Bringing together the TV moments of the week, including a raging studio radio documentary, the return of Broad City, Hayley Holt tackling Back Benches and a farewell to Pixie.
Rise of the Radio Punks
Prime’s excellent series of local documentaries wrapped this week with a breezy, boozy stroll through forty odd years of student radio. As I wrote earlier in the week (click through for the link)
“Radio Punks didn’t pretend to any kind of ubiquity, but managed to somehow roll half a dozen stations, five decades and hundreds of big personalities into a messy whole which captured the soul of one of the most vibrant sections of our media.” The best footage is from bFM’s mid-90s heyday, when it was the coolest media brand in the country – a heroic era which ex-Herald staffer Hugh Sundae is working hard to revive right now. / DG
Dancing With the Political Stars
Hayley Holt co-hosted the rowdy pub politics show this week and proved her political mettle, firing out questions to the audience faster than a Vienese Waltz.
Talking to Tamar, an aged care worker struggling under little government funding for her sector, she revealed that she was on $16 an hour, and that was all she would ever make. It was a raw revelation to come of a rowdy pub. Later, during a discussion about Richie McCaw becoming Prime Minister, Hayley emphatically declared “HAYLEY HOLT FOR PRIME MINISTER”. She’s got my vote. / AC
The Broads Are Back in Town
Thursday night saw the welcome return of Broad City to Comedy Central, launching the second season of 2014’s Best Show (as acclaimed by very fancy and credible critics). Where to even start with this treasure of a show? I am constantly amazed by Broad City’s ability to combine both complex ideas and surrealism with the most bog standard, base level observations about human life here on this grotty little Earth. In episode one, we learnt just as much about the phenomena of “swamp ass” as we did about heteronormativity and rape culture. A mighty feat for sure. / AC
Smashed Palace Comes in Like a Wrecking Ball
The last reality show I remember playing on The Box was also the first: an outstandingly tawdry confection called ‘The Player’ (click through for the link). A decade on and the channel’s finally ready to dip its toe back into those fetid waters again. Smashed Palace is a workplace-reality show, a docudrama set in a Horopito car wreckers yard which has been operated by the same family since the ‘30s. It’s two episodes in and starting to heat up – the second episode featured a boozy BMW rally around the yard, a magic set of Hamilton bogans and an ancient quartet of Minis changing hands for a cool $400 after 30 odd years decomposing in a Turangi back yard. Perfect. / DG
The Winter is Over (For Ferndale)
We farewelled Shortland Street’s Winter Season on Monday, with Pania’s pathological storyline reaching its climax. It may be sad to farewell Bree Peters who, as she explained in an interview (click through for the link) will leave a role that had “parents pulling their kids away from me on the street”. As if these farewells couldn’t get sadder, the little lass Pixie absolutely died this week. Rest in peace sweet Pixie, I hope you are in a better place, eating all the ghost weed brownies that you can get your hands on. / AC
Binge: Eat, Drink, Love on Lightbox (click here) – Sick of how the Masterchef judging panel is always a total sausage fest? Watch some kickass women run their food empires in LA instead
Watch: Sunday Theatre: Venus and Mars, TV1 Sunday at 8.30pm – Based on a true NZ story, features “poison pen letters, satanic worship, and a violent pyromaniac”. Sounds cool.
Movie: About Time, TV3 Sunday at 8.30pm – A time travel rom com that is actually good, and instils Rachel Adams’ typecast role as “love interest frustratedly stuck in the present always”