VISION ON SOUND EPISODE 172 - TX JANUARY 21 2024

01/21/24 • 59 min

PAUL CHANDLER, THE SHY YETI, is back to discuss TV ghosts...

First broadcast on FAB RADIO INTERNATIONAL at 19:00 on January 21st 2024

This week we welcome back PAUL CHANDLER, THE SHY YETI himself, that prolific podcaster from his very own THE SHY LIFE podcast, and we’re going to talk about GHOSTS, but probably not the GHOSTS that you might think we are.

Because, whilst we ought to note the passing of that much-loved sitcom of recent years on VISION ON SOUND - and who knows, perhaps on another week we will – our topic today is more about the ghosts that have appeared on other television shows that we have enjoyed over the years.

So whilst PAUL and I will be having a general chat about the subject, we will be touching upon RANDALL AND HOPKIRK (DECEASED) in both of its incarnations, PAUL’s perennial favourite DARK SHADOWS, the RICHARD CARPENTER classic THE GHOSTS OF MOTLEY HALL, taking a brief sideways trip into the TWILIGHT ZONE, considering the supernatural elements of SAPPHIRE AND STEEL, pulling off the mask of another janitor with the SCOOBY-DOO gang, chattering about some of those GHOST STORIES FOR CHRISTMAS, and even making brief references to Nigel Kneale’s classic THE STONE TAPE.

Not that we’re going into any great depth about any of these shows, as every one of them could be worthy of an hour all to itself – and will be if any listeners fancy joining me to talk about any or all of them.

Instead PAUL and I are just meandering through some of those dark places beyond the mortal realm, and lifting the veil briefly to take the merest glimpse into those worlds beyond, and our human interpretations of what they might be.

PLEASE NOTE - For Copyright reasons, musical content sometimes has to be removed for the podcast edition. All the spoken word content remains (mostly) as it was in the broadcast version. Hopefully this won't spoil your enjoyment of the show.

PAUL CHANDLER, THE SHY YETI, is back to discuss TV ghosts...

First broadcast on FAB RADIO INTERNATIONAL at 19:00 on January 21st 2024

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VISION ON SOUND EPISODE 171 - TX JANUARY 14 2024

STEVE HATCHER is back to guide us over to the flipside...

First broadcast on FAB RADIO INTERNATIONAL at 19:00 on January 14th 2024

What better way to welcome in another year than to take a time travelling journey to the flipside? We’re another year nearer to the future, and one further away from the television that we tend to talk about the most here on VISION ON SOUND.

Anyway, to start us off on our latest brand new shiny adventure, this week we welcome back STEVE HATCHER, and we’re going to talk about a pair of eccentric entries from the later era of PLAY FOR TODAY that rather flew in the face of some of the more usual type of stories that tended to get told in that series, by being rather clever little SCIENCE FICTION time-travel tales attempted on a BBC budget.

These were the 1980 play THE FLIPSIDE OF DOMINICK HIDE and its sequel from two years later ANOTHER FLIP FOR DOMINICK, which told tales of a time-travelling future society visiting the strange and mysterious world of the 1980s, and the interesting outcomes that such visits caused.

Starring, amongst others, PETER FIRTH, CAROLINE LANGRISHE, PIPPA GUARD, and PATRICK MAGEE, the plays were written by JEREMY PAUL and ALAN GIBSON, from an idea by ALAN GIBSON, who also directed, so it was very much a labour of love for them, and certainly the original play was a very well received example of the sweeter side of science-fiction storytelling, and has some strange connections with some other pop culture icons, as STEVEN will explain.

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VISION ON SOUND EPISODE 173 - TX JANUARY 28 2024

SANDY McGREGOR on MR BATES VS THE POST OFFICE

First broadcast on FAB RADIO INTERNATIONAL at 19:00 on January 28th 2024

We don’t often deal with all that much outrage in the generally cosy world of VISION ON SOUND, where often the most controversial opinion I make is about whether a fifty year old television series is still acceptable for modern viewing, how certain shows came to be wiped, or disagreeing with my guests as to whether certain TV shows can be considered to be absolute rubbish or not, or whether we should, perhaps, only award that dubious accolade to anything produced in the last ten years or so.

Equally, we don’t often consider much in the way of modern or recent television to come under what we loosely call our watching brief.

And yet, because a certain recent ITV television drama has been causing a lot of discussion, and indeed outrage, I felt that we couldn’t really ignore it for twenty years in the hope that it might become worthy of our attention.

So, having already borrowed - and devoured - his copy of the book THE GREAT POST OFFICE SCANDAL by NICK WALLIS, I invited SANDY McGREGOR back onto the show to have a chat about the implications of the recently broadcast powerful four-part drama series MR BATES VERSUS THE POST OFFICE, the story of what has been called one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in British History, written by GWYNETH HUGHES and directed by JAMES STRONG, which starred TOBY JONES alongside MONICA DOLAN and JULIE HESMONDHALGH as some of the “little people” doggedly and determinedly pursuing justice by taking on the POST OFFICE in a two decade battle to clear the names of over five hundred of his fellow sub-postmasters in a story which, finally, largely because of the broadcast of this production, has rightly been front and centre in the news agenda.

And whilst neither of us can claim any insights or personal involvement with the story, other than having taken a keen interest in it, and reading rather a lot about it, as well as discussing the series itself, our discussion does try to consider the power of television to occasionally make great positive changes happen, so we do briefly consider some of the – surprisingly few - other TV shows that can claim to have actually changed lives, and wonder just why it is that an important news story such as this somehow failed to make the same kind of impact in documentary form as it managed to as a drama series, and whether in future, that might be the only way any of us are likely to get the rest of the population to take much interest in some of the important things that are happening but which remain largely ignored.