The Blog of The Bob

Once again I seem to have failed to write anything for a few weeks, and once again I seem to be apologising for it. So sorry, once again, for my lack of posts. To make up for it I will write 9 posts a day, every day, for the next eight thousand years. Honest.

Anyway, the main reason for posting or not is whether or not I have something to say. And quite frankly right now there is plenty to be said about world events (and more to the point, the new series of Heroes has started - more on that later…).

The big issue at present is of course the slow and delicate collapse of capitalism. Or so the media would have us believe. I am not going to write lots about this as I definitely know less than many people about this subject and don’t want to waste your time…

Actually, I tried to write something but ended up with 8 of the most banal, obvious, and embarrassing simplistic paragraphs you’ve ever read, and I had to delete them before I vomited in self loathing. Read this article and you will get an idea of what I entirely failed to even approach in saying. I even tried to write a mocking paragraph about how rubbish they were and it was almost as bad. Let us not speak of this again children.

Instead… I’ll talk about the American election! Hey, no one else has said or written anything on this! I’m sure I’ll come up with plenty of original and witty comments. Honet.

The point has been raised a number of times over the past 8 years that once Mr Bush is no longer the Big Man, the political satirists are going to have a much tougher time. Now, I’ll lay my fairly obvious cards on the table and say that I do want Obama to win, but if he does The Daily Show won’t be nearly as good for the next 4 years. Or will it…

Remember back, if you will, to 1 May 1997. The sun seemed to be just that little bit brighter than it had been for the past 18 years, and most people thought it was shining out of the arse of a certain Mr Tony Blair. Please try and remember this without cynicism - we all* thought that this really was going to be a great thing, a new Britain, possibly even a New Britain. Things could only get Better, etc etc.

Let’s also remember that since then we’ve gained a minimum wage, devolution in Scotland and Wales, er… ASBOs? Um… they repealed the law that meant you could be hanged for treason or piracy. Er, I’m sure there were a few other good things that I was going to mention but I can’t remember what they are now. The Olympics? Please use the comment box below to help me out…

But my point is that if Obama gets the comfy seat in the Oval Office it won’t herald a new dawn of common sense and fairness, greater freedoms and equalities, less wars and terror, a world where all of mankind work together towards a glorious future, of countrymen lending others their ears… you get the point. I just don’t think it will make a huge difference, that’s all I’m saying. That’s the problem with democracy - we spend all this time choosing who to put in charge and then we just complain when they get it wrong. But as someone clever sort (Churchill no doubt) once said, Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried.

Anyway, at least things can’t get any worse. Unless we end up with a certain President Palin.

(* apart from the 3 people in Surrey who actually voted Tory that year)

Anyone who has ever lived with me, been round to my place, or indeed had me in their house, while watching TV will know that I have a tendency to hit the mute button during the advert breaks. In fact, tendency is perhaps not a strong enough word. A compulsion, an obsession, a sine qua non if you will.

I just can’t help it. Come the quarter hour and the remote will magically appear in my hand, finger poised to silence the dire warnings of the lack of car insurance, lady products, or appropriate dog food in our sorry little lives. For me though, as I can’t drive, am not and do not possess a lady, and don’t enjoy the taste of dog food, these are unnecessary interludes.

I fear that moaning about specific ads may become a semi-regular feature on here, as they really do make me want to curl up and buy (nothing, ever again), but here are some of the adverts that have caught my eye recently…

Stella Artois: They’ve finally dropped the “Reassuringly Expensive” thing, as that only works if it actually costs more than any other beer. Which it doesn’t. It’s also not very nice. And makes you want to beat up women (allegedly) hence why it is know as “wifebeater”. Allegedly.

Their new advert features all sorts of exciting medieval/fantasy style computer graphics and people in costumes, and even has a voice over by Patrick Stewart himself, telling us that Stella is from ye olde days and is made with only the traditional ingredients of water, hops, and er… the other ones.  He even promises the excitement of some sort of online game thing. So basically, all the things that would normally draw me in. But it’s Stella. Even if Patrick Stewart came round to my house to read The Lord of the Rings to me, recreated my favourite scenes from I, Claudius, and said “Make it so” when I offered him a cup of tea, I still wouldn’t drink Stella.

