## Step 6 - Writing

#### Writing a television review

The assignment is to write a review about an English spoken television programme you watched recently. In it:

- mention the moment you watched the programme;
- give the title of the programme;
- give a description of the programme without giving your opinion;
- describe what you did and did not like about the programme, giving arguments;
- give your judgement: should we watch it?

Compare your review with some class mates, give and receive comments, revise your work and hand it in for grading. Use between 200 and 300 words.
To give you an idea, you will find 3 reviews about tv programmes.
Read about:

The Autistic Gardener review – is autism the new baking? Alan and his team of on-the-spectrum gardeners did a great job creating a brilliant garden in a show that neatly demonstrated the pluses and minuses of their condition.
“I am a gardener. I literally am: A Gardner, it’s my name,” says Alan Gardner, possibly not for the first time. He’s also The Autistic Gardener, a new show on Channel 4. I wonder if they thought of calling it The Auticulturist, and then decided against it, probably wisely. Alan’s doing a makeover, on a disaster of a garden in Derbyshire, with the help of Charles, Thomas, Philip, Victoria, James and Victoria, all of whom are also on the spectrum. Autism, it’s the new baking, have you noticed? Very fashionable right now, on the TV. Which can and will be seen as both good and bad news. The booers will say that this is mental illness as entertainment. Which I don’t buy, not here anyway. It’s about challenging perceptions, detaching stigma, showing what people can do. It’s positive, without being either patronising or too worthy and boring. To be honest, the more of it there is out there the better. Another possible criticism is that you only get a certain sort of mental condition on TV. With autism, this usually equates to high-functioning autism and Asperger’s – the more televisual parts of the spectrum, you might say. And you can see people sitting at home thinking: this is not my experience with my son/daughter/brother/sister/self – they’re/I’m not good at mathematics or don’t have an encyclopaedic knowledge of plants, or anything. It’s a more valid criticism, but then you can see why it happens; seeing people who can do stuff probably makes better television than people who can’t. Not that this show pretends it’s all a breeze either. We hear about and see Thomas’s problems with communications, Victoria’s failure to be taken seriously, all of their struggles in social situations. It’s about the pluses and the minuses. Alan, who sees numbers and sequences in things, is very good at opening up his and the others’ worlds to a wider world, as well as getting the others into action. In fact, you might easily not know he wasn’t “neurotypical”. Yeah, you’re just pretending aren’t you, Alan, you dyed your hair, and painted your nails (how does that work, with the gardening, by the way?) just to get on TV, didn’t you? But then there are a few clues, such as when Ben the client clearly has some major concerns about the idea of two-metre vertical railway sleepers marching down his garden like pylons across the countryside. “For me, it’s trying to understand the purpose of it,” he says. Alan isn’t reading any of his worries, though. “The client is very happy and everything just happens to the point and it is perfect,” he says cheerfully. And happily, he turns out to be right to ignore/not to see Ben’s concerns. They put up the posts, Victoria paints them lilac and drapes them in camouflage netting; Ben and his partner Rebecca love them. They love Victoria’s five-storey insect hotel, and Thomas and Phillip’s layouts and planting, and James’s amazing reclining turf giant, and Charles’s Jurassic root stumpery. Between them, they’ve turned an unloved patch of couch grass into a bit of magic. It’s a brilliant achievement, and a brilliant garden. Bron: https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio

