The Bill (Drama Pace)

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  • malcy30malcy30 Posts: 7,050
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    The first three episodes of the hour format were shown on the same week on ITV. The episode "Team Spirit" and several episodes thereafter were shown weekly on Tuesdays. The Bill remained once-weekly for about 6 or 7 episodes before eventually settling into a twice-weekly format.

    Thanks for reminding me. I remember they kept changing for a while.
  • allthingsukallthingsuk Posts: 6,035
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    I think Liz Rawton is a great character too - you sum her up very well, she is very likeable.

    I'm really loving these episodes. I did enjoy The Bill in the 2001-2005 era as well when it became more soapy, but I have a real soft spot for these episodes we are seeing at the moment - there is great human drama, it all feels very real and authentic. Everything is subtle and understated. It's not afraid to just let things be as they are. In 2001-2005, everything became so melodramatic and over the top, and they were trying to outdo the last explosion or outlandish plot that it showed. It was as if the show became too afraid they might lose their audience because things aren't *dramatic* enough.

    The human drama element of The Bill with the officers and their private lives, feelings and the character-led elements, has been dealt with well. It was a rapid departure for The Bill from the half-hour era which only dealt with the crimes themselves and little private life storylines/human drama elements. While the half-hour era was easy to follow, concise and tightly scripted, the current era that we're being shown now gave the show new depth and gave some characters that we didn't know much about in the half hour era, greater depth.

    For example, in today's episode, in the second half of the episode with the courtcase and the boy in the care home, those storylines would have been the main plots in the half-hour era with no mention of Tony's ongoing dilemma with the death by dangerous driving case.
  • darrenh2011darrenh2011 Posts: 2,608
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    what the problem with this channel is 1 advert break too many even the episodes on Watch aren't cut like this and why oh why they don't air an uncut episode at midnight baffles me
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 276
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    Loving these episodes, one thing that stands out is that there's no music, so much better imo.
  • malcy30malcy30 Posts: 7,050
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    what the problem with this channel is 1 advert break too many even the episodes on Watch aren't cut like this and why oh why they don't air an uncut episode at midnight baffles me

    UKTV are well known for running with one edited version of a show as cheaper and no compliance risk of airing the uncut version during the day by mistake, especially as most shows have multiple screenings during the day.

    Yesterday had the stupidity of showing Camomile Lawn a post watershed C4 drama at various times throughout the day, which meant they had to hack out large chunks of it as the show is well known for its frequent gratuitous sex and nudity. Saw one bit and the episode made no sense whatsoever given its masssive cuts.
  • allthingsukallthingsuk Posts: 6,035
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    Episodes being shown this week on Drama:

    Deadly Impact
    Big Day
    Making Up
    The Cross
    Cast No Shadow - return of Burnside
  • ReadingfanReadingfan Posts: 10,211
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    Today was the first time I noticed the cuts as they took out one of my favourite bits of the episode (Conway asking if anyone wanted his paper and then saying 'don't blame you' as he threw it away!) The missing scenes are available from around 0.56-3.30 in this video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UimmSDSBfgo

    I think other episodes from this storyline are also available so if anyone's aware of any other scenes that have been cut it would be great to have them pointed out so people could at least see them! As I've said before Drama really should just have 1 episode a day (rather than repeating one at 8) - that way they could take up a 70 minute slot or whatever instead.

    Anyway a good episode today. Interesting to have no station bits at all and only 1 scene outside the court (which wasn't even shown!) That must be one of the few episodes ever to not have any scenes from the station at all? Perhaps slight overkill though to have Stamp being investigated by police complaints though - will have to wait and see!
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 7
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    I cant wait till the 'cast no shadow' episode! Frank Burnside and his one-liners epic!! :D
  • ReadingfanReadingfan Posts: 10,211
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    Nice to see a decent amount of Conway today - great character!

    Is The Cross Kerry Holmes first episode? I thought she was a really good character too.

