Tag Archives: Adrian Lukis

Collateral, Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Carey Mulligan, Jeany Spark, Nicola Walker, John Simm, Nathaniel Martello-White, Ahd, Billie Piper, Kae Alexander, Hayley Squires, Judy Namir, Ben Miles, Orla Brady, Rob Jarvis, Mark Preston, George Georgiou, John Heffernan, Shawn Dixon, Lati Gbaja, Buppha Witt, Molly Simm, Nicola Duffett, Kim Medcalf, Vineeta Rishi, Siobhan McSweeney, Guy List, Richard McCabe, Tom Turner, Jacqueline Boatswain, Robert Portal, Alais Lawson, Brian Vernal, Deborah Findlay, Nick Mohammed, Tony Way, Alex Reid, Adrian Lukis.

Collateral, Television Review. full post

(477 words, estimated 1:54 mins reading time)

Apple Tree Yard, Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

Cast: Emily Watson, Ben Chaplin, Mark Bonnar, Susan Lynch, Olivia Vinall, Stephen Elder, Jack Hamilton, Syreeta Kumar, Assad Zaman, Kezia Burrows, Steffan Rhodri, Adeel Akhtar, Rhashan Stone, Lydia Leonard, Nick Sampson, Frances Tomelty, Laure Stockley, Sebastian Armesto, Denise Gough, Adrian Lukis.

The problem with putting on a drama on the television, no matter how well intentioned, is that in some respects the pace of the script feels disjointed, it can either be too fast and therefore lose the viewer’s attention by being overly complicated or too slow and then being the type of programme in which the person enduring the ongoing situation is forced to believe that many of the scenes or characters could have been cut or not bothered with at all.

Apple Tree Yard, Television Review. full post

(470 words, estimated 1:53 mins reading time)

The Avengers: The Lost Episodes Volume 4. Kill The King. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

Cast: Julian Wadham, Anthony Howell, Lucy Briggs-Owen, Dan Starkey. Lobo Chan, Richard Cordery, Ozzie Yue, Lourdes Faberes, Karina Fernandez, Adrian Lukis, Elizabeth Morton, Matthew Cottle.

 

Heavy is the head that wears the crown, especially when it is the prime target for an assassination attempt on British soil of a foreign head of state.

The fourth box set of the highly popular adaptations of The Avengers lost episodes series sees both Dr. Keel and John Steed take a bit of a back seat in the opening chapter and one that with all the best will in the world feels as though it is still feeling the after effects of the falling out between the two characters at the end of Volume Three.

The Avengers: The Lost Episodes Volume 4. Kill The King. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(453 words, estimated 1:49 mins reading time)

New Tricks: Last Man Standing. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Dennis Waterman, Denis Lawson, Nicholas Lyndhurst, Tamzin Outhwaite, Anthony Calf, Tracy Ann Oberman, Amy Nuttall, Bernard Cribbins, Larry Lamb, Garry Cooper, Nigel Cooke, Nigel Betts, Adrian Lukis, Michael Shaeffer, Samuel Oatley, Samuel Collings, Kevin Bishop, Leon Williams, Ishia Bennison.

It may have come too late for New Tricks to be come back after this particular run, the last words have pretty much been said on what has been a tremendous drama, however in Last Man Standing, the two part opener to what is the last series, the team have arguably their finest moment in the sun.

New Tricks: Last Man Standing. Television Review. full post

(437 words, estimated 1:45 mins reading time)

Terry Nation’s Survivors: Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Caroline Langrishe, John Banks, Chase Masterson, Terry Malloy, Adrian Lukis, Camilla Power, Louise Jameson, Sinead Keenan, San Shella, Lucy Fleming, Ian McCulloch, Carolyn Seymour, Phil Mulryne, John Dorney, Lisa Bowerman.

For those that remember with fondness or indeed with a tightening grip of fear Terry Nation’s 1970s apocalyptic serial Survivors, the frightening aspect of a civilisation falling apart very quickly is one that is perhaps the most powerful and enduring images of its time and is probably matched only by the television film Threads a decade later. To see it happen on screen as part of a drama is one thing but to have it re-recorded by audio drama specialists Big Finish, already the guardians of the legacy of Doctor Who in audio form as well as establishing a great following with their episodes of the likes of The Avengers, Sapphire and Steel and Blake’s 7, is quite a different proposition.

Terry Nation’s Survivors: Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(675 words, estimated 2:42 mins reading time)

Midsomer Murders: The Killing Of Copenhagen. Television Review. I.T.V.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Neil Dudgeon, Gwilym Lee, Fiona Dolman, Tamzin Malleson, Ann Eleonora Jørgensen,  Birgitte Hjort Sørensen, Sanjeev Bhaskar, Richard Cordery, Nicholas Jones, Adrian Lukis, Joanna Scanlan, Poppy Drayton, John Duggan, Marcus Hutton, Jonathan Barnwell, Caroline Goodall, Nicolaj Kopernikus, Thomas Thoroe, Julie Agnete Vang, Anick Wiget, Pete Meads, Marie Askehave, Hannah Blamires, Pamela Betsy Cooper, Susan Fordham, Anthony Farrelly.

Midsomer Murders: The Killing Of Copenhagen. Television Review. I.T.V. full post

(504 words, estimated 2:01 mins reading time)

The Avengers, The Lost Episodes. Brought To Book. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Anthony Howell, Julian Wadham, Lucy Briggs-Owen, Colin Baker, Adrian Lukis, Tim Bentinck, Alan Cox, Blake Ritson, George Rainsford, Camilla Power, Sophie Aldred, Philip Mulryne, Kieran Bew, Richard Franklin.

With the murder of his fiancé Peggy still haunting him, Doctor David Keel finds himself further embroiled in the plans of the mysterious John Steed and his attempt to bring down the latest in organised crime in London in the second story re-made by Big Finish’s The Avengers: The Lost Episodes.

The Avengers, The Lost Episodes. Brought To Book. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(446 words, estimated 1:47 mins reading time)

Hot Snow. The Avengers: The Lost Episodes. Volume One. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Anthony Howell, Julian Wadham, Camilla Power, Colin Baker, Tim Bentnick, Adrian Lukis, Phil Mulryne, Blake Ritson, Anjella Mackintosh, Kieran Bew, John Banks, Richard Franklin.

Arguably The Avengers was one of I.T.V.’s flagship programmes that for its time possibly rivalled B.B.C.’s Doctor Who for its intrigue and audience adulation. Like the B.B.C. though, the television programme‘s early broadcasts were not as keenly looked after as they should have been.

Hot Snow. The Avengers: The Lost Episodes. Volume One. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(607 words, estimated 2:26 mins reading time)

Doctor Who, The Justice of Jalxar. Big Finish Audio Drama, 2.04, Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Tom Baker, Mary Tamm, Trevor Baxter, Christopher Benjamin, Mark Goldthorp, Rosanna Miles, Ben Bishop, Adrian Lukis.

Two of the best loved characters from the classic period of Doctor Who make a stunning return in the canon and manage to lighten the mood in their own superb interminable style in one of the stand out highs so far of Tom Baker’s return to the role he relished in for many years. Jago and Litefoot appeared nearly 40 years ago in the episodes surrounding the mystery of Weng-Chiang and now they return in The Justice of Jalxar.

Doctor Who, The Justice of Jalxar. Big Finish Audio Drama, 2.04, Review. full post

(570 words, estimated 2:17 mins reading time)