it's worth the hype. I highly recommend it, especially if you like that kind of thing normally.

I do enjoy fantasy/medieval type things... I might check it out. I just can't believe how much people are talking about it atm. Crazy.

It has been a massive hit. I don't think they expected it to be as popular as it has become. It really is incredible though, perhaps the best show on television. The acting is amazing, really complex characters and some of the locations are just gorgeous.

It's very different from your standard fantasy (god, isn't that a daft term?) series that took major inspiration from Tolkien. In fact I would say the series is almost a perversion of that type of fantasy, tainted by the ugly splotches of our world. Nobility and honour hold you down in this world rather than anoint you, good people die while wicked people prosper. It really is quite a fascinating approach to fantasy and the TV shows do a very good job of bringing the books to life. I would say get in on the show, you only have time to lose.

I have watched a few episodes and the man was awesome (along with one of my current faves Max Tegmark - I could listen to his theories all day) but the major problem with the Cosmos is that a lot of the science behind the show (NOT the theoretical musings BTW) is dated obviously which lessens the experience but that guy was an eccentric genius.

Hrm, so it's like a perversion of Tolkien-type fantasy? I'll check it out regardless... it seems to have made quite an impression on everyone.

If anyone wants to read the antithesis to Tolkien they should read Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast's trilogy : Titus Groan, Gormenghast and Titus alone. All written before 1960 and un usual in that they don't pertain to any fantasy world in effect and root themselves in everyday reality punctuated by surrealism.

http://www.fox.com/alcatraz/_ugc/ima...az_319x250.jpg

Watched the first season and felt it gave a lot of promise. On one hand, the show uses the same formukla for the core of each episode, like a lot of American shows do. However it also has a complex bigger picture that, so far, it has chipped away at in each episode.

Alcatraz prison was closed down and all the prisoners transferred off the island in the 60s but the premise is that this actually never happened, that nobody seems to know what happened to them and that in the present day these prisoners begin to start reappearing with no idea what happened to them.

Where they with it will decide for me whether I like the premise or not, I think. At the moment I'm enjoying it. I just wish it had been renewed for a second season already. I hate the wait with American shows. It deserves a second season.

If nothing else you get to see a decent amount of blood and tits which is always a plus.

Any bloody tits? Please tell me there's bloody tits.