Bates Motel

"Bates Motel" is a contemporary prequel to the genre-defining film "Psycho," and gives a portrayal of how Norman Bates' (Freddie Highmore) psyche unravels through his teenage years. Fans discover the dark, twisted backstory of Norman Bates and how deeply intricate his relationship with his mother, Norma (Vera Farmiga), truly is.

- Written by A&E Television Networks

The show starts out as Norman Bates being portrayed as a regular young man. As the show goes on, Norma and Norman's relationship gives us insight to how Norman came to be the way he is. An intricate back story to Norma's life is revealed and Norman's pshyche slowly starts to unravel, long before the events way down in the fruit cellar. - IMDB

'Bates Motel' is a new US television series. The first season premiered on March 18th, 2013 and ran for ten hour-length episodes. The series stars Vera Farmiga as Norma Bates and Freddie Highmore as her son, Norman Bates.

While the set is a perfect match for the original from the movie 'Psycho', including the iconic house, the series is set in the present, making it more of a re-imagining than an actual prequel. The show wastes no time in raising the tension level of the story. Within the first episode the Bates are confronted by the former owner who is clearly upset over the loss of his family property. We also learn fairly quickly that White Pines Bay is not your typical small town, in that it has more than its fair share of strange goings on. 

The series has recieved a rating of 8.2 out of 10 from IMDB members with over 44,000 votes cast. I have currently watched both season one and two and have made a start to season three. The show is sickening at times but keeps you shocked and wanting more! It is a must watch if you are into dark dramas. 

The show can be found on Netflix, but if you prefer to own the DVD the full box-set can be bought via Amazon for around £12 -  You can get the Box-Set Here - However if you are sad and lack a social life like me you should be able to blast all the episodes in a few days so I would advise you just to use Netflix for the price of £6.99 a month - You can sign up here - or if you have never used Netflix before you can sign up for a free months trial!

The next program I will plan on discussing is "Suits" an American legal drama created and written by Aaron Korsh. The show airs on the USA Network from its debut on June 23, 2011, which originally aired a 90 minute pilot. The show tells the story of Mike Ross, who works as a law associate for Harvey Spencer despite never actually attending law school. The show focuses on Harvey and Mike managing to close cases whilst maintaining Mike's secret....

Any feedback on my blog would be great and would ideally add some form of extra credit or something along those lines to my university project. So feel free to leave a comment, positive or not any feedback will be taken on board :) thanks, Scott.

Breaking Bad...

Breaking Bad is always something that I chose to pass by when flicking through Netflix, there was never a reason for it, it just never appealed to me strongly enough. However due to some powerful persuasion and light peer pressure from a work colleague in 2012 I was introduced to what would soon turn out to be one of my favourite TV programs today.

From episode one I was caught in what would be a very slippery slope. Watching episode after episode unable to stop watching what Walter White was getting up to.When I began to watch the series there was already at least two or three seasons readily available to watch. This was a downside for me as I swiftly lost a large part of if not all of my spare time to getting caught up to date with the thrilling TV series. Looking back on it now it was probably quite sad the days I spent watching episode after episode day after day, however that just highlights how addictive the program can become, with each episode ending on its own mini cliff hanger it keeps you exceedingly eager to keep watching! 

The show was initially aired in 2008 and is one of the best TV shows available to watch today, and is certainly one of my personal favorites!

"Breaking Bad" a show about a "Mild-mannered high school chemistry teacher Walter White thinks his life can't get much worse. His salary barely makes ends meet, a situation not likely to improve once his pregnant wife gives birth, and their teenage son is battling cerebral palsy. But Walter is dumbstruck when he learns he has terminal cancer. Realizing that his illness probably will ruin his family financially, Walter makes a desperate bid to earn as much money as he can in the time he has left by turning an old RV into a meth lab on wheels." - Wiki

Breaking Bad has an impressively high rating of 9.5 out of 10 on IMDB with over 671,000 votes. This is outstanding and just highlights how highly praised the show is by many. The show speaks for itself and needs no one to backup its greatness, you just need to take the first step and watch the first couple of episodes. With 62 episodes (5 seasons) you had better have plenty time to spare before starting your own Breaking Bad journey.

The show can be found on Netflix, but if you prefer to own the DVD the full box-set can be bought via Amazon for around £60.99 -  You can get the Box-Set Here - However if you think you can get through all 62 episodes in a month or two then I would highly advise you just to use Netflix for the price of £6.99 a month - You can sign up here - or if you have never used Netflix before you can sign up for a free months trial!

The next program I will plan on discussing is "Bates Motel" a contemporary prequel to the genre-defining film Psycho, it gives a portrayal of how Norman Bates' psyche unravels through his teenage years. Fans discover the dark, twisted back story of Norman Bates and how deeply intricate his relationship with his mother, Norma, truly is....

Any feedback on my blog would be great and would ideally add some form of extra credit or something along those lines to my university project. So feel free to leave a comment, positive or not any feedback will be taken on board :) thanks, Scott.

Picking a blog subject...

Picking a topic to write about for this blog deemed itself to be much more challenging than I had initially thought it would be. When I was told to write about something that I was interested in I instantaneously had a brain fart and became the most boring, uninteresting person imaginable with no hobbies or interests. Fortunately enough though I do have some hobbies and some interests and after a prolonged period of thinking time was able to come up with something I would be able to write about.

Eventually I decided to write about something that takes up a lot more of my time than it should, something that entertains and bores me, something packed full of variety and only costs me £6.99 a month...... I am indeed talking about "Netflix." With the dreaded 14 second countdown in between TV episodes I can find myself sometimes watching episode after episode late into the night or should I say late into the next morning. However this blog is not dedicated to my Netflix addiction (thankfully).

If you have never heard about Netflix then perhaps this blog is not for you but if you have then perhaps you will be interested enough to read about some of the TV programs and films I have watched recently and what I thought about them. One thing I constantly find with Netflix is that I never know what to watch next, perhaps if there were more "what to watch" blogs or articles then I would be able to better coordinated my time when on Netflix rather than scrolling through endless drivel to find something good enough to watch.

Over the next few weeks I plan on updating the world wide web on my views on some of the best and perhaps some of the worst things to watch on Netflix. However for just now I think I will call it a night! My next post will be about a recent TV series I have just finished called "Prison Break" originally aired in 2005 it is not new to TV screens but it is only recently I have taken the time to watch it. Stay tuned to see what I have to say about it...

Any feedback on my blog would be great and would ideally add some form of extra credit or something along those lines to my university project. So feel free to leave a comment, positive or not any feedback will be taken on board :) thanks, Scott.