What is it with the Beeb and Blyton? After years of snubbing her work, claiming she was a 'second rater' and 'lacked literary value', they decide to make a TV movie of her life which seemed nothing more than a stitch up 40 years after her death. OK, there is something more than unpleasant about some of her work, particularly her sexist and racist language (in the Three Golliwogs book my sisters had the Three Golliwogs were called Golly, Woggie and Nigger - and that was the 1960s!)

But she was very much a product of her racist and sexist upper middle class Edwardian, English upbringing and given that her output was prolific (over 6000 words a day for decades) it's easy to understand why some of her work varied in quality. For the most part, The Famous Five is glorious escapist stuff that children's dreams are made of and as for Noddy it's delightful pre-school entertainment. And these are just two examples from a stable that also included The Secret Seven, Malory Towers, The Wishing Chair and much, much more.

Watching Helena Bonham Carter play Enid Blyton though you would have thought she ate children, not wrote for them. Bonham Carter played the part brilliantly it has to be said but the leaden, two dimensional script made Blyton seem like an absolute monster of near Josef Fritzl proportions. Sure she probably wasn't the nicest of people, full of prejudice (as we have already seen) and hang ups about her own father who left the family home to shack up with another woman when she was a young girl.

But are we really meant to believe she completely ignored her own children leaving them to play upstairs with the Nanny, preferring at one point to pick up her dog rather than her crying baby from a cot. Then cruelly shipping the kids off to boarding school (the younger one played by the girl from Outnumbered) just so she could embark an affair with another man in her Knightsbridge love nest while her cuckolded husband was in charge of the Surrey homeguard.

In one scene she even boasts of having six different publishers just so she can get round war time paper rations to illustrate how little she cared about the war effort. In another she fails to recognise her brother who comes round to her palatial Beaconsfield home, Green Hedges, to tell her their mother has died. "She has been dead to me for years," Blyton coldly replies.

Sure she was probably an intensely driven woman who wanted to be loved by fans (what writer, performer, musician etc. doesn't) but was she really so, so evil and self-centred? Probably not. While Helena Bonham Carter seemed to relish the 'Cruella Da Ville' part, everyone else in the production, it seemed - including Denis Lawson who played her strong second husband Kenneth Darrell Waters - were reduced to little more than little lap dogs, quaking in her wake.

Brace yourselves! The daddy of indie comedy is coming back to our screens to share skewed views of the world and generally make us all laugh our crotches damp. Yessir, Rob Newman is back with a show called The History of the World Backwards (BBC Four, Starting on October 30th, 10pm).

In The History of the World Backwards, the genius that is Rob Newman (of the brilliant Mary Whitehouse Experience) returns to the small screen with a unique perspective on historical events in this brand new series for the Beeb. Fusing comedy sketches, history, archive and music, it’s a time warp where the world moves in reverse, but time still flows forwards. This is history in reverse.

On Thursday, you should tune in to what promises to be a fascinating show about The Genius of Photography (BBC Four, Thursday, 9pm). Sub-titled 1800-1914: Fixing the Shadows, the show kicks off the first part of six with some stunning photography, leading us from ancient Rome to the Great War.

The show starts with the camera obscura, travels through the photographic methods of mathematician Henry Fox Talbot and how the big impression of cameras on painter Edgar Degas. Of course, all these facts will only mean something to the enthusiast, so for the rest of us, rest assured that this will be an egrossing programme filled with beautiful images. I can't wait to see Man Ray and W Eugene Smith's work on my screen!

Even if I didn't know that Fanny Hill (BBC Four, Monday, 9pm) was a bawdy tale about a lady of the night, I would have guessed within seconds of the opening of the show. There was so much winking and knowing looks that it felt like a Carry On... film. It was so blindingly obvious that it left me stating out loud that "Anyone would think she's a madam". Of course, I was talking about Mrs Brown - the madam of the show.