Well. okay, maybe if he did all of those things. But it would have to be all three…

Hovis: This features a wee boy with something of the Oliver about him buying a loaf of ye olde breade from ye olde shoppe. But, shock horror, when he walks outside it seems to be slightly less olde. There’s a horse and cart in the street, but when he goes round the corner there’s suddenly motorcar. And then there are some World War I soldiers obviously heading off to war. And then returning (although they have too many limbs if you ask me…)

Yon boy (whose clothes have changed somewhat) turns a corner to find some ruined buildings - yes, you’ve guessed it, he’s now reached World War II. This is followed by a street party and some giggling girls (the 60s?) and then, rather strangely, he wanders between a large group of policemen facing off against a group of strikers. Is that really the best way to depict the 70s? Well, I guess it’s better than him bumping into Slade…

He eventually gets home and is all modern n’ stuff. Great. The point of the advert is that Hovis still make bread the way they used to. Which is blatantly not true. First of all, it’s hard to imagine that it’s baked by hand, otherwise half the country would have to be employed in the process. Even more so, the machines they use now are no doubt faaar more efficient and hygienic than even 20 years ago. Which is a good thing for all concerned as it keeps prices lower.

But the main thing this advert says to me is “British life in the 20th Century was just completely awful and depressing”. If these were our defining moments then I hope we manage something a bit better this century.

The thing is, it’s actually all rather impressive as an advert, and probably is quite affective and effectual for most people. I’m just ye miserable olde cynic.

To learn about the worst of them all, read this here article, which is far more eloquent than I could ever manage. What really gets me is that it’s a pretty good service that shouldn’t be too hard to advertise with just the basic facts. But these are overshadowed by the Hucknell Horror.

However, an extra note on this would be that they have followed Ginger Mick up with… Mel B. It’s got all the same problems as the previous, including a last line spoken by the bearded one himself of “Well, I spiced up her life”. Really? Is that really what you wanted to say? Really? I would have gone with something like “At least all that TV should keep her mind off having Eddie Murphy’s baby.” I’d buy that for a dollar…

I guess I have to throw in my 2 (euro) cents about this whole CERN LHC thingy (if you know not of what I speak click here. And buy a newspaper/radio/TV).

Well, the world didn’t end, which was nice. Of course, the pedants among you will know that actually today was just the machine being turned on - the potentially universe-eating moment comes when they get 2 particles to crash into each other and, like, this whole mess of crap comes out (to quote Friends, of all things).

But it was nice to hear on the Radio 2 news this morning that the world was probably not going to end today (this is perhaps something that should be said more often).

The 1 minute story basically ran with the facts:

1. World’s largest science experiment starting today

2. To uncover the secrets of the Universe

3. Took years to build

4. Cost lots of money

They really should have stopped there quite frankly. But they added:

5. Might kill us all

6. Probably won’t

Unless you had already heard about the extreeeemely small potential for black holes they really shouldn’t have mentioned it. There’s nothing like being told that everything will almost certainly be okay to scare the bejesus out of people. They even had an expert to reassure us that the experiments would not destroy the Earth, as more volatile particles hit the planet every day. Who was this expert? Well, apparently it was Stephen Hawking, but quite frankly it could have just been Terry Wogan with a voicebox.

(okay, that was a cheap shot and I’m sorry)

However, I was wondering though if anyone took the whole thing to heart and started preparing for The End. You know the sort of thing - telling people they shouldn’t that they love them; committing crimes for a laugh; selling all their stuff and spending the money on that Amazing Spiderman issue 1 they always wanted, and then burning it.

For the record: I have always loved you, I would never do anything illegal, and I have nothing worth selling.

So if any of you did anything like this (or even considered it) why not leave me a comment below so we can all laugh at you. Hey, what does it matter if we do - the world might end tomorrow…

Right, time to get back into this blogging malarkey. I need to learn how to write shorter, but more regular posts. Apart from this one probably…

To give you an update on what’s been happening with me recently, I’ve been promoted (although of course I won’t be telling you what I’ve been promoted to), I’ve been doing some dating (more on that later, maybe…), and I’ve been eating slightly too much, drinking plenty of fluids, and generally having fun.

Three things that have made my life just that wee bit better recently:

Home Cinema: My flatmate has been borrowing a video projector from his work at the weekends allowing us to watch films on a screen roughly the size of your house. It’s great, and some films really do benefit from this. Those watched so far include The Empire Strikes Back, Hellboy, and er, Knocked Up (which probably didn’t gain much). Of course, as we are watching these through a computer we can also have giant Internet - this means big screen BBC iPlayer, 4OD, or Demand Five, plus an shows on DVD. So I have also been watching giant Family Guy, huge Curb Your Enthusiasm, and the ultimately experience that is Neighbours on a cinema-sized screen. Only in my dreams have I imagined such a thing…

I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue: One of my friends lent me a whole bunch of episodes of I’m Sorry I haven’t a Clue on CD which I have been enjoying on my way home from work. Walking through the park while listening to the best punning in the world ever is a great way to recover from a hard day at the office. Although people give me strange looks when I burst out laughing for no obvious reason…

The Wii: My flatmate also has a Wii, which I’ve been playing a little too much. I’ve manage a bowling best of 236 and a Wii Fitness age of 21 on Wii Sports, but I’ve mainly been playing Guitar Hero. More on this later, but basically it’s another good way to waste time after a day at work.

So hopefully I been feeling these pages with lots of meaningless drivel over the next few weeks, months, and years. Watch this space…

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Finally, as I haven’t posted anything for a while I suppose I should give you an update on the World as it currently stands, following on from my first ever entry. Let’s see…

News:

• The credit crunch continues, and everything costs more and more these days (anything below £3 a pint of beer seems alright these days…)
• Gordon Brown is still Prime Minister somehow; Alex Salmond is First Minister; George W Bush is still President but not for much longer (Obama and McCain are now the official candidates; the Conventions happened over the past 2 weeks).
• Physics might, but probably won’t, kill us all. On Wednesday.

Sport:

• The Olympics finished two weeks ago, and Team GB (shudder) did better than anyone expected, and the whole thing was rather enjoyable. The Para-Olympics start today.
• Andy Murray is in the semi-finals of the US Open later today. And hey, he’s going to be 4th in the world after this tournament, so maybe he’ll win. Against Nadal. Maybe…
• Scotland are currently losing 1-0 to Macedonia in a World Cup qualifier.
• This may well be the last time I mention sport on here until the next World Cup…

TV and Entertainment:

• Big Brother has FINALLY finished. I managed to watch about 9 seconds of the whole thing, and I feel proud. Decent programming might now return to Channel 4 and E4. Or at least lots of reruns of Scrubs.
• A new series of the X-Factor has started and it’s exactly the same as every other year.

Well, it’s all over. I am indeed writing on my blog tonight (clearly) but there was no exercise biking whatsoever. Shocking…

While we’re talking about moving about (or not) I guess I should throw in my tuppence about the Olympics. So far, I’m actually rather enjoying the whole thing. I’ve watched some swimming, diving, canoing, gymnastic-swinging-like-a-crazed-monkey, and judo. Which is not bad considering I’ve been asleep or at work while most of it has been going on (and no, I’m not watching it on the sly at work - our computers don’t allow us to have such fun).

It’s slightly annoying that we still seem to be hearing more about London 2012 than we are about Beijing 2008, but that’s the British media for you. The usual issue of Scottish people being British when they win has already raised its head too - David Florence was very much being called Florence of Great Britain today. Fairy nough really, that’s who he’s representing, but sometimes it’s rather irksome.

