-SG1 and Stargate Atlantis but I feel that it may have lived out its life. The production company has changed several times since the shows start in 1997 and each new team hopes to revitalise the franchise. Even with a high profile cast including Robert Carlyle for the latest series Stargate Universe I feel new interest will not come to the series. This is not to say I do not recommend it but I can understand why its niche audience is as big as it may get.

The 1978 series Battlestar Galactica and its 2004 reimagining have earned a cult classic title but I was never too attracted to it. Something about the combination of Lost in Space and I-Robot never caught me but I can understand why it acquired such a following way back when. The series sees the remains of humanity on the run through endless, barren space from a sentient robot species called the ‘Cylons’ whose only intention is to destroy the human race. What the series does do well is portray space as the empty, desolate, claustrophobic vacuum it is through which the survivors of our race travel in their fleet of space ships. The series is more about the characters and emotions within this harsh, terrible setting than the space ships and aliens attempting a study of human nature which works to a degree but I feel may have reached too far for too long. The 1978 and 2004 versions differ in many ways and each has its own loyalists understandably. The prequel series Caprica is set for release later this year though I cannot see it capturing too much attention. I would say this is Sci-Fi for the psychologists and philosophers but perhaps not a large popular audience.

The cast of Firefly

By far my favourite Sci-Fi series of all time has to be the 2002 ‘space western’ Firefly. People will be more familiar with the sequel and tribute film Serenity than the original series but if they enjoyed the film, they must definitely check it out. The comparison of “the final frontier” and the American western frontier has been made before but for me it has never been done so well. The combination of Joss Whedon’s writing with Nathan Fillion taking the lead created an incredibly amusing and exciting story for me. Though it ran only a single series, the 14 episodes contain enough to intrigue and amusement for the popular audience who may not have yet given it a go. Taking nearly all the western archetypical characters and plots and successfully transferring them to a gritty and dark future is easier said than done but in the end, the series just works. Firefly was cancelled by 20^th Century Fox due to a miscalculated “lack of interest” soon proved wrong leading to the production of Serenity. I will admit it is not for everyone but something about the silent space vacuum, logical physics and southern fiddle playing makes me a die-hard Brown Coat…. which is a Firefly fan.

Of course much more space orientated Sci-Fi has been produced and some of it is prettier than others. While I wouldn’t mind seeing more of The Chronicles of Riddick, I would just as much love to forget the disaster that was Farscape. To use a quote I just found by French essayist Joseph Joubert “Space is to place as eternity is to time.” I may be taking it out of context here but it can easily be read that space is eternal and while it is eternal, we should be able to create and write more new material in our fantastical imaginations and explorations of it. I am excited to see what the future holds for growing franchise and who knows, James Cameron could us the opportunity amaze us with something new rather than just his flashy visuals. As always, any opinion is a worthwhile one so drop me a comment if you have anything to say.

What Went Wrong Mr Shyamalan?

Last week I sat through two hours of M. Night Shyamalan’s new film Avatar: The Last Airbender which nearly murdered my soul. This is not just because it was a very poor film but also because it was a very poor film based on one of my favourite concepts ever. If you didn’t know, the film is based on a Nickelodeon cartoon series known by the same name state-side and by the name Avatar: The Legend of Aang over here in England. I have long praised the three series as the best production of the western cartoon industry ever taking into account the Walt Disney Company and Warner Bros Animation. Many a reader will consider me sad by this point in but I urge you to not judge me yet and read on.

My opinions are clear.

For a proper commentary on both cartoon and film I must provide you with some synopsis of plot. The series is set in an Asian-centric universe where four ethnic groups can each telekinetically control one of the four Japanese elements: Water, Earth, Fire and Air. Amongst each generation an Avatar is born who has power over all the elements and maintains peace amongst the people. The clincher is that he disappeared over a hundred years ago allowing the Fire Nation to lead an assault on the rest of the world wiping out the entire Air Nomad people knowing that the Avatar would be born into their race next – it runs in a cycle. Fast-forward a century and southern Water Tribe members Katara and Sokka find the last airbender, a 12-year-old boy called Aang frozen in an iceberg. Events discover he is the Avatar who ran away from responsibility a hundred years ago and was preserved in ice. Three series and 61 episodes run as Aang must learn his place in the world, master the elements fast due to dramatic circumstances so he can “save the world” as Katara puts it in the intro to every episode.

If you are not yet bored, you may agree that the story already has much substance. Combine this with fluid animation and dramatic fight scenes and you get the workings of a modern epic. The cartoon also decides to t

ackle some heavy issues for a children’s programme, never shying away from the blatant racial genocide and death aspects of its intricate plot. For a cartoon it becomes emotionally engaging as we see growth in our favourite characters as they race to prevent an atrocity. Unlike other cartoons it does not stick to episodically vignettes but flows as a single, long epic. I implore the production team for widening the audience beyond young kids and not treating their viewers like idiots. So if I’m glorifying this children’s cartoon as one of the best told stories of all time, how did they make a bad film out of it you ask me? I can only respond with disappointment that I really don’t know.

