Sunday 27 August 2017

Prince of Shadows





Gary Chalk collaborated with Joe Dever on the first eight titles in the Lone Wolf series, but then the partnership broke up. One of the results of this was Chalk's next project, the short-lived Prince of Shadows gamebook series, which lasted for just two titles released in 1988 and 1989, “Mean Streets” and “Creatures from the Depths”. Beyond having the same illustrator, the two books have a rather similar feel in their premise, worldbuilding and rules… in fact, you have to wonder if Dever wasn’t tempted to call his lawyer at any point. One way in which these books were very different, however, was their size and internal format. Permit me to demonstrate the former point:


So, what are they like inside? Ask that question not a moment longer, as here’s a blog post that’s going to tell you all about them.

Sunday 20 August 2017

Scenes From the Dwarf




The Penguin 60s range, as published at some point in the mid-late nineties, was a series of pocket-sized books about various subjects. The range included cookbooks, retellings of ancient myths and, in this case, a selection of Red Dwarf script extracts, billed in Grant Naylor’s introduction as “the least unmemorable scenes”, and also containing material cut from the broadcast versions. We were still a good few years away from actually getting to see the deleted scenes through the magic of DVD, so this was definitely the book's biggest attraction when first published. As part of my continuing commitment to write about things that are of interest literally to me and me alone, here is an analysis of the book’s contents.

Sunday 13 August 2017

A Table Comparing Tenures of Prime Ministers With Those of Doctor Whos


Tenure
Doctor Who
Prime Minister
November 1963 to October 1964
William Hartnell
Alec Douglas-Home
October 1964 to October 1966
Harold Wilson
October 1966 to June 1969
Patrick Troughton
January 1970 to June 1970
Jon Pertwee
June 1970 to March 1974
Edward Heath
March to June 1974
Harold Wilson
June 1974 to April 1976
Tom Baker
April 1976 to May 1979
James Callaghan
May 1979 to March 1981
Margaret Thatcher
March 1981 to March 1984
Peter Davison
March 1984 to December 1986
Colin Baker
September 1987 to November 1989
Sylvester McCoy
January 1990 to November 1990
Sylvester McCoy (series off-air, technically still incumbent)
November 1990 to April 1996
John Major
May 1996
Paul McGann
May 1996 to May 1997
Paul McGann (series off-air, technically still incumbent)
May 1997 to March 2005
Tony Blair
March to June 2005
Christopher Eccleston
June 2005 to June 2007
David Tennant
June 2007 to January 2010
Gordon Brown
January 2010 to May 2010
Matt Smith
May 2010 to December 2013
David Cameron
January 2014 to July 2016
Peter Capaldi
July 2016 to December 2017
Theresa May

Sunday 6 August 2017

Now That's What I Call One Song to the Tune of Another




Here’s one of the great baffling questions of radio comedy: Why has there never been an I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue compilation release, made up purely of the very best examples of One Song to the Tune of Another?

Just to prove such a release would work, I have come up with my own tracklist for it, consisting of my favourite examples from the show: