Chris Angwin

Daft Punk: 'Giorgio by Moroder'

One of the best tracks on Daft Punk's epic new album, Random Access Memories is their collaboration with Giorgio Moroder.
Compiled from a interview with the influential composer/producer, the track is a stunning homage to his work in creating 'the sound of the future'.

Take a listen to Giorgio by Moroder. It's fantastic:

Game of Thrones Season 3: Episode 8 recap

Spoilers ahead!

Episode eight proved to be the wittiest episode this season not least due to the absence of Theon's never-ending torture story. But to ensure that people still sat watching with their legs crossed, they had Melisandre put leeches on Gendry's erect member. Lately, this show has really had it in for penises.

Arya and the Hound don't take too long to make up and start getting along. After deciding against trying to mash in the Hound's already mashy face, they saddle up and Arya grabs a hold of his barrel of a body as they ride toward the Twins and the wedding the whole countryside is talking about. And just in case simply doing the right thing isn't enough to win over Arya and the audience, the Hound gets a great new catch-cry: 'Fuck Joffrey. Fuck the Queen.' Word.

After being tasked to find out just who the Yunkai's 'powerful friends' are, Ser Jorah undertakes a stealth mission to track rumour through the streets, source information on the who, the why and the wh- no, wait, there they are, hanging out in Yunkai city's backyard.

It's the Second Sons, racing their horses fast, slapping the asses of their very clean prostitutes and throwing their weight around as much as possible.

Surely a conjunction of action from the books, the reveal that these guys are hanging around on retainer hits a weird note. Why didn't the envoy just say, 'We've got a horde of mercenaries hanging out round back. They're five minutes walk away. Ten, max. You're bound to run into them.'

Mero, leader of the Second Sons, makes a quick bid for being the most douchey character since Joffrey, but also the most broadly sketched. He basically spends his entire screen time spewing every objectionable thing you've overheard in a bar. Characterisation shorthand, I suppose. And it works, because when his head rolls out onto Daenerys' carpet, all I could think was 'that's what you get for sniffing crotches, man'.

Daenerys also gets what looks to be her new crush, the diamond eyed Daario Naharas, 'the man who always has a choice'. And that choice seems to be between appearing smug or appearing self-satisfied. He's good at both.

What the dragons were doing during all this business?

Melissandre introduces Gendry to Stannis, who had little regard for the bastard, but also sees no need in torturing the boy. Melissandre says that the situation requires the tact of taking a lamb to slaughter. She's done it plenty of times, and they've never seen the knife. So when she ties up Gendry and tosses leeches onto him, I wondered in what why this counts as not seeing the knife? But then that got me thinking- is Stannis going to end up the lamb in this scenario?

Tyrion tries his best to forge some kind of understanding with Sansa in the lead up to their nuptials, and thankfully he finally says the magic words 'I will never hurt you', which finally lets Sansa relax her eternally tensed shoulders.

Margeary tries on a bit of her charm on Cersei, looping her arm in arm and calling her 'sister' (I love the way Cersei tries to pull herself away at first, but, like a Chinese finger trap, Margary's embrace just seems to tighten). It was a pretty stupid thing to do if you've ever met Cersei, but it goes even worse than I expected when Cersei threatens to have Margeary strangled in her sleep for the insult. She's pretty stubborn, ol' Cersei, but it smells a little like burning bridges to be threatening the soon-to-be wife of your son, the King, whose respect for you has waned enormously of late.

Joffrey gets plenty of moments to retain the title of most horrible character by trotting out the indignities one after the other: walking Sansa down the aisle, snatching away Tyrion's footstool at the altar, threatening midnight rape on the wedding night and attempting to cajole the crowd into stripping Sansa and carrying her to her chambers. You win, Joffrey, Mero's got nothing on you.

Olenna proves herself to be the person you most want to sit next to at a wedding, with her hilarious riffing on the inevitable incestuous links soon to be bonded through this spate of marriages.

Tyrion, a mess of drunken forlornness, threatens Joffrey in a moment of impatience, but thanks to Tywin's diplomacy and Tyrion's ability of poke fun at himself, the moment is soon diffused. Even the Lord of Tits and Wine has play by the rules sometimes.

