First: it looks like I’m getting two weeks off! So, this week’s Telly Addict, although not a review of the year, acts as an end-of-the-year, end-of-the-world edition. Under review are BBC Sports Personality of the Year, BBC1; the finale of Season Three of Boardwalk Empire, Sky Atlantic (no spoilers); The British Comedy Awards, C4; Richard E Grant’s Hotel Secrets, Sky Atlantic; Inside Claridge’s, BBC2; and Little Crackers, Sky1.
Secondly, I was also asked to promote The Great British Bake Off as my favourite TV show of 2012 (incorrectly billed as “the best TV programme of 2012″ in their more provocative headline). You can watch my little three-minute film here. Props to the Guardian website people for, once again, flagging this up on the main page. It’s reassuring to see that the commenters below the line have been instantaneous with their comfort and joy.
I watched this once. The presenters heads are completely up their own arses and it’s about the most tedious, poncy, self opinionated, piece of shit I have ever had the misfortune to view. Baking should be fun, with these arseholes it becomes a ritualised chore. More utter bilge from the increasingly bilge-producing BBC.
The middle-class fetishisation of food at a time of austerity – just what a PSB provider should be doing! What next … four celebrities in a big house with all the heating and electricity on talking about how warm and cosy they are?
FFS. We used to have telly like Kenneth Clarke’s Civilisation, Malcom Muggeridge, Face to Face, Not Only …But Also... Now we have endless cookery crap and people taking DNA tests live on air. Seriously- God help this country. It ain’t the Royals fault, either.
Corn syrup for undernourished brains.
Utter trash. Pointless competitions make for cheap nasty television. The smug presenters and contestants are horrible.
No names, obviously, as that would be playing into their evil hands. (I like the concept of “self opinionated” though.) So it’s “Goodwill to all men!” to those miserable fuckers, and “Merry Christmas!” to the rest of you. Thanks for viewing this year – in increasing numbers, so I’m told, since we moved to Tuesday mornings. Here’s to another year of me sitting at a slight angle and trying not to wear the same shirt two weeks’ running.
Never Knowingly Underwhelmed 
Coo, some people are horrid, aren’t they? Surely there are worse things on telly than the cake programme. I dunno, Andrew, you must find it quite tiring. I don’t understand why people watch stuff they hate. I hardly watch any telly at all because I can’t be arsed, but I don’t spend all my time looking for people who like, for instance (chooses programme at random) Hollyoaks, and slagging them off. What’s the point? I don’t get it. There are loads of proper things to get worked up about, aren’t there??
Anyway, have a lovely Christmas. I hope you have enjoyed your year. I imagine the whole ‘drummer from CUD’ thing has made it quite a memorable one.
Re your comment at about 1:40 (about SPOTY nowbeing called SPIZ)
You probably remember the Where’s Captain Kirk hitmakers Spizzenergi – Spizz is still going strong and is very chuffed that the BBC’s graphic design department has designed a new logo for him 🙂
I’ve never seen the programme; strange, as I’m an artisan baker. But I did enjoy the comments you picked out. Miserable fuckers? Well, aren’t we all, when it comes down to it? Happy Christmas Andrew! More of the same next year please. J x
Oh dear, when I noticed you were reviewing Little Crackers – a show that has generally produced what it says on the err… tin – I had hoped our views on Caroline Quentin’s contribution would coincide but I’m afraid I thought it stunk the place out.
I know you aren’t keen on bad mouthing people so I’ll reign myself in a tad but she seemed to be under the impression it was an art house film and she was embarking on a career as a director (I’m sure the editor was stitching her up when he included the clip of her shout “action!” during the ‘making of’) but what she came up with just characteristically smug. I realise those last two words belay some prejudice on my part but I promise I came to this with an open mind.
The best of these short stories come genuine slices of real life, like Cathy Burke’s from the first series, or at least a collection of real moments put together to form some kind of narrative, as with Joanna Lumley’s decent effort from the current one. I just thought CQ had fixed her eye on being commissioned for a series and forgot to tell any kind of tale at all.
That’s me being charitable that is.