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Post by raggedbone on Oct 24, 2008 18:37:53 GMT
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Post by Jamie on Nov 3, 2008 21:58:31 GMT
The randomiser has selected another classic episode so this one has been a joy to re-watch and review. The randomiser choosing these episodes is giving us treats but it’s not very random, maybe next time we’ll get an episode that's not an episode one, four or a Christmas special! Until next time… I've had chance to watch through this episode from our random review list, I look forward to reading everyone's thoughts of the episode and you can read my review below: T. Bag and The Revenge of the T.Set: Episode One ‘The Stone Circle’ – My Review The episode starts in the High-T’s temple, The High-T Lady summons T-Bag and decides T-Bag should turn over a new leaf and become a member of the T. Set once more. After using her magic to destroy T-Bag’s evil T-Plant, The High-T Lady transforms T-Bag into the traditional T. Set robe and out of her red dress from Turn On To T-Bag. T-Bag appears in her red dress from Turn On To T-Bag and T-Bag’s Christmas Cracker, this gives continuity between the last series and this series, giving an extra layer of depth for the fans of the series. This fan certainly appreciates these references to the previous series and with this episode there is more of them to come. A girl walks into the curiosity shop from out of the rain and pretends to browse; Thomas enters and figures out that she has come in to keep out of the pouring rain. They introduce themselves as Thomas and the girl is called Sally. Thomas then tells her he has the kettle on and offers her a cup of tea; he walks out the back whilst Sally continues to browse. The familiarity of the curiosity shop eases us, the viewers, into the series but as we all know we would not be in the shop for long. The shop is full of miscellaneous bric-a-brac and has the High-T banner hanging up in the centre, and numerous props used throughout the series, like the Fizz bottle from episode four and the toy aeroplane T-Shirt gives the Emperor in episode two. These additions to the shop makes the real word (in the shop) and the world of T-Bag merge together giving greater mystery to the ‘was it all real’ question that was never really answered. The consideration of dressing the set with these props shows the attention given to the episode and the resulting details that are still being discovered today on repeat viewings. The addition of Kellie Bright to the series was one of the highlights of the programme. As Diana Barrand’s character in the previous series, Holly-Anna Jones, was specific to Turn On To T-Bag we knew a new girl would need to be found and they could not have picked a better one than Kellie. Kellie gives a first class performance and fits effortlessly into the surreal scenario but plays the character convincingly drawing us into the story. Elizabeth Estensen describes Kellie on the reunion DVD ‘bright by name and bright by nature’ and I wholeheartedly agree. Back in the temple, T-Bag has lost all her evil magic. T-Bag notices there is one leaf of the T-Plant intact. The High-T Lady then demands that T-Bag drinks from the cup of goodness, T-Bag reluctantly drinks the tea from the cup and the High-T Lady walks out. Alone in the temple, T-Bag spits out the tea of goodness and picks up the remaining T-leaf and seizes the chance to reclaim her glory. The leaf restores T-Bag’s powers and transforms her into a magnificent purple dress. T-Bag then changes the temple into her new T-Room. Sally peers into the teapot in the curiosity shop and T-Bag and the new T-Room rock from side to side causing T-Bag to hold on to her seat, the effects on this scene are not perfect by any means but compliments the feel of the series. Sally continues to look in as The High-T Lady returns and sees what T-Bag has done, T-Bag undoes the destruction of the T-Plant and the High-T Lady decides to stop her by using her magic but T-Bag overpowers her with her rejuvenated powers. T-Bag then casts The High-T Lady away and she sees Sally and conjures her into the temple, Sally shouts for Thomas. Thomas rushes in and notices the teapot on the table; he peers in and sees Sally tied to a post with a green laser approaching. He then tries to use his magic to transport himself in the teapot to