Recommendation: THR Roundtables

Above is the latest instalment of a Hollywood Reporter 'Roundtable' interview (hosted by Feature editor Stephen Galloway), which has become my new obsession online. Each one's an hour-long chat with a group of actors, actresses, directors, writers, etc, and they're very enlightening.

It's official! Peter Jackson is directing an episode of DOCTOR WHO!

It's been nothing but a rumour for awhile now, stemming from the fact Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit) is a lifelong Doctor Who fan, but the video above confirms things: the Oscar-winning New Zealand filmmaker is going to be directing an episode! Nothing else is known yet, but it's implied he'll be travelling to Cardiff to film, and production won't be travelling to the Southern Hemisphere to take advantage of those epic Kiwi landscapes. (But I could be wrong! I sure hope I am.) I also presume Jackson will be doing an episode for Series 10 next year, and surely you'd only get a director of his stature for a big, expensive premiere.

All very exciting. There aren't many TV shows that could get a director like Peter Jackson to work for them. He must be waiving his usual fee, right?

Video: What's wrong with HD BUFFY?

Here's an interesting video on the many issues remastering Buffy the Vampire Slayer to high-definition has caused, simply because they haven't consulted the original filmmakers. I'm currently watching the show via Amazon Prime and their stream is mostly in widescreen (I believe it's essentially the widescreen UK DVD release), and that occasionally throws up some "blunders"--mainly film crew being visible on the edge of the 16:9 ratio screen, although recently I could see the "off camera" wires being used to make it appear like a keyboard was being used by an invisible Buffy...

Video: SNL's HOBBIT OFFICE

Martin Freeman (The Office, The Hobbit) was the guest emcee of this past weekend's SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, and the highlight was the sketch I've embedded above. It's beautifully simple: what if the characters of Peter Jackson's Middle-earth saga were employees of an Office-style mockumentary? Freeman amalgamates Bilbo Baggins and Tim Canterbury from his two biggest pop-culture hits, with support from Bobby Moynihan (Gandalf/David Brent), Taran Killam (Gollum/Gareth), Kyle Mooney (Legolas), and Kate McKinnon (Tauriel/Dawn). It's rare for a SNL sketch to make me laugh, but this one managed it.

Video: Norwegian SHERLOCK parodies 'Oklahomo' & 'Mind Phallus'

Norwegian comedians Vidar Magnussen and Bjarte Tjøstheim have made two parodies of the BBC series SHERLOCK, which I'd like to share with you because they're well-made and contain fun moments: "Oklahomo" (above) and "Mind Phallus" (below)...

Video: Fan-made LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN opening titles

As a big fan of Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill's LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN comics (particularly the original ones set in Victorian times), it has always pained me that the 2003 movie was such a resounding disaster (creatively and commercially). Maybe one day, enough time will have passed for Hollywood to attempt a remake, because the idea's just so brilliant. And, perhaps, fan-made videos like this one could help rekindle the flame...

Short Film: DUST with Alan Rickman

Here's a great short film, written and directed by Ben Ockrent and Jack Russell. It stars Alan Rickman (Die Hard, Harry Potter) as a strange man who follows a little girl and her mother home one day, but takes a very unexpected turn. DUST is definitely worth seven minutes of your time.

This week, I'm loving... OUTLANDER's Opening Titles

Isn't it beautiful? Totally captures the mystery and romance of the Highlands of Scotland, while cleverly mixing together The Skye Boat Song's melody with lyrics paraphrasing Robert Louis Stevenson's poem Sing Me a Song of a Lad That is Gone (with lad altered to lass).

Video: GAME OF THRONES – Season 4 Gag Reel

Debuting at San Diego Comic-Con, here's a two-minute gag reel for GAME OF THRONES season 4, which primarily consists of the cast fluffing their lines and some set dressing failures.

Video: GAME OF THONES, '80s style!

What if HBO had made Game of Thrones during the 1980s? The result may have looked something like this amazing fan-made video of the imagined opening titles, complete with the GoT theme tune on a keyboard synthesiser. Love the attention to detail with this effort, such as the wobbly VHS-quality image.

