Videos Of The Week #7: Robbie's Cyberman Storm Madness

Hello and welcome to the latest Videos Of The Week - hand-picked by people who are 98% guaranteed* non-bastards. It seems like the first week of July has whizzed by at the speed of an apple, strapped to the back of a Cheetah being pulled on a skateboard that's tied to an F1 car. To help slow things down simply take all of your clothes off, grease yourself up and rub these videos all over your body.

*Not a guarantee.

Look what you've done to my door

Last Saturday (1/7/2017) saw the finale of the latest series of Doctor Who, entitled The Doctor Falls and BBC One naturally didn't want to let it pass without ceremony. Aside from the trailers and all the usual promotional material, the channel decided to do something a little different with the ident and announcement leading into the episode itself...

Don't worry - announcer Duncan Newmarch somehow managed to survive his attempted upgrade and can still be heard on BBC One. One thing you may have noticed was the brief flash of the famous Test Card 'F' as the screen glitched out. The version they used on this occasion was the original that aired for the very first time in July 1967 - 50 years ago last weekend, when the BBC became the first broadcaster in Europe to begin colour broadcasting - initially on BBC Two only - with coverage of Wimbledon. This brings us nicely onto the next video...

These are extraordinary scenes

...As we travel to another period in Wimbledon history - the 1985 championships. On Friday 5th July 1985, there was a huge - and I mean HUGE - electrical storm in London during the afternoon and everyone attending that day of play got caught in the middle of it. The storm was so colossal that the BBC decided to stay with it, as people ran for cover and water cascaded down steps. Sit back and enjoy 7 minutes of it...

That poor cameraman.

It's the only place I'll ever get a job

Next we have a bit of a longer video, which is an entire comedy special from Hagrid himself - Robbie Coltrane. I've only recently discovered this and I'm so glad I have, as it's a rare chance to see such a distinguished actor doing comedy outside of the odd cameo in various sitcoms and shows. It's a shame it was only a one-off, especially as it is often overlooked. Originally shown on ITV in 1989, the video below comes from a Channel 4 showing in 1995 (despite what the description says on YouTube) and includes the adverts intact, as an extra treat. Enjoy!

My particular favourite sketch is the Border Television one, which I know will go over the heads of some people, but the characterisation is fantastic.

Pardon

Finally for this week, some music from one of my all-time favourite bands... Madness, with a beautifully summery song and a brilliant video. It's Wings Of A Dove, from 1983...

POP FACT: The inspiration for the video for this song came about when Dave Robinson, founder of Stiff Records saw a French TV ad for the Iveco Daily van a few years earlier and thought it'd be a good idea to include it in a Madness video somehow, so he bought the rights to use it and the rest is history... although it's obvious the van you see Madness getting into is a Ford Transit.

That's all for now. Seeya.