TV - American Style

Just watched "28 Days Later". Very good. Jolly well should be as it is made in Grand Britain.

However, I'm not sure what it's running time was in good old GB. But here, it took 3 hours. For example, there were 4 ad breaks in the last 30 minutes. Each break is 4 minutes long. Somewhat kills the suspense.

They show no adverts in the first 20 minutes of these epics and then increase their occurence as the audience is hooked.

Did you know that a standard primetime show (like frasier or king of queens) takes the following form:

Intro (which follows immediately on from previous show)
Break
Opening Credits
Break
5 mins of show
Break
5 mins of show
Break
Final witty one liner + Credits
which then roll into the next show.

They don't put breaks between shows. As people are more likely to get up and do something less boring instead.

One of the more bizarre things is that they run the trailer for the show your watching in the break in the show you're watching.

They do entire 1 hour episodes that 'bring you up to speed' on the series so far.

Some films are so long they're split them over two nights. Like a truly epic movie such as.....Harry Potter (admit it, you were expecting me to say LOTR)

If I ever hear anyone whinge about their TV licence I'll pee on them.

Shoot me.