[via Nick Schaedel]

Video: GAME OF THRONES - season 4, visual effects showreel

The fourth season of HBO's Game of Thrones has finished, so embedded above is the now-customary visual effects showreel. It's another very entertaining look at the digital trickery that goes into making this big-budget series, and I'm always surprised by just how much of its reality is actually false. (There are a few spoilers in the footage, so only watch if you've finished season 4.)

Video: Celebrities Read Mean Tweets #7

One recurring skit on Jimmy Kimmel Live has been reducing me to hysterics for awhile now, so I thought I would share the mean-spirited love. It's Celebrities Read Mean Tweets. The conceit is very simple: celebrities read out the mean tweets people have written about them. There's something incredibly funny about watching famous people do this; perhaps because they're told to show no emotion (but don't always manage to), or that some of the tweets are fantastically bitchy and occasionally right on the money. In this seventh edition, I particularly loved the description of David Blaine, Gary Oldman's reaction, and Ethan Hawke's tweet.

Here are the earlier six editions:

Video: Can Anyone Understand TRUE DETECTIVE?

HBO's True Detective has made a name for itself because of its haunting strangeness and, well, occasionally unintelligible Southern accents. E!'s The Soup have nicely spoofed the latter, in a video starring Joel McHale (as Matthew McConaughey) and his Community co-star Jim Rash (as Woody Harrelson). Enjoy.

Video: SHERLOCK mini-episode – 'Many Happy Returns'

As a primer for Sherlock's return on New Year's Day, the BBC have released a seven-minute appetiser called "Many Happy Returns". This gives us some insight into what the supposedly dead Sherlock Holmes has been doing since he faked his own demise...

Video: WHOLOCK - Doctor Who meets Sherlock Holmes

The same fan who created the astonishing fake Doctor Who 50th anniversary trailer is at it again! Embedded above is his latest effort; which uses all manner of digital trickery to create a short crossover for Doctor Who and Sherlock, as Matt Smith and Benedict Cumberbatch get to share a scene thanks to the wonder of CGI. This is a lot rougher than his previous video, as it's far more ambitious in telling an actual story with "performances" cribbed from various bit of footage, but it's still a marvellous effort... and gives you a flavour of what a genuine crossover episode might be like.

Update (15/12/13) - below is a video of how the video was achieved, which just makes it even more impressive:

Video: FREAKS! the Italian MISFITS remake you didn't know existed

Misfits ends this Wednesday after five series, and we're still waiting for the US remake (which doesn't appear to be happening now Josh Schwartz has left Warners Bros., who own the script he co-wrote with Howard Overman). But did you know Italy already has a version of Misfits on-air, which started life as a webseries in 2011 before being shown on TV? You can watch the first episode above, which comes with English subtitles. The Freaks! official YouTube channel has a lot more content, too.

DOCTOR WHO's 50th: 'What About Everything' music video

This is a superb fan-made video by Babelcolour, expertly editing together clips from Doctor Who's 50 years to match the lyrics of Carbon Leaf's "What About Everything". It's nice to see a video of this nature that has a happy, upbeat, whimsical quality for a change.

Video: BREAKING BAD, the alternate MALCOLM IN THE MIDDLE ending

It's a common joke to theorise that Breaking Bad was actually a prequel to Malcolm in the Middle, as both starred Bryan Cranston as Walter/Hal and couldn't be more tonally different. So while the joke of this video isn't anything new to fans of either series, it's great to see Cranston reprising his old role and roping in screen wife Jane Kaczmarek to sell the idea...

Video: DOCTOR WHO - 'The Night of The Doctor' prequel

The BBC have given us prequel 'webisodes' of Doctor Who for awhile now, but they're usually just light appetisers only hardcore fans lap up. The kind of thing that feels extraneous and largely inconsequential. "The Night of The Doctor" is a little different, so click above before you read more...

Video: GAME OF THRONES - Bad Lip Reading (extended trailer)

You may seen videos from the Bad Lip Reading team before (where they re-dub footage with a bizarre, often hilarious, stream of verbal nonsense). They've just released a spoof Game of Thrones trailer, that re-imagines the HBO fantasy drama as a dumb comedy aimed at teenagers (Medieval Land Fun-Time World). The results are odd and occasionally very funny, although I think the joke's stretched at over five minutes. But it's worth a look, especially if you're a GoT fan.