save her, after trying and failing he tries again and appears in the temple, he unties Sally with moments to spare as the laser sparks causing an explosion and a plume of smoke. Following on from T-Bag regaining power, mention must go to her new purple dress which is my favourite one of the Tallulah Bag era and really suits the character of T-Bag giving her that regal and magical feel in abundance. Raymond Childe, the costume designer, must be applauded for his work on the series, especially the purple dress, one of his finest creations in my opinion. Raymond also provides the High-T Lady with a great costume; her dress is perfect for the character. The costumes of Thomas/T-Shirt and also Sally Simpkins are also a credit to him. T-Bag walks in and Thomas (now T-Shirt) realises it was a trick to get him there, T-Bag tells him to explain, calling him T-Shirt. Sally does not understand so T-Shirt tells her that he is not Thomas anymore he is T-Shirt. T-Shirt tells her that she is no friend of hers; she insists he makes a cup of tea for her, he resists but ends up making T-Bag a cuppa. Sally tells her she wants to go but T-Bag tells her that she has seen too much and has to stay, T-Shirt asks her to let her go but T-Bag tells them they are both staying. If only T-Bag had let her go back to the shop she would never have had her new nemesis. T-Shirt presumes that T-Bag is up to something and rightly so. T-Shirt tries to get T-Bag to explain her plans T-Bag tells him that the less that he knows the better which will stop him messing everything up; throughout this Sally takes the opportunity to sneak out and eventually T-Bag gives in and decides to tell T-Shirt her plan but not in front of Sally, then she realises Sally has gone and she must find her. Sally then reaches the stone circle and meets The High-T Lady, she tells Sally that T-Bag is dangerous and T-Bag wants power. T-Bag finds Sally in her saucer and decides to stop her as she has had trouble before with little girls, Deborah and Holly. At the stone circle The High-T Lady tells T-Bag that she will never get away with it, she then shows Sally eight silver spoons in a case and explains to Sally that the spoons were formed from a meteor of solid moon silver and that every one hundred years something spectacular happens in the night sky and the stars align themselves and rejuvenates the T-Set in the name of all that is good, the spoons attract the power like magnets and focuses the energy onto the stone circle. T-Bag takes the spoons and promises that the power will be hers and she will be the empress of all that is evil. T-Bag then goes back to the T-Room, Sally asks what they should do and T-Shirt reassures them that he will think of something. T-Bag calls T-Shirt and he goes. Back at the T-Room T-Bag is drawing on some plans of the stars and calculates that in ten days the stars will be ready (conveniently giving the series a chance for nine more episodes). T-Shirt offers to hide the spoons somewhere safe but T-Bag tells him they are already hidden. T-Bag then reminds T-Shirt they have had great times in the past, T-Shirt thinks back and we are treated to clips from the past three series, the first is T-Bag tripping on T-Shirt’s skate and crashing into the side of the T-Room from Strikes Again. The next clip is T-Shirt trying to hypnotise Gilbert but ending up hypnotising T-Bag instead from Turn On To T-Bag. The last clip is from Bounces Back when T-Bag fights Black Hearted Belle and cuts down the sails from the mast and knocks herself out. T-Shirt smiles at his memories and T-Bag decides to relax and catch up on her beauty sleep. These memories have been added by the director Leon Thau after changing the original scripts, as this was Elizabeth’s last series I thought it was apt to have a look back at the previous series. If I had to pick three short clips from the previous series I think I would have picked these clips too. T-Shirt then goes to the stone circle and asks Sally and the High-T Lady to help him look for the spoons, they start looking but Sally tells T-Shirt that they are not here as she leans on the plinth below some flowers, they discover the spoons and sally picks them up. T-Bag walks in and T-Shirt pretends to stop Sally. T-Bag then demands Sally gives her the spoons and decides to use her magic against her but nothing happens. The High-T Lady explains