Around the dial

This week I'm starting things off with a video from the Oddity Archive YouTube channel, which looks at the history of radio and television news bulletins. If you're any kind of a news buff, most of these clips will be familiar to you (Pearl Harbor, JFK, 9/11), but what really sold it for me is the host's opening rant on how cable news has cheapened the concept of "breaking news" beyond recognition. I've been complaining about this for years, which is one reason why I, a self-professed news junkie, never watch it anymore. I'm tired of being manipulated by people who can't tell the difference between a genuine news bulletin and promoting whatever story the network is hot on at the moment. It's great stuff—I think you'll agree with what he has to say. One other thing he mentions, and you have to be of a certain age, I think, to appreciate this: there used to be a time when the words "bulletin" or "special report" made your heart skip a beat, because you knew, just knew, that something terrible had happened. Now, in the era where everything is breaking news, you don't feel that way anymore, which is good. But that sensation of waiting the five or ten seconds to find out what had happened—that feeling was indescribable.

At Comfort TV, David has a "purchase or pass" recommendation on Our Miss Brooks, the 1950s sitcom starring Eve Arden, which is just coming out on DVD. I've only see a couple of episodes on TV; I'm most familiar with the show from radio days, and though I enjoy Arden, I could never really get into the series. I'll let you find out for yourself what David thinks.

The Hitchcock Project returns to bare•bones e-zine this week with Jack's look at the Stirling Silliphant-written episode "Little White Frock" from Hitchcock's third season. We haven't seen this one yet, so I'm not going to go into detail, but you'll enjoy how Jack follows the tale from its short-story origins to its appearance on the small screen. Entertaining as usual.

Here's something sure to be a crowd-pleaser from Classic Film & TV Café: seven things to know about Angie Dickinson. It's probably a symptom of my sheltered upbringing, plus my mother's musical tastes, that I first knew her as Burt Bacharach's wife before I did as a movie star. (She has some interesting things to say about Burt, by the way. What a fool he was.)

Does Bob batch it or botch it? Well, according to Hal at The Horn Section, it's a little of both, as he reviews "Bob Batches It," a very funny 1956 episode of Love that Bob!  I've also got Hal to thank for linking to the site That's Entertainment, which this week takes an in-depth at the 1956 radio comedy The Magnificent Montague, starring Monty Woolley, which was Nat Hiken's claim to fame prior to doing The Phil Silvers Show.

At Cult TV Blog, John admits that he thought the 2000 reboot of Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) would have everything he disliked, but to his surprise, he would up enjoying it thoroughly, especially the episode "A Man of Substance," which manages more than a nod to The Avengers.

It's time for Jordan's monthly look at the back issues of The Twilight Zone Magazine over at The Twilight Zone Vortex, and in the issue of October, 1982, we have movie and book reviews, an interview with Nicholas Meyer, director of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Marc Scott Zicree's continuing guide to the original series, and the teleplay of the fifth-season episode "In Praise of Pip," which contains one of the first mentions of Vietnam on television. TV