Radio Times

There was a telling exchange in a recent episode of Property Ladder.

The much-lusted-after presenter, Sarah Beeny, was questioning a particular couple's decision to give up their careers and become property developers despite having poor organisational skills, and no money behind them. They replied: "But you CAN make a living doing this!" "Who says you can?" asked Sarah. "The television programmes say you can!" wailed the couple.

And therein lies the power of Property Ladder. It allows us to indulge our own pie-in-the-sky dreams of making thousands of pounds profit for virtually no effort - maybe...

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After the first episode of The Peter Serafinowicz Show, one viewer wrote to Radio Times saying "Peter needs a ruthless editor". That's just what he doesn't need: left to his own devices he's created a silly, unpredictable, technically superb little marvel that's the antidote to identikit sketch shows.

It's right to be self-titled, because it feels like a unique comic brain squirting messily onto the screen. Who cares that nobody's saying "You'll soon grow to love the weird taste of internet ham" in the playground, that accountants aren't impersonating Alan Alda ("Ludicrous! Preposterous!") by the water cooler?...

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Rise, people of Birmingham, rise. This mockery of your accent must end and it must end now. For too long has it been the subject of needless and unfair derision.

Yes, it's different. And yes, some think it's strange. But it remains the most interesting and unique of all the colloquial tongues. It's better for telling jokes than Scouse and it's more menacing when miffed than Mancunian. And that's why its prime television exponent right now, the unassuming, self-effacing Adrian Chiles, is the leader of this uprising.

Chiles is the classic everyman. From football on Match of...

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Without a Trace is, without a doubt, the US crime series for those of a nervous disposition.

Cloned CSI teams gain huge audiences by wading merrily through blood, gore and body parts in various telegenic American cities. Thankfully, this leaves Without a Trace's FBI missing persons squad to go about the serious business (and they're all very serious) of solving crimes by asking witnesses pertinent questions and taking advantage of those fortuitous coincidences beloved of TV scriptwriters. Any forensic work is handled in a mercifully unseen laboratory, and the majority of dead bodies are recovered off-camera.

One...

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A good cliffhanger should reward you for a year's devoted viewing and leave you salivating for a few months in anticipation of its outcome. Here is a top-five run-through of the TV moments that have kept us on the edge of our seats.

5) Dallas: A House Divided (1980)

When scheming oil supremo JR Ewing was shot full of holes, Dallas producers set the standard for end-of-season climaxes. Suspects included rival Cliff Barnes - played with all the menace of an indignant Daffy Duck - and permanently soused wife Sue Ellen. Turns out it was Bing Crosby's daughter...

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Over the last half-century, science fiction has provided us with a plethora of well-worn themes and ideas. Some speak to life's big questions - religion, mortality, humanity - some reflect the concerns of the era that produced them, and others are just lovely, silly fun. Paul Jones chooses a few of his favourites.

Aliens

• Aliens do not understand the human concept of "love", yet they are fascinated by it - especially the voluptuous female ones.

• There is something fundamentally inferior about alien DNA: they are obsessed with combining it with human DNA.

• The powerful energy...

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Despite salvaging some pride in the recent one-day internationals, England's Test side had a horrible winter of discontent. But did this national catastrophe dampen the spirits of our British commentators? No, sir. They soldiered on impartially, offering non-partisan and carefully weighed assessments of the action on the field...

I'm joking, of course. Geoffrey Boycott greeted each England error with the wail of a ravenous man whose Yorkshire puddings had been burnt to a cinder; Jonathan Agnew mumbled "oh dear, oh dear" into his chocolate cake; over on Sky Sports, Ian Botham called for some kind of military coup...

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You more groovy RT-ers out there may be familiar with the concept of the "mash-up": some clever DJ chappie welds together two or more tracks from seemingly incompatible styles to create something that shouldn't work but does, brilliantly. Witness the splicing of rave-granny Madonna's Ray of Light with the Sex Pistols to produce the immaculately titled Ray of Gob - genius.

Simon Pegg has now introduced the idea of the movie mash-up, saying of his latest film, Hot Fuzz, that it's "as if Tony Scott was to guest-helm an episode of Heartbeat". It's not the first movie to...

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Football, as we all think we know, is about opinion. Yet when someone has the temerity to express an opinion they're bumptious, pretentious and getting above their humble station.

This brings us to BBC Radio Five Live's Alan Green, the man who has single-handedly transformed football radio commentary. Once upon a time, back when BBC Radio 2 found itself accidentally anointed as the voice of football, commentaries were delivered in the honeyed but opinion-free tones of dear Bryon Butler or Peter Jones.

Today, Alan Green, blessed with national radio's sternest Ulster accent since Gerry Adams, has more opinions...

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Whovians and enthusiasts of classic TV were over the Moon when Doctor Who regenerated in 2005. The Tardis came with the territory, of course, as did the companions and the monsters, but there was something missing…

That elusive piece of the jigsaw was found under the cosmic coffee table of the recent series-three finale, in the person of the Doctor's archenemy, the Master.

For where there is good, light and harmony, there is always evil, darkness and discord. And while in the programme's 44-year history there have been hordes of power-crazed species we can safely classify as evil,...

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TV's always had a difficult relationship with teenagers. They're too easily made the butt of unkind jokes (Adrian Mole), exploited as glossy sex objects (Hollyoaks), or stereotyped as precocious young fogeys (Dawson's Creek).

But those years are such an intense, confusing, amusing time - it should be possible to make a rollicking good show out of them. E4's Skins, a comedy drama about a bunch of Bristol 17-year-olds, is that show.

Skins was billed as being written by rookie writers, which sparked fears that it would be a juvenile mess - and the carnal riot in the original...

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Most people - unless they're dedicated medical folk or ineffective managers looking for a steady job - are anxious to stay away from hospitals. There's something about those long corridors with their unmistakeable clinical reek,and that strange grey lino that makes your shoes squeak, which sends you running for the exit.

Probably the only hospital in the world I'd gladly visit, therefore, is the Princeton-Plainsboro. And that would be for one reason: to enter the orbit of god-like diagnostician Gregory House.

Hugh Laurie is a revelation as the doctor whose bedside manner leaves a lot to be...

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I don't know who first had the idea "What TV really needs is a time-travelling cop show!", but millions of discerning viewers are certainly glad they did.

The TV crime-drama landscape is increasingly marred by scriptwriters competing to come up with the goriest case possible to challenge their two-dimensional characters. Against this background, Life on Mars is a breath of fresh air. It has an endearing quirkiness that the creators of its American counterparts - those slick, big-budget, over-produced behemoths - can only dream of.

With its knowing nods to cop shows of the past, Life on...

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Talk about being spoilt for choice. Trying to choose the best Simpsons character is rather like being punted on a gondola past a parade of very sexy people, colourful iced cakes, several pots of cash, holiday vouchers, a dolphin that talks, David Bowie's house keys and an arrest warrant for Noel Edmonds, and being asked to pick just one. Where does one even start?

Let's take it methodically.

First, the main characters are out. Logistically, they have to be. How on earth, for instance, could you choose between Bart and Homer? They're so very different, yet equally...

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