the magic of the spoons protects her so when T-Bag threatens to harm her and Sally gives the spoons to T-Shirt, he walks over to T-Bag then stops and uses his magic to scatter the spoons so T-Bag can not get them. T-Bag then puts T-Shirt into her power and then casts Sally and the High-T Lady away. T-Bag asks him where the spoons are and he tells her that he does not know, he scattered them away as far as he could. T-Bag then calls him a stupid boy. At the stone circle the High-T Lady takes out a pendant and gives it to Sally asking her to retrieve the spoons saying the pendant will keep her safe. Sally holds the pendant and slowly disappears. I must add at this point the wonderful casting of Jan Holden as The High-T Lady. Jan’s performance as the head of the T. Set is just superb, she catches the essence of the show perfectly and to the writing of the show it’s a brilliant conclusion to T-Bag calling herself The High-T in previous series. The performance is serious and very believable and she makes a great addition to the long line of ‘anchor’ characters throughout the series and, alongside Major Happy, is one of my favourite out of the nine anchor characters. T-Bag was one of Jan’s last TV appearances and is a great commemoration of her acting legacy. I like the explanation given by The High-T Lady that the pendant will lead through the T-Junctions through time and space, this makes me chuckle every time, the tea references in this episode borders on the obsessive but makes the episode truly T-riffic (I just could not resist another tea pun)! T-Bag tells T-Shirt they have to get the spoons before Sally does but T-Shirt asks her how they will find them as they could be anywhere, T-Bag tells him that the charm will lead Sally to the spoons and the girl will lead them. T-Bag looks into the screen and warns Sally ‘Seek out the spoons Sally Simpkins but just remember this, my dear, wherever you go we’ll be right behind you’. I really enjoy the warnings T-Bag gives at the end of the many of the series opening episodes and this one is one of the best, Elizabeth at her very best – oozing venom for her new adversary. Overall I have decided to rate this episode ten out of ten as it has all the right things to make a truly excellent T-Bag episode, this episode marks the start of a superb series. To sum up….this episode has left me shaken and stirred! |
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Post by raggedbone on Nov 20, 2008 12:33:22 GMT
OK, four weeks late, but better late than never as the saying goes, here's my review of Revenge 1 which is (I think) the longest I've ever done ... well it is this series! The other two should follow over the next week all being well ... and the next episode for review will be posted tomorrow ... and, for once, we have some variety! Anyway, on we go ...
T.BAG AND THE REVENGE OF THE T.SET, EPISODE 1: ‘THE STONE CIRCLE’
As atonement for her evil deeds, Tallulah Bag is returned to the Temple of the T.Set, to serve the all-powerful High T. Very quickly, however, T.Bag regains her magic, usurps the High T. Lady from the temple, and with T.Shirt back at her side, plots an audacious plan of universal proportions. She plans to hijack the upcoming T. Ceremony, when the stars converge in a ‘magnificent celestial formation’, and a powerful burst of ‘universal energy’ is focused on an altar at the centre of a stone circle. T.Bag hopes to harness that power using eight silver spoons, forged from ‘a meteor of sold moon silver’. Unfortunately for her she hasn’t banked on the interference of her treacherous T. Caddy and her latest foe, the benevolent Sally Simpkins, who steal the spoons and scatter them through time and space. Once again, the quest is on …
Did I mention that T.Bag and the Revenge of the T.Set was absolutely my favourite series of the show? Oh I did? Well the fun all starts here and this episode is a corker from start to finish, and rides high in my personal T.Bag Top Ten.
On paper, it is a very traditional opening episode; like our first reviewed instalment, T.Bag Bounces Back’s opening effort, we are walked from Point A (the set-up in the early stages) to Point B (the silver spoons and T.Bag’s plans) to Point C (the characters setting off on the quest). However, in its execution, there are so many things about this series opening which set it apart as unique from its stable-mates.