Of course, he then has convince Sansa that's he's a decent fellow at heart and has no interest in sharing her bed 'until she wants him to'. When she asks what happens if she never wants him to, he settles into the couch for the night. Shae barges in in the morning and pulls the pillow from below his head, but gives him a conciliatory glance when she notices the clean bed sheets. It's the subtleties of romance that elude so many people.

When things return to Sam and Gilly and their trip back to the wall, I really wondered why on earth Sam is even trying to light the fire when we all know Gilly's the one who knows about this shit? I thought they were in this together. There's no 'I' in frozen, Gilly. Finally, when she's convinced Sam's not purposely trying to make her feel stupid, she volunteers to light the fire. In like, 5 seconds.

The ravens announce the arrival of a white walker, come to stach away the newborn boy, providing us with a big finish that pays off the dramatic value of that old dagger Sam found in episode six. After having his sword disintegrated by the icey touch of the walker, Sam stabs the zombie in the back with the dagger, the only thing he still has on him. So powerful is this weapon that the zombie collapses and explodes. Amazing weapon! So amazing, it seems, that it's not really worth picking back up.

So here we are, on the precipice of episode nine, traditionally the climax of the season, before episode ten gives us denouement action and sets up the storylines for season four. There's a break next week for the US Memorial Day weekend (viewing figures dipped for the corresponding episode last year, so they're giving it a miss this time) so we will have to wait in anticipation of the resolutions episode nine may give us:

Will Arya get back to her family?
How many teeth will Edmure's bethrothed actually have?
Does Theon find out who's torturing him?
Will the Yunkai be defeated easily?
How will Casterley Rock be taken?
and will anyone ever care about what Loras' father once told him?

Game of Thrones Season 3: Episode 7 recap

Spoilers ahead!

The writing reigns were handed over to the creator of the Song of Ice and Fire, George RR Martin himself this episode, and he takes the opportunity to put more more dialogue in the characters mouths than ever before. Things don't progress hugely plot-wise this episode, but we do get a greater sense of who these characters are and what's driving them, and surprisingly, most of it has to do with love in one form or another. But for those who might be turned off by the emotional nature of this episode, there are also 100% more bear fights than usual.

Jon Snow and Ygritte (in love) made it over the wall and are taking the long road to Castle Black for their surprise attack. Things are comparatively summery as the wildlings run across the green hills, wander through the dried shrubs and Ygritte charmingly mistakes a windmill as a castle. Jon goes on to inform Ygritte about other things she's never been exposed to beyond the wall, like the definition of swooning. His explanation is fine, but for most of the women I know, the modern definition would be closer to:

Swooning: Verb: 1. To be emotionally affected by Jon Snow describing how he would rip off the silk dress he made you wear.

Jon also tells Ygritte that the wildings are sure to be defeated in their attack, just like they have the last six times they tried (true? Or more Westeros fairy tales?). Ygritte, unperturbed, decides it's time to make out on a rock.

Robb and his army get stuck in the mud on their way to Walder Frey's castle for Edmure's wedding.
Following a quick discussion about how upset the crotchety Frey is going to be at their lateness, Robb and Talisa (in love) get in a little bit of mid campaign love-making and then a post-coital chat while Talisa lies in the nude and writes to her mother and Robb surveys his ~~game of Risk~~ war plan. The scene plays out fairly typically as a romance sequence, particularly as Talisa reveals that's she's expecting. This prompts Robb to take a 'night off from the war' and climb back into bed and talk about all the places they're going to go 'when all this is over'. But outside the thunder is rumbling. (Literally- thunder rumbles as soon as he climbs into the sack!)

Back in King's Landing, Sansa and Margaery have a staid discussion about Sansa's new betrothal to Tyrion, and the fact that as women, their pleasure is a complicated business. And of course, Tyrion knows a thing or two about this complicated business.

Despite his expertise, Tyrion still finds his situation problematic, and tries to discuss it with his henchman Ser Bronn, who doesn't see what the problem is and so isn't very helpful. Tyrion's girlfriend/lover/funny whore Shae (in love), however, sees nothing but a problem, and walks out when Tyrion fails to convince her that everything is going to be fine. She's right, of course. This is Westeros, nothing is ever fine.

A wonderful scene where Tywin visits with King Joffrey gives us a brief, but satisfying opportunity to see the little twat cower when Tywin, uninvited, walks up to the throne to stand over the young King. We do learn that news of the Dany and her dragons has reached King's Landing, and that Tywin doesn't think this is anything to worry about. The comeuppance train is boarding!

