OUTRAGEOUS - Part Deux

I ranted about the ridiculousness of American television broadcasts of international events here. Today the National Broadcast Company did it again. The Beijing Olympics opening ceremony is not being telecast live. Because the execs at GE (parent owner of NBC) in their peacock sized brains can think only about the moolah that will be generated by broadcasting the ceremony during primetime, so the North American audiences can watch it per their convenience at 7:30 PM with their TV dinners and beers and then run to the stores to buy all the fancy products advertised during the broadcast. So all of us peacock-pestered folks will have to wait to watch the spectacle which the 90% of the world population has already experienced. One of those instances when capitalism stinks.

OUTRAGEOUS

OUTRAGED.....The Wimbledon men's semi-final between Safin and Federer is not being telecast live on any American TV channel. Shame on you ESPN, shame on you NBC. Some ridiculous contract arrangements has prevented ESPN to broadcast the match live and NBC cannot do without their Today's show. So here we are, following the match on wimbledon.com when there are 14,000 channels dedicated to sports in this country. Give me my State controlled Doordarshan any day, they would telecast even the Davis Cup matches live.
DAMN YOU ESPN, DAMN YOU NBC.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY.

Rome

I just finished watching both the seasons of the HBO/BBC production "Rome".

My Verdict: The best piece of television drama I have ever seen.

The series spans the history of the Roman empire from the victory of Julius Caesar in Gaul and him becoming the Emperor of Rome after dismissing the Senate and Pompeii, to Julius Caesar's famous assasination (at the hands of Brutus his nephew) and then to Octavian becoming the Emperor after defeating Mark Anthony and Cleopatra in Egypt. All of this is narrated with parallel stories of the life of two fictional characters. This forms for 22 one hour each episodes of glorious writing, directing, acting and production. Its interesting to see how the political and the power games played centuries ago have striking resemblances in contemporary global politics.

The DVDs of Rome have a neat feature called "All roads lead to Rome" - turning it on shows historical tid-bits about what you see on the screen. It gives an incredible insight into the things you see in the frame - the daily lives of Romans, the customs etc. Ohh I wish all history lessons were taught like this. Immensely enjoyable and entertaining. If any of you kind readers ever think of gifting me anything - get me the complete DVD sets of this show. My gratitude will forever be yours.

One note: The show has graphic content: nudity, language and gory violence. Not to be watched with children. The graphic content however is essential to the narration.