TV Troll: Green And Greener

By Jo Last edited 216 months ago
TV Troll: Green And Greener
green_wing.jpg

Rejoice, rejoice, rejoice, for the new series of Green Wing (Fri 9pm C4) is upon us! We don't envy whoever has to go round the Tube taking down all the teaser posters, however. There isn't much we can add to this, except it makes us happy. As does the thought of Adam Rickett being eaten by Lord Freddie Whatsisface - shame that the producers of Alive: Back To The Andes (Wed 8pm Five) chickened out of making the "celebrities" in this bizarre tribute to the survivors of the crash in the Andes eat the blackened flesh of their fallen comrades. The emoting of unfamous, thicker-than-thick non-entities over an event to which they have not the slightest connection probably means the death of irony, or something. The film is on afterwards (Wed 9pm Five) so why don't you watch that instead (although we have to say it sounds a little depressing) and get your empty reality TV calories from Beauty And The Geek (Fri 10.30pm C4)?

AMERICANS: Here comes a Footballers Wive$ (Thur 9pm ITV1) s5 spoiler – beware! So, after hermaphrodite babies, more lesbians than you can shake a Lancôme Juicy Tube at, death by shagging and cocaine, dog-assisted involuntary infanticide, and murder galore, what new excess was there for the show's scriptwriters to throw at us? Well, why not incest, then? It makes perfect sense. Pity poor Paulo, the new Sparks stud – caught between Joan Collins's Eva (aka Mommie Dearest) and Zoe Lucker's Tanya (aka Supervixen), the poor boy is likely to have his eye poked out by a flying stiletto any second soon. In other FW news, Liberty and Tre's Cleopatra-themed wedding was a hoot, and overflowing with drama, not least the mystifying decision of the usually-immaculate Lucy to wear a top that gave her four boobs. Not a good look, dear, even for you. TV Troll prediction: she'll be shagging Tre by the end of the next episode.

Cilla Black, Liverpudlian legend, is the first star to appear on Eating With … (Wed 8.30pm BBC2), a new series where the rich and famous tell us what they like to eat. We'd like to see the Paris Hilton edition ("I eat cotton wool soaked in orange juice. And cock") or the Gywneth Paltrow edition ("I eat miso soup and probiotic organic bioactive badger shit. And when no-one's around, I order a dozen kebabs and smear my face and body with mayonnaise and hollandaise sauce") but Our Cilla will do for now – apparently she's a big offal fan. True story: a friend of a friend of TV Troll's (only the best sources are good enough for Londonist!) was on his way to interview Cilla in a taxi; upon mentioning his destination to the driver, he was somewhat taken aback when said driver replied in broadest Scouse that he should "tell her she's a c*** and kick her in the snatch" - advice he did not follow, sadly. How interesting can a programme about other people's dietary habits be? Not near as good as the amazing You Are What You Eat (Tue 8pm C4), that's for sure, because even given Cilla's predilection for offal, there is bound to be 100% less shit-poking. Shame! Completing the Triforce of offbeat cooking programmes this week is a new series of The Hairy Bikers' Cookbook (Wed 8pm BBC2), when the hirsute ones will take their unusual, undomesticated gods-approach to food to Vietnam. Watch in awe.

Now, you may recall, dear reader, that TV Troll is a massive Strictly Come Dancing fan, so you might expect the TV dungeon to be a foetid pit of antici…pation in the runup to the new series of Strictly Dance Fever (Sat 7pm BBC1), its sort-of spin-off show. In fact, we're just … not that fussed; Graham Norton is only good when he's being Father Noel, and, frankly, watching celebrities try to dance is better than watching Joe and Joanne Public. Still, at least some lives will be improved and some happiness spread. The Olympics are likely to have the same happiness-spreading effect, like a gigantic much-spreader loaded with rainbows and happy dust – but what about Olympic Architecture: After The Circus Leaves Town (Wed 8.30pm BBC4)? Given how much council tax we Londoners will end up paying the last thing we want is a load of pale pachyderms clustered sadly around a post-apocalyptic East London landscape.

It's Not East Being Green: No, not Kermit's eternal lament, rather another docusoap about well-intentioned, foolish brave urbanites who swap town for country and, in this permutation of the recipe, aim to do it in the greenest way possible. The kids, predictably, aren't too impressed, but this looks like it'll be fun for the viewer at least. Will we all have to live in a greener-than-green way one day? It'd hardly be a bad idea seeing as how the planet seems to be going to shit rather faster than a Dragonforce guitar battle (trust us, you want to watch that video) but … effort! Ugh! Will we still be able to watch TV? If not, is life really worth living?

Last Updated 28 March 2006