From the Writers Guild of Canada:
Writers Talking TV – Strange Empire
The WGC’s WTTV at the second annual Canadian International TV Festival (CITF) with creator and showrunner Laurie Finstad Knizhnik interviewed by Denis McGrath. Listen here.
From CBC:
In this episode of Making Murdoch, go behind the scenes with Yannick Bisson, Paul Aitken and Brian Kaulback as they discuss “What Lies Buried†and the challenges of shooting an episode almost entirely in the police station set. Also, Toronto historians Mike Filey and Bruce Bell provide a look at Old Town Toronto circa 1902, including the real Station House 4.
Dragons’ Den, CBC
A chic entrepreneur makes a big splash in the Den and gets one Dragon’s temperature rising; a romantic pitch tries to get the Dragons swooning over their business; and a handy entrepreneur hopes his Major League partnership will help him construct the perfect pitch.
Republic of Doyle, CBC
When a tense strike at the docks turns violent, the Doyles team up with Jimmy and Wolf to protect a witness but uncover something more sinister in the process; Jake faces off with Saul again to dangerous results; Rose encounters a surprise from Sloan’s past; Jake receives some shocking news.
Saving Hope, CTV
Dr. Shahir Hamza and Dr. Alex Reid try to save the memory of a young woman suffering from Alzheimer’s with a radical surgery, but it’s another one of Hope Zion Hospital’s doctors whose life is threatened, requiring immediate medical attention.
From James Bawden:
Twins Documentary Gets Double The Exposure
It’s entirely right that filmmaker Leora Eisen’s new must-see documentary on identical twins should get a double exposure on both CBC-TV and the Documentary channel. The shorter 42-minute version is on first –on The Nature Of Things CBC Thursday night at 8. Then there’s a longer, more substantial version running on the Documentary channel starting November 30 –it’s on during a free preview week. I’m not giving away too much by saying Eisen is herself a twin and she documents meticulously her relationship with her twin Linda Lewis who was suffering from leukemia during the filming. Continue reading.
Call them CSI: Kids. Or maybe Children in Black. Meet the Odd Squad, TVO’s latest kids series designed to educate as well as entertain. The team, consisting of agents with names all starting with the letter “o,” investigate math mysteries in their small town.
Wednesday’s first case? “Zero Effect,” which finds partners Otto (Filip Geljo) and Olive (Dalila Bela) reporting to their boss, Ms. O (Millie Davis), after an art installation of 1,000 pieces of chewed-up bubble gum is reduced to just one piece. After zipping through clear tubes from Odd Squad’s super-secret headquarters and into the town, they learn friend Polly has lost a zero off the 50 cent price of the hot chocolate she’s selling, cutting into her profits. Using math–and super-cool CGI–Olive explains how taking away zeroes affects numbers using tenths, hundredths and thousandths.
Turns out the lack of zeroes is due to a suspected Number Hog that is unwittingly consuming the digits from the world. The Odd Squad urgently tries to figure out who–or what–is doing it because Otto’s birthday is tomorrow and he’s supposed to turn 10. If they don’t stop the Hog in time he’ll lose that zero and turn back into a baby.
Created Tim McKeon (Adventure Time) and Adam Peltzman (The Backyardigans), each half-hour episode of the Toronto-shot Odd Squad is geared towards kids in Grades 1 and 2 and aims to strengthen math skills. It certainly does that but–unlike some math classes–has fun doing it. The agents are smart and sassy (Ms. O is an over-the-top hoot) and HQ is a riot of colours, sounds and interesting beasts. Floating monster fish, a Tyrannosaurus Rex, super-cool climbing wall and … wait for it … a unicorn all call the joint home.
Odd Squad debuts Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. ET on TVO. It then airs Mondays at 5:30 p.m. ET and Thursdays at 6:30 p.m. ET on TVO.