I actually have a slight problem with the whole national thing with The Games anyway. I can’t help but feel that it should be more about individual achievement rather than glory for your country. But this is probably all tied up with my whole hatred of Nationalism, which stems from studying too much 20th century history. But what with Russia and Georgia slogging it out over the past few days, and the general ill-feeling between China and America, it doesn’t seem very healthy to me to make it about the countries. Make it about the individuals and let them all join together in one big harmonious sporting mélange says I.

Is mélange the word I’m looking for? Never mind, moving on…

You don’t make films for your country (well, usually) or TV programmes. So why sport? You only make music for your country if it’s Eurovision, and that never ends well. Unless you’re ABBA or Cheryl Baker. Which you’re not.

I seem to have lost my thread entirely so I’ll end on a true story: One of my friends emailed me about my tea post yesterday, saying “I think tea drinking should included by [2012] - a true British past time. I could be in your “entourage” and be the guy that carries your tea leaves for you.”

I simply responded that he is more than welcome to be my tea caddy.

All too easy…

I haven’t got round to writing anything in a while, but I’m back now. I’ve not really been away anywhere, it’s just that life got in the way briefly. Sorry faithful reader (and there is one of you). I won’t let it happen again. To make up for this I’m going to try and post something every night this week. I’m also going to try and use my exercise bike every night this week. Bets are on which will last longer…

Anyhoo, today I’ll tell you about one of my new favourite places, where I’ve been spending my time instead of sitting in front of my computer writing this nonsense.

Ladies and Gentle Ben, I give you Tchai Ovna, a pair of tea shops in Glasgow, although I’ve only been to the one in the West End. They serve over 80 types of tea from around the world (without even making the “Around the World in 80 Teas” joke) and have a fantastically detailed menu that describes not just the flavour, but the history and sometimes the effect, contained within the brew. For example,

It’s a really relaxed atmosphere - the first time I was there they had live citar music. Awesome. The West End branch has a lovely wooden porch out front where people smoke shisha pipes (whatever they are). Look at the website for more…

And they know what they’re doing as well. It’s not just a case of stick in some boiling water - different teas need different receptacles, temperatures, and infusing times.

I bought some as a gift for a friend and the waitress gave me some verbal instruction on how each should be prepared; for example the white tea should be made using water at 70 degrees centigrade. To get the water at this temperature, Tchai Ovna’s method is to boil it, then pour it between 2 Perspex jugs 4 times. That’s science kids.

Now I’m fussy about my tea. Very fussy. And it’s my life-blood. There is no other foodstuff that I would find as difficult to give up; this includes chocolate, meat, alcohol, and cheese (in that order, from easiest to give up to hardest). It’s not just the caffeine (although it is largely to do with it…), there’s a comfort factor about tea that I don’t get from anything else.

However, I’d rather drink instant coffee than suffer a cup of tea bag Typhoo, or overly-stewed Tetley. I use loose leaf tea, both at home and at work; in the former I use a pot and no strainer - I grew up with the leaves at the bottom of my cup. At work I have a wee, screw-top tub thing, with grills round the side that you can use to make single cups (or in my case pint mugs) of leaf tea - I guess you would call it a re-useable teabag if you wanted to address by name. I even have 3 types of leaf in my desk, Assam, Earl Gray, and Lapsang Souchong, which I mix according to my mood.

I’ve got to say at this point that while I’m really fussy about how I have my tea, I’m not snobbish or judgmental about how other people like their cuppa.

That said, I’m rather put off by being offered a “cuppa”, or a “brew”, which is about as snobbish as you get.

As I said earlier, for me, tea is about comfort and familiarity. It’s associated with childhood, home, safety, The Mother’s kitchen table. And therefore I usually try to make my cups of tea similar to what I drank as a kid. It’s a comfort factor. However, after I started sharing flats with folk who grew up in er… not in an Enid Blyton novel, I soon realised that some people preferred a tea bag dunked in hot water a few times to carefully measured, loose leaf tea, slowly infused, lovingly prepared, and poured after the milk.

I could write about this for evermore, but bloomin’ George Orwell beat me too it. Git.

