The first recording today is an edited recording of Charlie and Lola – Never Ever Never Step on the Cracks.
Lola is getting a bit caught up with superstitions. Her father told her “Dad said if I hop, hop, hop, really quickly to bed, then the sea ticklers won’t tickle me. Hop, hop, hop!”
Then Charlie makes the mistake of mentioning the bedbugs.
“Well, you’d best not step on the cracks in the pavement then.” “Why?” “Because otherwise, the bears will get you.” “There are bears? Here? Living underneath the pavement?” “Oh yes! If you step on the cracks, they’ll jump up and get you.”
All her friends know about it but it’s not only bears, it’s crocodiles and lions too. At this stage it seems like they’re bullying Lola.
Lola’s scared to go outside, so Charlie has to try to convince her that not everything people say is entirely truthful. “You know Mum says, don’t pull faces? ‘Because if the wind changes, your face will stay the same.’ Is that true?”
“Or when Dad says, “If you watch too much TV, you’ll get square eyes.” Is that true?” “No, that’s not true too! Silly Daddy!”
Media Centre Description: Children’s animation. Join Lola and Charlie, a brother and sister, as they deal with topics that affect their everyday lives. Lola is in a superstitious mood. There are so many unlucky things you can do. Charlie plays along with this but Lola’s imagination gets carried away. If you step on the cracks, do bears really jump out at you? Or is it crocodiles? Or maybe lions? How can Charlie persuade Lola that some of these things are simply not true?
Recorded from BBC TWO on Wednesday 13th February 2008 07:33
BBC Genome: BBC TWO Wednesday 13th February 2008 07:35
The next recording starts with the end of Richard & Judy talking to Omid Djalili.
Then it’s an episode of The Simpsons we’re seen before – The Homer They Fall.
Media Centre Description: Homer becomes a professional boxer when doctors discover he was born with a unique genetic condition that protects his brain from injury.
Recorded from Channel 4 on Wednesday 13th February 2008 17:58
After this, the recording ends with the start of Hollyoaks.
The last recording today starts with the end of Freaky Eaters.
There’s 60 Seconds of news, and the BBC Three rebranding looks like it’s fully kicked in.
They’ve started with personalities doing “You’re watching BBC Three”. Here’s Joanna Page.
There’s a trail for Upstaged.
And a trail for Being Human.
Then, it’s a new episode of Torchwood – Reset. We’ve missed an episode in our timeline, but I think we’ll be catching up. Maybe the recording that would have been on today was bad.
This episode opens with the team tracking weevil, when they discover a dead body. Then, as they are preparing to examine the body, there’s a visitor to the Hub. Ianto is leafing through a magazine and casually says “Sorry, we’re closing” until the visitor holds up an identity card, and suddenly it’s “Excuse me, Ma’am.”
It’s Martha Jones, now working for Unit, and investigating a series of unexplained deaths where it appears to be Toxic Shock, but they’ve turned out to have been poisoned.
She finds a needle mark in the eyeball, Yuck.
Tosh tries to find his medical records, but there has been a major crash on the NHS systems, and she can’t retrieve his records.
Martha and Jack catch up. “How’s the family?” “Getting better. They send their love.” “Give them mine.” This simple exchange made me cry. They also talk about Martha’s new job. “You should have called me if you were looking for a job.” “I wasn’t. This woman from UNIT rang out of the blue, said I was just what they needed, that I’d come highly recommended by an impeccable source.” “You mean…?” “Well, who else would have done it?” “He must have thought he owed you a favour.” Hold on, Jack, maybe he thought she was highly qualified for the job?
Marth’s given a tour, and looks at some gadgets. Owen tries to demonstrate one particular device. “I call it a singularity scalpel. See, what it does is concentrates energy on a tiny fixed point without damaging anything on the way.” But when he tries using it on a piece of paper in a cup, it actually hits something yards behind it, almost hitting Ianto.
Another victim turns up, but she’s survived the attack. “Look, he just, he came towards me with a great big bloody needle, didn’t he? You know, my dog bit him and then I kicked him in the nuts.”
Another less lucky victim turns up, a student. Martha and Owen theorise that the attacks aren’t only meant to kill, but to destroy something in the victim’s bloodstream, destroying evidence of their medical condition.