Penny Dreadful, series 2 episode 1, review: It is still gloriously silly
Eva Green was haunted by malevolent spirits, Josh Hartnett fought off a gaggle of pointy teethed women, Harry Treadaway shouted ‘Pull. The. Lever. Now!’, and Timothy Dalton chewed every piece of scenery in sight. Penny Dreadful is back and it’s still gloriously silly, high camp fun, and easily the most outrageously entertaining guff currently being aired. The only problem is that my opening sentence could easily describe the entire first series or the opener to series two. We’re back alright, but on very familiar ground. Existing in the ‘demimonde’, Penny Dreadful imagines a Victorian London where all your favourite freaks and ghouls from gothic Victorian literature are present and correct. It’s a city where Dr Frankenstein and Dorian Gray can have a chat about vampires with Van Helsing. I was hoping that this series would introduce us to a new host of ‘real’ fictional characters from the Victorian back catalogue. Sweeney Todd? Ebenezer Scrooge? Moby Dick, maybe? As we are, we’re stuck with the same old lot. Even the nasty baddies are almost identical, so much so that having witnessed them Josh Hartnett’s werewolf gunslinger (it’s that kind of programme) had to ask whether they were the same bunch. This time round it’s not vampires who are trying to get Vanessa Ives (Eva Green) to marry The Master (who we assume to be the devil himself) but Helen McCrory’s Evelyn Poole and her merry band of frizzy haired witches. McCrory, taking her cue from Dalton, has gauged the temperature of Penny Dreadful entirely correctly and is making the most of every cackle and curse. Still haranguing his creator for a date to the prom is ‘the creature’ Caliban (Rory Kinnear – at least I think it’s Rory Kinnear, though it looks for all the world like Robert Smith from The Cure in fancy dress as Meat Loaf from the I’d Do Anything For Love video). And having smothered poor Brona Croft (Billie Piper) with a pillow Dr Frankenstein (Harry Treadaway) has just the gal. Cue lightning, rain and Treadaway getting to wheel out his Colin Clive impression. It (she) is indeed alive (‘Alive!!’) but Caliban is going to have some competition on his hands if Dr Frankenstein’s, er, interest in Brona’s naked corpse is anything to go by. At least Caliban has definitely got another job now, following his dismissal from the theatre for being weird. The lovelorn creature is now in the employ of David Haig’s creepy waxwork museum, which is currently struggling thanks to ‘that Tussaud woman’. It’s heartening to see David Haig crop up as the jolly Oscar Putney but I fear for his blind daughter Lavinia (and this is television, so we know that blind = kind). A tenner says that Caliban tries to get a snog out of Lavinia before tearfully breaking her neck. It would be just like him. So it’s business as usual in Victorian London. Let’s hope that changes as we get further into the series. Bron: https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/reviews