Visit this site to see what he said. I’ll take his point one at a time, but you may want to skip to the end:

1. Different teas for different purposes says I. See the Tchai Ovna website for more. But I guess the available teas were a bit different in 1946. Apparently there’d been a minor skirmish over the past few years.
2. It depends what he means by small quantities. I do drink it by the pint, but it’s always a fresh pint…
3. Almost certainly true, but I never usually bother. I blame my Mum, who never did this either.
4. Indeed. This is one reason why I like having a pot - I can keep adding to the pot in front of my, so the tea in the cup gets stronger and stronger.
5. Yup.
6. Aye min. Apart from the bit about putting flames beneath the kettle (if it’s electric)
7. Hmm… I don’t generally stir, but once again, The Mother never did this so I don’t.
8. Does he mean a mug over a wee cup? Not sure, but my pint mugs are normal mug shaped, just bigger.
9. “Pour the cream off the milk”? What? Get in the now Orwell!  Actually, that said, I would always use semi-skimmed as whole milk does what yer man there says and makes the tea taste funny.
10. This is tricky. With a pot I go milk first as, given what i said above, you can always add more tea to taste. However, I genuinely notice a difference when the milk is poured onto the tea. I once heard that the Royal Family take the piss (extract one’s urine) from us commoners who add the milk first. But hey - I didn’t vote for them either…
11. Absolutely Georgie-boy, couldn’t agree more. Once again, I’d rather go without tea than drink it with sugar (for the record, I usually put sugar in coffee…)

Aaaaaanyway, the point I am eventually going to get to is that it is indeed an individual preference. Much like most things in life in fact. It’s about what you grew up with, what is familiar, and what seems natural to you. It’s about what you want to get out of it; be that a caffeine fix, a hot drink, the tranquility of the ritual of making tea, or the feeling that you’re better than everyone else because you do things in a fancy way (I’m guilty of all the above of course, but I’ll only admit to the first 3).

Ultimately, my views on tea are the same as my views on religion - I’m probably not right, but I’m certainly more right than you are.

Right, just time for a quick update:
Film of the week/month: Not a difficult choice - The Dark Knight.

There’s really very little I can say that hasn’t already been said by some fanboy on the Internet somewhere, so I’ll keep it simple. It is really good. My only perhaps slightly controversial comment would be that while Heath Ledger is outstanding as the Joker, it seemed more like an ensemble piece to me. Christian Bale manages to be a convincing Batman and Bruce Wayne, which is something that none of his predecessors ever managed for me. Michael Caine could have been a terrible choice as Alfred, but I just think he’s marvellous in this (as he was in Batman Begins). Maggie Gyllenhaal manages to be Not Katie Holmes, which is a good start, and is neither pathetic nor the plunky comic-book girlfriend that sometimes appears in these films. Morgan Freeman is just Morgan Freeman, and that is always spot on; Gary Oldman always pretends that he’s not Gary Oldman (I never seem to recognize him…) and that’s even better.

But it was Aaron Eckhart who for me who was outstanding, or perhaps I should say surprisingly outstanding. His character of Harvey Dent could have been nauseatingly All-American and entirely one-dimensional (Justice is good, let’s all be nice to each other, look at my shiny white teeth) as an obvious counterpoint to The Bat’s good-guy-with-issues routine. Having a quick peek at IMDB shows me that Mr Eckhart hasn’t had a glittering career up to this point, but I’m willing to bet that he might have a few more parts heading his way soon after that performance.

Hopefully I’ll see it at the IMAX sometime soon - apparently it’s so good people were actually gasping at certain points (and how often do you actually hear a crowd gasp?)

Place of the week: Edinburgh Botanic Gardens. I lived in Edinburgh for 9 years and never made it to the Botanics, but spent an enjoyable afternoon there yesterday. The great weather helped of course.

DVD release of the week: Spaced has finally been released in the States on DVD. If you know any Americans who you think would enjoy such comedy gold, why not send them a copy. Or at least a link to an appropriate online shop. Apparently, commentary includes contributions from such people as Kevin Smith and Quentin Tarantino. Weird world.