I wish I could give the bloke a bit of praise for once and apportion some of this greatness in Leon Thau’s direction. Alas this episode is full of the usual safe camera work (static long/mid-shots and close-ups, with the occasional pan, tracking shot or zoom) and stilted blocking, hallmarks of the show’s first six years. There are some nice touches here or there (the star-field opening, the special effects and his usual use of stock sounds and music), but it’s possibly true to say that his most significant contributions to the series lie in the scripts, rather than his direction … of course, that depends on how much he rewrote …
According to Lee Pressman, that wasn’t very much in this episode. In his 2007 interview with the High-T Website, he notes that for this episode, Thau’s only major influence seems to be in removing some material and adding ‘six minutes of contrived flashbacks’ (well it’s actually only two minutes, but it’s intriguing to speculate about what was replaced). When the episode was first shown (and on its repeat broadcast), I was very happy with these reminders of instalments past: not having ready access to the show’s early years, pre-Revenge, it offered a brief look at episodes of T.Bag which were already little more than vague memories. Twenty years on and after many repeated viewings of not only this episode, but also the episodes from which the flashbacks were taken, I can understand why the writers were a little irked at the excision of material for a ‘best of’ compilation of T.Bag pratfalls. That said, it can’t be discounted that on the day of recording, time was running short, deeming these inserts necessary; and it is amusing to observe that T.Shirt’s happiest memories of his time with T.Bag all involve pain and misfortune for her.
The elements which really make this episode unique (and to a large extent, the series as a whole) can be found in the script and in the performances; of the latter, especially in the performances of the three regulars.
Pressman and Cathro’s take on the treasure hunt hook this time is beautifully set up and is a culmination of many different elements from the show’s previous four years. We’re offered ancient orders, stone circles, astronomy, Pagan-esque ceremonies, temples with secret passages, sacred artefacts, and more tea puns than you can shake a novelty teapot at. The ‘T.Set’ is a wonderfully potty idea and offers us a potential back-story for the main character; sensibly the writers don’t go into too much detail about this, leaving it to our imaginations to fill in the gaps. And the quest objects themselves, the spoons; such an inventive idea for this particular series.
There are several concepts here, subverting established expectations of a T.Bag series, which make it all the more interesting; most notably the quest itself. For the last four series, we have followed the treasure hunter as she seeks out objects which will bring about T.Bag’s destruction. This time, the stakes are much higher: Sally is tasked to find the spoons to prevent T.Bag herself from gaining even greater power; there’s not even a guaranteed doom in store for the character at the series’ end. Having been given her own subplot and greater standing in Turn on to T.Bag than in previous outings, this series goes one better; T.Bag is a much more dangerous foe as a consequence and the treasure hunt is more thrilling and tense than ever.
Added to that, rather than setting off round the various limited lands, stories or television programmes of the magic object in the Curiosity Shop, this quest takes the three main characters on a quest through ‘the T.Junctions’ of time and space. The story potential for the writers is now seemingly endless and it’s no surprise that they re-use this idea in three of the subsequent four series.
Other little touches include the opening scene; it’s rather amusing that, having issued the line to any dissenters in previous series, it’s the High T. Lady and not T.Bag who warns: ‘I am the High T!’ Similarly the Curiosity Shop scenes take a different turn: in earlier years, it was T.Shirt who was kidnapped and Debbie who thought herself into the shop’s magic-door artefact; this time around, Sally is kidnapped and T.Shirt thinks himself down into the teapot to rescue her.
There are also (excluding the flashbacks) some nice little nods to the show’s history. When Sally escapes her clutches and T.Shirt suggests she ‘leave her be’, T.Bag spits: ‘my life’s been plagued by loathsome little girls: Deborahs, Hollys, bleurgh! I’m taking no chances with this one’. When faced with yet another laborious quest thanks to T.Shirt, T.Bag acknowledges: ‘well that’s just great; here we go again; you stupid boy!’
Overall it’s simply a very well put together story which blossoms and develops over the series’ ten episodes and while the direction is decidedly safe, the performances heighten the quality of the script. There’s not much one can say about John Hasler here that hasn’t already been said: his performance is as reliable as ever and his fractious relationship with Elizabeth Estensen’s T.Bag is as top-notch as you can get. He’s a bit stuck in this episode, caught between wanting to help Sally and the High T. Lady defeat T.Bag and knowing his (inevitable) fate if she twigs his treachery. Although this is Kellie Bright’s first on-screen appearance, this episode would have been one of the last shot so her performance here is very assured and confident compared to the second and third episodes. Bright is so very good in the role of the kindly treasure-hunter and her relationship with T.Bag is reliably and brilliantly prickly from the off. Veteran actress Jan Holden gives us a rather odd and quirky turn as the High T.Lady which suits her role as T.Bag’s opposite, dare I say it, to a T!