Within 20 minutes, we saw Fanny having a lesbian encounter, and then sending a bloke off "half cock", resulting in Fanny squawking "he was all over me like a mad beast!" The man, a rich odious type, was furious and left with "20 guineas spent" in his trousers (if you catch my drift). Fanny's virginity remained intact. In that opening sequence, we also saw a frankly alarming amount of "puppies with pink noses". Again, I must point out that all these puns are not from my hand, rather, from the mucky mind of the show. I felt cheated that Kenneth Williams hadn't burst in and let out a slow moan and a double entendre.

With 'salami slicing' cuts threatened at the BBC resulting in a net loss of 1800 posts, three unions which represent the Beeb's workers have announced that the corporation has until midday to reconsider, or they will ballot for industrial action. It seems that BBC Vision, regions and news will bear the brunt of the redundancies, should they go ahead.

But there are problems in Tellyland across the pond, too. The Writers Guild of America are currently in talks with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers over "residuals" - the payments a writer receives whenever his or her work is broadcast. If no settlement is reached, then the screenwriters are prepared to go on strike, meaning shows in production could be stopped in their tracks. It's thought that reality TV and hours of repeats will have to fill in the gaps while there is a lack of original work being written. [via BBC and MediaGuardian]

It was only this morning Anna was telling us about the impending job losses at the Beeb and now it seems those who don't lose their jobs might not have an office to go to anyway, as the BBC Trust has finally approved the sale of the prestigious Television Centre. You know things are bad when you have to sell the family silver to make ends meet, and with the Trust asking for a "property portfolio strategy" it looks likely there's to be more cashing in on the Beeb's architectural assets before we're done.

A complex the size of Television Centre could be worth many hundreds of millions and is clearly a juicy pear ripe for the plucking in the eyes of the cash-strapped Trust, who are obviously completely unaffected by the 50 years of television history embedded in a structure that was home to Top of the Pops, Blue Peter and hundreds of other famous BBC names. The Trust's statement, released today, also includes the chilling promise to scale back investment from areas which were "not delivering enough public value." I don't care what you say, the debate about the future of the minor digital channels ain't over yet.

It's just not been a good few months for the BBC, has it? Cookiegate and Crowngate have diverted attention for a while, but this has simply served to paper over the cavernous cracks of a much bigger problem - the fact that the licence fee has been settled at a rate below inflation. The Director General, Mark Thompson, has had some tough decisions to make, and, unsurprisingly, there are winners and losers. Well, more losers to be honest.

There are two sets of people that will be affected by the changes - the employees and the viewers. Let's start with the former. The biggest job losses are likely to come in BBC News, as news across all platforms and channels - radio, terrestrial bulletins, News 24 and the internet - will soon come from just one department. It's thought that around 500 people will lose their jobs as a result.

After being completely taken with Jermaine and Bret during the live show broadcast as a little taster, I found the opening episode of the series good... but not great. Mof reviewed the second episode, and, like me, found things to enjoy, but also found it rather hard to get his head around the down-beatness of it all.

Actually, I really liked the second episode, and have really grown into the series as a whole. And how glad I am! There just isn't enough bizarre, New Zealand musical comedy out there, is there...?

Before we even start talking about the fiasco at the BBC involving The Queen, I'd like to tell you about a grievance I have. The Royal hubbub at Television Centre has seen the media dubbing the incident as 'Crowngate'. The suffix of 'gate' stems from the Watergate scandal. In that case, if scandals are all tagged with 'gate', then Watergate should really have been 'Watergategate'.

Anyway, enough of that. As most of you will probably know, Peter Fincham has tidied up his desk, taken down his foam dart board and loving stroked his vast desk for one last time, as now, he's just another bloke sat at home in his pants eating pork scratchings. However, most blokes in that position aren't the former controller of the British Broadcasting Corporation. He was fired because someone re-edited Her Majesty to look like she was storming out of a room... as opposed to storming into a room. What's all the fuss about? Are more heads going to roll?