Personal victory of the week: Getting quoted on Radio 4. I shit you not. Check out Sunday’s Broadcast House about 20 minutes in. The bit with John Culshaw; when they read out the entry from Bob, Glasgow - that was me!

Okay, there are probably lots of Bobs in Glasgow, so I can’t actually prove this is me. But if you go to the BBC News website’s Magazine and then go to the Monitor pages (here’s a link in fact) you’ll see that actually the comment was left by The Bob, Glasgow. Huzzah!

Hey kids! Do you hate adults? Do you find that they’re too happy and content in their own lives? Then why not try Annoying the Crap out of Them!

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Harsh? Maybe. Fair. Oh yes indeedy. Twice this week I’ve to endure noisy children; once in the cinema and once on a train, and I feel the need to vent my spleen dear reader.

Okay, so maybe the cinema one was partly my fault. I went to see Wall:E on a Sunday afternoon, so there were always going to be loads of kids in there. Standard rule of cinema-going: if you want to avoid the screaming hordes while seeing a film rated lower than 15a, go to a late show.

However, this was worse than usual. I don’t mind a bit of random commentary from the kids - in fact it can be quite funny sometimes. When I went to see Spiderman 3, the moment Thomas Hayden Church appeared on-screen, loads of kids in the cinema said “It’s Sandman!” under their breath (even though at this point he wasn’t - he was just some bloke). They no doubt recognised him from all the merchandising and such like that they had been surrounded by for weeks before the film came out. “I hope he’s as cool as he looks on the side of my trainers/cereal box/mobile phone” they were probably thinking. The adults were probably thinking “Oh, it’s that bloke from Sideways - I hope this is as good.” I’m fairly sure both age groups were sorely disappointed…

Anyway, I will begrudgingly admit that kids have just as much right to be in cinemas as I do (although, they did pay less for their tickets for exactly the same film, same size of seat, same air…) But if they aren’t even going to watch the film then they should get the hell out!

On Sunday there was a family sitting a few seats along from me that consisted of 2 adults and 3 kids: one wee girl (I’d guess she was about 1-ish) didn’t even look at the screen and spent most of the time singing to herself; another slightly older girl seemed to be fairly quiet throughout, but eventually got taken outside by the father as she was crying. Finally, there was a boy of about 4 (at a guess) who said at one point “Mum, I don’t like this!” and later “Mum, I’m bored”. From my point of view the first of these was the worst - she was only 3 seats along from me and pretty much kept up as a secondary soundtrack for the whole film. ARGH! But it seems that the other two were hardly enamored to be there, and surely the parents weren’t enjoying the film either? I would have thought in that situation that at some point the parents would have realised that this was a lost cause and they were just ruining it for everyone else?

As you might have guessed (and hoped) from all this, I don’t have children myself. And yes, it’s easy for me to judge other people with their kids. So easy in fact that I’m going to do it again right now.

I was heading back to Glasgow from Aberdeen earlier in the week, slightly hungover and rather tired. The first hour or so was nice and peaceful, and I dozed away while listening to various things on my iPod. That is until Burt Raccoon woke up… Actually, that is until we got to Dundee.

A mother got on the train with her 2 kids, a boy and a girl of about 6 and 4 respectively (at a complete guess, but they may well have been younger). For a while they seemed to be sitting nicely (ie quietly) and doing, well, something. I didn’t really pay them any attention as I was still in my dreamland, being sung to sleep by Joni Mitchell (or somesuch). The first time I really noticed them was when they all started noisily tucking into various foodstuffs, which may well have contained large amounts of sugar. Or possibly cocaine. Whatever it was, trouble wasn’t far behind.