Speaking of the dragons, the unsullied army have arrived in Yunkai, the yellow city, with intentions to raid it for its slaves, or you know, just negotiate to have them all released in exchange for letting the masters live. The Yunkai emissary gets introduced to Daenerys, the woman whose title is a bit of a mouthful, but whose business card would pull some serious rank.

Needless to say, the emissary gets run off with a warning to release the slaves or suffer the consequences. He's seen the already sizable dragons, so he knows Khalessi is serious (and satisfyingy smug), though news that the Yukari have 'powerful friends' doesn't exactly bode well.

Meanwhile, the Red Woman gives Gendry a personal history lesson as they float out over the broken bodies of ships in Blackwater Bay. Melisandre is treating him with more respect than she's shown pretty much anyone, so perhaps things are finally on the up for the bastard blacksmith? Of course, 'on the up' in this instance may mean using his royal seed to help birth a few more smoke assassins. It's a mixed bag, is what I'm saying.

Arya's had enough of the Brotherhood of Banners and their pragmatic approach to honour and decides it's time to bolt to freedom. Wouldn't you know it though? She's not a hundred feet away before the Hound lunges out of the dark and grabs her. We already know he's on Arya's To Kill list, so what will it take for her to soften on him? Can he convince her that's not all bad- he saved her sister from a band of rampaging Kings Landing-ans (?), after all.

Bran's story finally takes a solid direction, as we realise that despite his brother Jon not being at Castle Black, the young troupe of the gifted are still planning to head beyond the wall in search of Bran's raven. Osha's had enough of this mystic crap and by way of a horrific zombie back story tries to convince her young companions that north of the wall is no place for man. It doesn't have quite the impact of Jaime's amazing monologue from episode five, but it shades Osha's character in new, tragic ways.

Theon's nightmarish storyline only gets more insane as he gets briefly seduced by a couple of women (in lust, briefly) before his wild-eyed torturer appears once again with a custom made castration knife. What the hell is going on?

Briene and Jaime (not in love exactly, but utterly committed to each other) have a nice scene as they farewell one another. Brienne, stoic as ever, releases Jaime from his debt, as he swears to return the Stark girls to their family. His choked-up inability to reply to Brienne's final 'Farewell, Ser Jaime' sends pangs to the heart.

It's on the way from Harrenhaal as the disgraced maester Qyburn treats Jaime's stumb for seepage that he is told that Brienne's father's paltry ransom fee isn't going to save her. Launching into action, he convinces his guards to help him lead a rescue mission to save Brienne from what he assumes will be sexual indignities. Little does he realise that the proclivities of House Bolton men run to more exotic tastes.

So Jaime runs up the walkways of the castle only to find Brienne, dressed in her Sunday finest, not surrounded by rapists, but fighting a giant bear with a wooden sword as the crowd sings 'The Bear and the Maiden Fair'. Which also comes as a bit of a surprise because they've been singing this song all season and I always assumed the 'bear' was some kind of metaphor. Nope, actual bear.

It's the only piece of action this episode, but it's suitably savage, from the claw marks drawn across Brienne's desperate face to the pure spectacle of the many wonderful shots (like below) during the sequence.

We're coming down to the tail end of season three now. The showrunners have been patient, and with an extra eight minutes each episode, have managed to really take their time time setting up all of the story arcs, so that they can finally deliver that big, satisfying climax. But only once we're all slick as baby seals.

Arrested Development Season 4 full trailer

Some of the cast look older, while others look eerily the same (and Michael Cera actually appears to have grown younger), but everything feels right about this first full length trailer for the sort-of-forth season of Arrested Development.

To borrow a line from Jeffrey Tambor's other signature role - This is exciting, isn't it?

Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity: first trailer

After the incredible Children of Men (7 years ago!), it's exhilarating to think of what Director Alfonso Cuaron could achieve on a canvas this size.

Along with Pacific Rim, Gravity looks like the very thing IMAX 3D was made for. (It also looks like the stuff of nightmares).

Hit expand and watch this thing full screen. This is really going to be something.

Ghostpoet's new album stream

Ghospoet's first album Peanut Butter Blues & Melancholy Jam was one of the best surprises of 2011, so it's great that upon the first few listens, his sophomore effort, Some Say I So I Say Light really seems to deliver.

Stream the whole record below and hear for yourself: