The week in entertainment

Film: Hereafter and Eastwood has crafted a masterpiece. I loved this movie.

DVD: The Terry Pratchett/Sky trilogy (Hogfather, The Colour of Magic, Going Postal). Hogfather is the best (see here for more), but Going Postal was excellent, too. CoM was okay.

TV: Modern Family - This episode was hilarious. First the whole Claire saying "My kids didn't go to pre-school" and realizing that... yeah. Then Cam and Mitch discover that being gay adoptive parents of an Asian child puts them in the "very desirable" category for diversity-hunger pre-schools. Mitch: "Finally being gay is a plus! It's like playing dodgeball in school and actually getting picked first!" Cam: "I always got picked first - I could throw a dodgeball through a sheet of plywood. But I take your point." And then ... dun dun. They lose out to "interracial lesbians in a wheelchair with an African baby!" The Middle remains sporadically amusing, but this was not a good episode, really. Better With You - I can't take it any more. These people aren't quirky, they're just annoyingly, impossibly weird. And Ben? He is so stupid. Her mother is filling your work inbox with junk email? Dedicated yahoo.com email address, idiot! IDIOT. House is improving. I still think getting him and Cuddy together is a mistake, but at least it's not totally dominating the plots. It was nice to see some House-Wilson action again, and to see somebody call Taub on his attitude (though I still like him better than Foreman!). No Ordinary Family had a better episode than last week's, but it's still an uneven show. The Mentalist had another engaging episode even if there was a little raggedyness about just how the crime the murder was covering up was supposed to work. Poor Grace - "I could come with--"

Read: Two more Inspector O novels (Hidden Moon and Bamboo and Blood), both very different not just from A Corpse in the Koryo but each other. Hidden Moon is a runaway train building to a helluva climax, and Bamboo is a confusing (in a good way) ramble through a minefield of politics where O never quite knows what's happening but knows it's dangerous. These books are excellent. Locked In, which I would have read a while ago but the virtual to-read list is harder to keep track of! Anyway, another taut winner from Muller. And finally got up the nerve to read Nemesis, which I'd been putting off because every review of it hinted darkly how someone Falco loved was going to die and push him into his darkest journey yet. Well, I was pretty sure it wasn't going to be Helena, but what with all the coyness I was afraid it might be Petro. Or Aulus or Quintus. Or Albia, or Maia... But it's Geminus. Yeah, his dad. And since he dies - of natural causes, at that - in the first chapter, I fail to see the point of all the secrecy. This is another riveting entry in the series. Brilliant.