And then there’s Elizabeth Estensen, back for her final series and giving the most powerful performance of her tenure. Having seen quite a bit of Georgina Hale recently, it’s interesting to compare the two takes on the T.Bag role; Hale’s T.Bag relies as much on the material she’s given as on her rather unique playing style; with Estensen, the material is less tailored and the performance is everything. As with T.Bag Bounces Back, in this opening episode, T.Bag is on top and Estensen is superb at putting everyone in their place and ruling the roost. ‘Tallulah Bag will be empress of all that is evil’, she booms in the middle of the episode, laying her claim on the T.Ceremony.
Over the years several people have reminisced that they found T.Bag quite a dark series. I’ve never really seen that myself; T.Bag was, to quote one of the writers, ‘pure pantomime’ and in many ways, it’s the comedy which prevails over the drama in the show. I can understand why, as children, some people would have been scared of Tallulah Bag; at times Estensen gives a very menacing performance, no more so than in T.Bag and the Revenge of the T.Set. OK, so for most of Episodes 2 to 9, it’s business as usual with T.Bag gradually getting more desperate as her schemes unravel and more incompetent as a consequence; but in Episode 1 and (especially) Episode 10, the humour of the character is at a low and Estensen gives a quite threatening performance: ‘seek out the spoons, Sally Simpkins,’ she spits in the closing scene to a chorus of screeching violins; ‘but just remember this my dear: wherever you go, we’ll be right behind you’. For me, Estensen was never better than in this series which would sadly be her swansong.
On the production side, John Plant gives us some reliably wonderful sets which heighten their 2D constraints. The new T.Room in the temple is great with a rounder set again giving more space for action, and exquisitely painted with grey mock-stone walls, columns and carvings. The lighting is a bit bright once the High T. Lady’s out of the way, but that’s only a minor gripe. The Curiosity Shop is again nice and gloomy, made all the more atmospheric with the occasional brief flashes from a thunderstorm. The Stone Circle is the best of the obligatory three sets here, with similar designs to the T.Room, slightly dimmer, slightly moodier lighting and a very dark purpley-blue backdrop. Also of merit are the designs of the T.Set banner, with its altar and cups and saucers; and the very odd teapot, shaped (it would seem) like a mountain with the temple at its top.
Its new costumes all round in this series, with T.Shirt getting an outfit similar to the last series with a stronger green colour and better design. Sally’s clothes – ‘the little girl in blue and pink’! – are simple modern day fare and much more effective than the heavily designed pieces previously worn by Debbie and Holly. Raymond Childe really outdoes himself with T.Bag’s highly detailed new purple gown and headdress. While it’s hardly subtle attire, it is without doubt Estensen’s best regular costume of the whole series. The High T. Lady’s gown is a much simpler white and gold affair, not dissimilar to T.Bag’s costume, again contrasting the two characters.
As mentioned, the special effects are a strong point in this episode; all very simple, but all very effective. We have the reassuringly obligatory thunderclaps from T.Bag, with the green laser bolt which threatens Sally and the pink sparks during the contest between T.Bag and the High T. Best of all is the opening sequence with its ‘heavenly choir’ soundtrack, detailing a white glow passing the stars in the night sky and descending to the temple in a shaft of white light to reveal the High T. Lady on her throne.
Now to rate this episode; hmmm … Well I’m very tempted to give it ten out of ten; but then again, as far as I’m concerned (as you can tell from the list of ratings!), that would be perfection, lightning-in-a-bottle time; and while this is one of my favourite episodes, there’s still one I rate even higher. So it has to be (a very high) nine out of ten for me. If you get the chance, do have a look at this episode while it’s still on photobucket – this is T.Bag at its best.
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