The first crime was the wee boy playing his Gameboy (DS) without any earphones, with the sound turned up (he was playing a Star Wars game as I could hear the Mos Eisley Cantina music). I myself have often played my own Gameboy (Advance) on trains and am ridiculously paranoid about making sure no one can hear the tinny music coming out of it. My annoyance wasn’t just that he has a DS and I don’t (I bet he has a Wii as well, the git) but the fact that the mother didn’t tell him to turn it down. As it turned out he only played it for about 5 minutes and then got bored…

The two kids started screaming, purely to annoy the mother. She reacted by hissing at them to be quiet, which just made them laugh more and scream all the louder. They then started hitting each other, and not just little play fighting, but what looked like full-on beatings. What was Super-Mum’s great way to handle this? By hitting them. Mmm… healthy rolemodels…

The kids didn’t really seem to care about this very much, and reacted against it by playing-up even more. This included more screaming, banging various things off the table and running up and down the aisle. The mother did some more hitting, shouting, and general exceptional parenting. This went on for about 45 minutes I reckon until we finally arrived back in the Weeg.

So let’s pass some judgement here. I guess in both stories it’s clearly the parents who were mostly at fault, and if I wasn’t such a coward then perhaps I would have said something in the cinema. I don’t think there was anything constructive I could have done on the train, and hey - they might all have turned on me (like I say, I’m a coward).

Still, especially in regard to the two on the train, let’s not go too easy on the little ones. While there is something to be said for nature and nurture, there’s also something to be said for just being a wee shite.

Rant over. Next week - why kittens and puppies should all fuck off and die.

In response to a comment left by Richard in my post about Heroes, I thought I would explain the N.E.R.D. concept.

No-one Ever Really Dies.

That’s pretty much it. It’s the idea that in any story, no matter how dead someone seems to be, there is always the possibility that they could come back in one form or another.

I think it was originally said in relation to comic books, but it can happen in any story.  It tends to be in sci-fi more than any other genre because, let’s face it, if you’re dealing with time-travel, magic, or ridiculous technology you can pretty much do what you want. I was about to start listing some of my favourite examples but it’s a bit tricky - I don’t want to spoil the party for anyone else by revealing something I shouldn’t. But here are some examples you all probably know about:

Sci-fi

Superman - He was actually killed off around the mid-90s, probably in an attempt to get some new readers. They bought him back within a year…

Pretty much any/every Doctor Who baddie - Davros and The Master are good examples. They always seem to be left in a burning spaceship, or trapped in time or somesuch. Although when John Sim’s Master got shot it seemed sort of permanent. But it wasn’t, let’s be honest. (I always thought that in the recent series instead of saying “Activate Temporal Shift”, the Daleks should have just said “Activate plot device”).

Buffy - she died at the end of series 5, (”Devoted Sister, Beloved Friend. She saved the world. A lot.”) only to be resurrected at the beginning of the next series. Wasn’t the shark-jumping moment it could have been… Just remembered that Buffy actually died at the end of series 1 as well, but came back to life in the same episode.

Gandalf - I don’t need to explain this one. If you haven’t read Lord of the Rings or seen the films then get the hell off my blog and don’t come back until you’ve at least watched the films.

The soaps do it all the time as well.

Harold Bishop - about five years after being swept into the sea (”Haaaaarooold!”), he came back as Ted, the Salvation Army shop assistant.

Dirty Den - ‘Ello Princess. Don’t know or care much about this one…

Bobby Ewing - a whole series of Dallas turned out to be a dream just so they could bring back a popular character. Awesome.

Others:

Jesus of Nazareth - allegedly. I should probably leave that one there for now.

And from the same book - Lazarus. I wonder if his wife was still able to claim on his life insurance?

Gary Barlow - I won’t say that he’s back for good, but I’ll think it…

Wispas - they went, then came back, supposedly for a limited time only. Are they still about?

There are also those characters that do actually die but still remain integral to the plot either in as ghosts or visions, or through vision, time-travel, or whatever other excuse the writer can come up with. Obi-Wan, various Harry Potter characters (I ain’t spoiling nothing…), Darnell in Heroes.Kosh in Babylon 5 (oh dear, I’ve hit an all-time geeky low…)

I’m sure there are thousands more. So hey! Why not tell me your favourite one - click on the comment tab below. Maybe you’ll spoil some really good book, film, or TV programme for someone…

You must all watch this now (click on the banner):

Mr Whedon, I salute you! I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s instalment already…