Gwen and Ianto visit the student’s friend. “Was Barry doing any sort of drugs at all?” “Well, he used to be really clean. Reckoned he had to be careful about what went into his body because of his diabetes.” “Barry was diabetic?” “Sure. But when they cured that, he was doing booze, blow…” “Wait a minute. You’re telling me Barry’s diabetes was cured?” “Sure.” “That’s impossible.” “Well, he stopped taking insulin. He was fine.”
With this information in hand they go back to talk to Marie, the ball-kicking survivor, and ask her if she had any serious medical conditions, and she eventually confesses that she had HIV, but was cured by something called The Reset, from an organisation called The Pharm. Then she suddenly starts convulsing and flatlines, and when she’s dead, hundreds of insects start bursting out of her mouth and swarm around Martha and Owen before dropping dead.
Jack goes to talk to the head of The Pharm, Dr Aaron Copley, played by Alan Dale. He’s extremely evasive. “Well, obviously our research suites are classified, so we can’t grant you access to those, but we’d be delighted to give you the PR tour.” “Normally, Aaron, we go where we like.” “Not here, actually. Ask Whitehall. We’re fireproof.” “Yeah. I had a bad experience with a politician recently. I tend not to listen to Whitehall any more.” “Let me get someone to guide you back to your vehicle.”
Tosh tries asking Owen out on a date, and this time she’s clear that’s what she’d doing, and for once, totally out of character, Owen accepts.
Martha goes undercover at The Pharm by applying to be a medical test subject, and she gets access to a computer. Nice to see the usual impossible IP addresses here.
Tosh gets access, and they get information on the insect parasite which they call the Mayfly.
Their files also reveal that they’ve got an actual assassin on the book, and looking at the list of targets for him, they find one woman who hasn’t been reported dead.
There’s alarms at The Pharm as Martha is trying to get back to her room, but it’s not her they’re looking for. It’s a giant mayfly.
Gwen catches the Pharm assassin before he can kill his next victim.
Martha is caught, and Copley intends to experiment on her. He’s discovered that she’s travelled through space and time.
The captured assassin starts coughing up blood and complaining about stomach pain. He’s got a mayfly growing there. Owen opts to try the gadget he tried out earlier, convinced that he knows what he was doing wrong last time. It doesn’t end well for the assassin.
“He must have breathed in larva when one of his victims died. This could have been me, or Martha.”
But they still need to get into The Pharm to rescue Martha, and Tosh has an idea. They take the body of the assassin, gaffer tape his hands to the steering wheel, and hide in the back of the truck, driving it by remote control.
They find Copley having given Martha the mayfly, and one is growing inside her. “She’s survived the larval stage, the only subject ever to do so.”
Gwen, Tosh and Ianto discover a room full of alien creatures, who are being harvested for the exotic chemistry they produce.
Owen tries for a third time to use his gizmo to kill the mayfly inside Martha, and thank goodness it works. OK, so her heart stops for a few seconds, but that’s just dramatic licence.
An Armed Copley confronts them as they’re leaving, having shut the whole place down.
He shoots Owen, then Jack shoots him. And it looks like Owen is dead. I thought it was odd that his character seemed like it was softening earlier. I’d forgotten this happened.
Media Centre Description: Science-fiction drama set in Cardiff, created by Dr Who writer Russell T Davies. Captain Jack calls in Martha Jones to investigate mysterious deaths. When the trail leads to a sinister medical testing centre Martha must go undercover. But have Torchwood underestimated how far the testing centre will go to find medical breakthroughs?
Recorded from BBC THREE on Wednesday 13th February 2008 21:48
BBC Genome: BBC THREE Wednesday 13th February 2008 21:50
After this, there’s finally a new trailer for Lily Allen and Friends.
There’s also a promo for BBC Asian Network.
Then, another burst of 60 Seconds news, this time showbiz news.
Then, looks like BBC Three are trying out in-vision continuity announcers. I wonder how long this will last. I’m going to guess that this was the outcome of one of their Upstaged thing they’ve been promoting.
The recording ends with the start of Phoo Action.
Here’s The Simpsons ad breaks.
Adverts:
- trail: Kingdom of Heaven
- trail: 4Music Sundays
- Lloyds TSB
- Uncle Ben’s Express Rice
- Herbal Essences
- Weetabix
- Specsavers
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- Neutrogena Visibly Clear
- Learndirect
- trail: The Big Bang Theory
- trail: Rude Tube
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- Vax
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- trail: Next on Four