M. Night Shyamalan had the workings of something special here but it never gelled together properly.  I understand the difficulty of attempting to fit ten hours of necessary plot into a single two hour film but the whole thing left much to be desired. Many things went unexplained in the plot even when it was true to its roots and little depth was given to the characters. I think many audience members not fans of the series would strongly question the flying, six-legged bison who is never referred to in the whole film but only shown. It is points like this that lose the effect and joy of the story and the characters within it. The chosen aspects of plot portrayed are perhaps not all the ones I would have selected myself but with two sequels in mind they needed to select their plot points now. The special effects were not even as spectacular as we could have hoped for. I am a growing fan of 3D films having begun a sceptic but the investment added little to the experience. The control of the elements was slow – much slower than in the cartoon – which made the dramatic battles a lot less dramatic. The gritty, dark nature was lost with the removal of any serious violence and death which makes the story seem unnatural; nations at war kill the enemy not capture as many as they can. It was like they had dumbed it down. They took a children’s cartoon and dumbed it down. Maybe they felt it was unsuitable or too complicated for the parent audience? The other controversy is of course the issue of race. I was strongly against the use of white actors but perhaps not Indian actors in an Asian-centric film. I would have preferred to see an accurate portrayal of the cartoon in all its aspect. This is not what I expected from a director of great, mature films. Mr Shyamalan, I left that cinema thoroughly disappointed; and there I had hoped a real live action version of Avatar would legitimise it for a new audience… sigh….

If you were thinking of going to see the film, I recommend you save your money. Instead, go find some source to watch the original cartoon. If you stick with it, I assure you that you won’t be disappointed at all. Watching a cartoon in your late teens or adulthood may seem embarrassing but trust me, this is a cartoon that anyone can appreciate for its animation and storytelling greatness.

Again I invite any feedback you are willing to give me on improvements or your personal opinions. Type away people of the world!

Got Talent?

The time has come again when the huge phenomenon and supposed “talent show” X-factor begins again. If you are one of those people who, like me, watch it for the wrong reasons, read on. If you are one of those true believers and diehard fans, you should definitely read on because your dreams need to be crushed and your mind brought back to the reality that is void from reality television.

The root of my scepticism, I must explain, came about after reading Ben Elton’s amazing book Chart Throb. Ben Elton is one of those wishy-washy comedians trying to say something about the big picture but not often enough succeeding. He has missed the bar before but when he nails something, that something feels thoroughly nailed. For example, the Queen tribute musical We Will Rock You contains a plot ill suited to the genre and feels completely out of place while the book in question here works incredibly well. Elton’s imagining of the behind-the-scenes world of a musical talent show is so satirical you can easily believe it all to be true. I am happier to believe his version than what I see on television at least.

Without spoiling the book, which I highly recommend, I shall explain the hilarious interpretation of the auditioning procedure that is so terrible it could quite possibly be true. The books Simon Cowell clone by the name of Calvin Simms lays down the optimum candidates for success on the show: the ‘clingers’, the ‘blingers’ and the ‘mingers’. The ‘clingers’ are those who “have always dreamed of this! My only dream! My last chance,” you get the picture. They are the crying wrecks that the audience can fall in love with, project themselves onto and watch grow before their very eyes. The ‘blingers’ are those who think themselves all that when we can tell by looking at them, their vocals will assault our ears something rotten. A ‘white-boy’ attitude is not mandatory but goes a long way for them. The ‘mingers’ are the vile idiots which provide the most laughs based on their looks or voice. Calvin Simms says he is making an entertainment show and not a talent show so it is ‘clingers’, ‘blingers’, or ‘mingers’ he wants; not singers. A decent share of each category ensures a successful season. Watching the X-factor since reading, I cannot appreciate it in the old light of belief but thoroughly enjoy it with comparison to the Elton’s satirical alternate.

As I say I do love the show regardless of my criticisms but am also annoyed regularly. The combination of large celebrity personalities and moaning hopefuls can be a bit much for me but won’t stop me from following the majority of the show of course. And with the revelation of Auto-tone technology in post production, the show gives me ever more reasons to lovingly role my eyes. I don’t really mind if the audition tapes are Cher-ified to please our ears but understand the anger of those, still believing it a talent show, who want to hear the original thing and judge it themselves. As far as contestants go, I loved Zimbabwean born “Gamu Nhengu” who had so much soul in her voice and I felt quite moved by the experience. Unfortunately for production I think she stole the show early on and no one really compared. Nutty mother of one “Shirlena Johnson” certainly proved interesting and entertaining if nothing else though her qualification still bemuses me.

It would be unfair to ignore Sky 1’s attempt to steal viewers away from ITV with their own musically minded show Must be the Music. Judged by those you may never have heard of, forgotten or been uninterested in – that being Jamie Cullum, Sharleen Spiteri and Dizzie Rascal in that order – the show is surprisingly entertaining. It was my hope on first watching it that it would avoid the cheesy factor that makes X-factor what it is but, alas, it did not. What it did provide was an opening for other musical styles, instrumentalists and bands. It has long been my opinion that bands and instrumentalists should enjoy the same publicity opportunities as solo singers have had on TV. Britain’s Got Talent was perhaps an option but they had to compete against dancing dogs which was always going to be unfair. I thought the encouragement of musical ingenuity was also good as contestants are not bound to the same cover lists and expectations as on other shows. The show is not without fault but the musical freedom contestants are allowed is what I, as a viewer, have been expecting for a long time. The judges also proved to be surprisingly charismatic which provides some one-upmanship on the X-factor whose judges I cannot stand. Something about the combination of the ugly Louis Walsh, annoying Cheryl Cole (no I don’t understand the obsession) and… euch… Simon Cowell just aggravates me. Of the Sky contestants, the young pianist “Kyle Nash-Baker” thoroughly impressed me with his moving musical stylings while others such as the band “Legion of Many” were a bit lost on me. I appreciated their costumes greatly but not so much their musical talent.

I will reserve harsher judgements of both shows until the season develops but so far I am enjoying them greatly. Your good opinions I am willing to hear so if you have a response, comment or criticism, feel free to throw it my way!

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