'East Los High': A teen soap opera that's a teaching tool
Monica Ramirez, "Yvonne," left, and Vannessa Vasquez, "Camilla," right, joke around looking into the mirror as they rehearse a fight scene during filming of "East Los High" at Plaza de la Raza for Hulu. (Bob Chamberlin / Los Angeles Times)
Inside a cramped writers room in a Hollywood office building, a team of overage teenagers was debating how a Los Angeles high schooler might carry on a conversation with a counselor about being the victim of domestic violence. "I'm not sure the character's reaction would be hesitation so much as defensiveness," one said. "Yeah, I think she'd be, like, 'You don't understand! I'm his girlfriend! I want to make him happy!" another chimed in. This is how Hulu's popular teen soap "East Los High" gets made. In these quarters, telenovela meets after-school special, spawning story lines that had laptop and cellphone screens fogged up in its first season last summer, all the while trying to relay a social message.
The series consistently ranked among the ad-supported streaming site's most popular programs, demonstrating that an English-language show with an all-Latino cast — a TV unicorn in the broadcast marketplace — can find a following. Times TV critic Robert Lloyd singled it out as one of the top summer shows to watch last year, saying it was not only "as eventful as any other teen soap" but noted that it "feels down-to-earth and issue-oriented." Hulu hopes the clicks and taps won't slow when it launches the second season on July 9. "It is the type of show that works really well on a digital platform like ours," said Rodrigo Mazon, director of content acquisition at Hulu. "It's addictive, and Season 2 is even more so." In the teen drama academy where "Pretty Little Liars" and "The Vampire Diaries" rule the halls with episodes indulging in cheating, sex, secrets and violence, "East Los High" tackles the same narrative pushers for educational purposes. The half-hour series was developed as a response to the high rate of teen pregnancy among Latinas in the U.S. by Population Media Center, a Vermont-based nonprofit that creates content to promote social change. Carlos Portugal, whose credits include Tyler Perry's "Meet the Browns," was enlisted to create the series, which he did with the help of producer Kathleen Bedoya. "We know we're a small show," Portugal said. "And that's OK. I just felt that when I watched TV, I wasn't seeing myself, or my sisters or my nieces being represented. There's a void that we're just trying to help fill." "East Los High" makes use of soap opera elements to deliver a social message — similar to the Sabido Method, a way of mixing entertainment and education developed in Mexico in the '70s by Miguel Sabido and adopted by certain Mexican telenovelas including "Vamos Juntos" ("We Go Together") and "Los Hijos de Nadie" ("Nobody's Children"), which both aired on Televisa. Hulu licensed the finished 24-episode first season and made it available on HuluPlus, which requires a membership, as well as Hulu and HuluLatino, the latter of which consists primarily of Spanish-language content. The streaming service quickly discovered that casting a wider net for young Latinos interested in bicultural programming in English was beneficial, with the series ranking as one of Hulu's top 10 shows in its premiere month. Not an especially surprising outcome when you consider the market for it: U.S.-born Latinos account for more than 60% of Latinos in the country, according to recent census data. "We wanted to create a place where kids could learn about sex ed and the countless other issues teens face these days," said the online series' executive producer Katie Elmore Mota. "But you can't talk down to them and you can't make them fall asleep." Some of the issues dealt with in the show's first season included losing one's virginity, promiscuity and unplanned pregnancies. On the show's Hulu page, viewers can find a comprehensive list of links with more information on the topics discussed during an episode. It heads into its second season now as a Hulu Original — allowing for a slightly bigger budget. The 12-episode sophomore outing shifts its focus on a new cast of students at East Los High, introducing Vannessa Vasquez as incumbent bad girl Camila, along with her posse of friends, while still keeping its eye on some returning characters. We wanted to create a place where kids could learn about sex ed and the countless other issues teens face these days. - Katie Elmore Mota "The wholesome kid show, the polished teen drama isn't real life," said Danielle Vega, who returns as reformed bad girl Ceci — one of several familiar faces. "'East Los High' is gritty, it's in your face because the world out there is in your face. But it's also teaching something, which is incredibly important because you look at kids these days and they don't look up from their screens. So at least this show gives them something to think about when their eyes are glued to their devices." Themes woven into the series this season include bisexuality and domestic violence, the latter of which was being explored during a writers room session in January. The scene involved one female character's visit to a counselor with whom the teen's physically abusive relationship with her boyfriend is discussed. The writers debated cutting some dialogue for the sake of brevity, but a note from the powers that be ruled that certain phrasing needed to be kept to be in line with how a professional might approach the situation. More than 15 public health organizations — including the National Domestic Violence Hotline, Advocates for Youth and Planned Parenthood — advise on the scripts and offer suggestions on what works and doesn't work in getting the educational points across. "I like that my culture is a reference I can access and draw from," said writer Charo Toledo. "But it's a real challenge — kids these days are constantly faced with adult situations. And yet they still express themselves as kids — and you have to keep that in mind so that when they watch the show, they don't feel like they're in a classroom." The eight writers for the forthcoming season said they made a concerted bid not to overdo the preaching. "The first season, we were a little more educational," Portugal said. "The kids would go to counselors and clinics. Kids don't always care what adults have to say. They go to their peers. So we're having them talk to each other more about some of the issues they're going through when it makes more sense." Determining when that applies and crafting the sabroso story lines is a writers room where the minority are the majority. It's composed solely of Latino writers, with the exception of one African American woman. Not to mention, the bulk of the scribes are women, with just two men. The world they've crafted doesn't deny Latinos can be dropouts or teen moms, but they've broadened the scope so that Latinos are also doctors, counselors and activists. "Since we are the culture, it never feels like, 'Oh, we're creating stereotypes,'" Portugal said. "Stereotypes exist. I think one of the reasons why we are doing this is we present them, and then we start exploring them. My hope is that the people from East L.A. see themselves being portrayed as diverse individuals." "East Los High" is all shot on location — a good portion is filmed in Boyle Heights, with Norwalk and Lincoln Heights also providing backdrops. So if the places feel authentic, it's probably because they are. In the first season, for example, the house belonging to a producer's tia (aunt) was used as-is. "The production designer was, like, 'What should I do?' and I'm, like, 'Don't do anything! Just go home,'" Portugal recalled. "I don't want a production designer coming in putting in baskets and Frida Kahlo paintings. It was already perfect — and it was what we wanted to capture: ourselves. How we live. This show is just trying to do a small part in showing that." Bron: https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/tv

If you do not know what to watch, try this link: trailer of East lost high.