    Still no seen of Geoff Daly and Sam Harker's barely spoken yet - he popped up a few times today but no lines!
  • SOAPYFANSOAPYFAN Posts: 2,095
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    Dan_Cbbc wrote: »
    Hi Ken, the box sets are in 2 parts so the first boxset is Episode 1-60 and then the 2nd boxset is Ep 61 to the end of the year, so yeah if you want the second one then here it is.

    http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_odkw=Supermarket+Sweep&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313&_nkw=The+Bill+Series+14+Part+3-5&_sacat=0

    There you go.

    I know this is going to sound weird, but are they completely uncut... i.e - do they include the Previously On and End of Parts??
  • allthingsukallthingsuk Posts: 6,035
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    Readingfan wrote: »
    Nice to see a decent amount of Conway today - great character!

    Is The Cross Kerry Holmes first episode? I thought she was a really good character too.

    Still no seen of Geoff Daly and Sam Harker's barely spoken yet - he popped up a few times today but no lines!

    Conway was a great character. It's a shame we haven't seen more of Conway's wife because I think she's a good character, sticking up for Derek.

    And I must add, Christopher Timothy would have made a superb addition to The Bill's cast.
  • Dan_CbbcDan_Cbbc Posts: 1,842
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    SOAPYFAN wrote: »
    I know this is going to sound weird, but are they completely uncut... i.e - do they include the Previously On and End of Parts??

    They certainly do yep, I wouldnt of got them myself if they hadnt had them.
  • dazza89dazza89 Posts: 13,909
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    Conway was a great character. It's a shame we haven't seen more of Conway's wife because I think she's a good character, sticking up for Derek.

    And I must add, Christopher Timothy would have made a superb addition to The Bill's cast.

    Ha loved Dereks's wife after he died and she had a go at Chandler and Brownlow, brilliant stuff!
  • ReadingfanReadingfan Posts: 10,211
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    Dan_Cbbc wrote: »
    They certainly do yep, I wouldnt of got them myself if they hadnt had them.

    Yep - though I think these too contain some scene-cuts to episodes? Indeed I believe one is missing completely from 2000! I guess the question is is it worth paying circa £35 for these DVDs?!

    I remember Brownlow coming back after Conway died (although actually I think it was the memorial service technically for the 6 that died in the station fire as I think Conway had a separate funeral - and I don't remember Brownlow speaking much!) I remember Conway's wife having a go at Chandler around then. I'm sure she was played by a different actress then - of course Melanie Kilburn who played Sandra in today's episode went on to play Laura Bryant from 2004-2006.
  • Dan_CbbcDan_Cbbc Posts: 1,842
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    Readingfan wrote: »
    Yep - though I think these too contain some scene-cuts to episodes? Indeed I believe one is missing completely from 2000! I guess the question is is it worth paying circa £35 for these DVDs?!

    I remember Brownlow coming back after Conway died (although actually I think it was the memorial service technically for the 6 that died in the station fire as I think Conway had a separate funeral - and I don't remember Brownlow speaking much!) I remember Conway's wife having a go at Chandler around then. I'm sure she was played by a different actress then - of course Melanie Kilburn who played Sandra in today's episode went on to play Laura Bryant from 2004-2006.

    There is 1 missing yep no scene cuts though except one on Lock In and The Untouchables thats it, Ive put both of the missing scenes on YouTube.
  • ReadingfanReadingfan Posts: 10,211
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    Dan_Cbbc wrote: »
    There is 1 missing yep no scene cuts though except one on Lock In and The Untouchables thats it, Ive put both of the missing scenes on YouTube.

    Some missing scenes from today's episode are available here from about 3 mins in - we didn't get to see Conway breaking down! It also didn't flow very well because you had Brownlow leaving the station speaking to Monroe and then Stamp/Garfield headed out of the station but there was no sign of Monroe etc. - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVn7-W4_BKM&feature=c4-overview&list=UUn_fiLuGVgArzo_jZmdJAgw

    If we can upload any missing scenes from Drama this way/find them on Youtube etc. then that will at least be something - it really is very poor! I did email UKTV to suggest they they just went for 1 70 minute episode per day - if you'd like uncut episodes then feel free to do the same!
  • PhilH36PhilH36 Posts: 26,191
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    Readingfan wrote: »
    Yes - and I think a key issue is that in 1998 there were 3 parts to an hour episode, whereas the convention now is to always have 4. So essentially for each hour episode there must have been more content then than there was in the episodes that aired in the show's last years on ITV.

    Not necessairily. When shown on ITV dramas like Scott And Bailey will have three ad breaks in but they usually run right to the top of the hour and remove the break between the end of the show and the next programme so I don't think the actual content has reduced. US shows, on the other hand, have definitely got shorter to accomodate more ads. If you look at a dvd (or VHS in some cases) of a show like Buffy or The X-Files where there's four episodes per disc/tape, you'll see that for earlier seasons the total running time is several minutes longer than for later seasons.
  • Bonesy84Bonesy84 Posts: 5,741
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    Readingfan wrote: »
    Yep - though I think these too contain some scene-cuts to episodes? Indeed I believe one is missing completely from 2000! I guess the question is is it worth paying circa £35 for these DVDs?!

    £35 i paid a lot more than that for most of them :confused:
  • ReadingfanReadingfan Posts: 10,211
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    Bonesy84 wrote: »
    £35 i paid a lot more than that for most of them :confused:

    Hence the use of the word circa :) I was going off what was said earlier on this thread. I've not got them myself but when I looked I thought they were around that price, maybe slightly more - postage seemed to be the main cost!
  • ReadingfanReadingfan Posts: 10,211
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    PhilH36 wrote: »
    Not necessairily. When shown on ITV dramas like Scott And Bailey will have three ad breaks in but they usually run right to the top of the hour and remove the break between the end of the show and the next programme so I don't think the actual content has reduced. US shows, on the other hand, have definitely got shorter to accomodate more ads. If you look at a dvd (or VHS in some cases) of a show like Buffy or The X-Files where there's four episodes per disc/tape, you'll see that for earlier seasons the total running time is several minutes longer than for later seasons.

    There was definitely reduced content to The Bill's episodes in its later years on ITV. I remember reading a few articles about how it lost a minute or two at different stages so I'd guess it was probably around 5 minutes by the end - I think the 1998 episodes were around 50 minutes whereas the later ones were around 45.
  • Bonesy84Bonesy84 Posts: 5,741
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    Readingfan wrote: »
    Hence the use of the word circa :) I was going off what was said earlier on this thread. I've not got them myself but when I looked I thought they were around that price, maybe slightly more - postage seemed to be the main cost!

    Yeah your right postage is the bad thing
  • darrenh2011darrenh2011 Posts: 2,608
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    so let me try and make sense of this please.. so far the scenes cut by the drama channel have been scenes where nothing much happens ?
  • ReadingfanReadingfan Posts: 10,211
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    so let me try and make sense of this please.. so far the scenes cut by the drama channel have been scenes where nothing much happens ?

    If you look at my posts 58 and 67 you can see some links to the extended episodes and thus see some of the missing scenes. I guess it's a personal opinion as to how important they are. I've noticed the last two as the episode hasn't quite flown without it. And ultimately I like to see every scene as often more relaxed ones are my favourites (i.e. just two cops having coffee and sharing a joke or whatever, even if they're not integral to the story.)
  • ReadingfanReadingfan Posts: 10,211
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    Some nice lines in today's episode:

    Quinna:I've left my diary behind.
    Boyden: Forgotten what day it is have you?

    Deakin: I guess it's all about interview technique - I think I'd better lead then Rod

    Deakin: I daresay you'll be looking for a different brief!

    Deakin and Boyden - along with Conway - are the kings of 1-liners - probably my 3 favourite characters.

    I noticed Rod and Deakin swapped places when Deakin started leading the interview - does the person doing that sit in a specific place?

    I believe they cut out a scene where Harker realised he'd pulled the solicitor over so a few scenes didn't make sense. Can't find this one online but would be nice to see the missing scenes!

    I think today's and Bang Bang You're dead are my favourite episodes so far
  • allthingsukallthingsuk Posts: 6,035
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    Very strong episode today.

    Loved Deakin/Rod Skase today. Nice to see Sam Harker as we haven't seen him recently. And good to finally get some closure on the Tony Stamp/Jane Douglas/Simon Attwell hit and run story. It sort of dragged on a bit but good to see it's been rounded off today.

    Boyden's excellent. Witty character along with Conway.

    My rating: 9/10.
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