On Tuesday, you can watch the show I deem to be the best thing on the box at the moment. It's Charlie Brooker's Screen Wipe (BBC Four, Tuesday, 10pm). It's incredibly difficult to convey just how great this show is. So, in an attempt to convince you to watch it, I'm going to stop talking and give you a video instead. He's much funnier than me...

Charlie Brooker's Screen Wipe (BBC Four, Tuesday, 10pm) is fast becoming my favourite programme on the telly... which is not bad for a glorified clip show with shouting in-between. The second series of this wonderful show has only just started (we're on the second one) and already, it is proving to be superior to the first. I think this is for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it's easier to watch Brooker as he's obviously loosened up in front of the camera and secondly, I'm used to seeing him in front of a camera. For years I've read his Guardian columns and TV Go Home, and he didn't end up looking like the man I had imagined all that time.

With this new found ease comes a new found fury. Brooker, instead of pointing out the horrendous flaws in 90% of TV shows has now turned the whole thing on its head and now focusing the heat seeking bile on TV as a whole... as an industry... as the soulless moral vacuum that it really is... and it's great.

The newest thing that has fans of alternative comedy squealing with mirth is the musical ho-ho-hoe down of Flight of the Conchords (BBC Four, Tuesday, 9.30pm). A pair of Enzedders who made it big in the US with their unique brand of comedic songwriting and ultra dry wit. Last week, our Anna dug it (but saw room for improvement) ... but what about the rest of us?

Like many, I was very impressed with the taster shown on BBC Four before the series started. It featured Jermaine and Bret live, unplugged and in stonking form. In fact, I started to think that I may go easy on future comedians who turn up with guitars (although I'm not ready to embrace Jasper Carrot as yet). So when the series started, it was with a real sense of anticipation. Could this be the show that compels me to tune in week after week and reward me with huge gut laughs?

Andrew Davies has a string of successful TV adaptations to his credit. Bleak House, Pride and Prejudice, The Line of Beauty, Tipping the Velvet, House of Cards - all a testament not only to his prodigious output but also to his versatility.

Never one to rest on his laurels, Davies has two new adaptations coming to UK television screens shortly and as with his earlier work, each is as different from the other as the channels for which Davies is writing.

As everyone knows, the world of media is a slime bucket. People are tossed aside in favour saving money and cutting corners. To hell with the content! Show me the ad' money! Well, the BBC is no different as, according to the National Union of Journalists, the corporation are planning to ask news staff to write a 200-word memo setting out why they should keep their jobs.

The union has reacted angrily to the move, accusing executives of "losing the plot" and asking staff to "write their own suicide note". It has written to the BBC asking for clarification after being informed the initiative was discussed at a meeting of the BBC journalism board. A source told The Guardian that everyone in BBC news would be asked to write 200 words on "why they want to keep their jobs" by mid-October. These would then be considered by a panel of managers.

The weather is indifferent and going out to the pub will only serve to make your feel ashamed to be a part of the human race. Cheap alcopops and horrific music will blare to the point of stripping the skin off your ears. That may not be your weekend, but it's what I'm expecting from my night out. So, whilst you're gleefully tucking into some digestives and curled up on the couch, spare a thought for me. Here's what I'd be watching this weekend if I had stayed in...

Friday - My Name Is Earl, Channel 4, 10.35pm

Quite simply, My Name Is Earl is still the best comedy on TV. It's been on for ages, been shunted around the schedule by the hapless twits at Channel 4, and it still manages to come up trumps with each episode. The cast are great, the script is even better. Could this be one of the finest comedy programmes ever shown? I think so. Tune in tonight and laugh your belly open.

I'm watching BBC Three and BBC Four quite a bit these days. It's got a cracking mix of comedy and documentaries that are seemingly aimed square at me. However, both channels have been under the threat of closure thanks to a funding gap of £2billion at the BBC, with people demanding that they should suffer in favour of news and current affairs.

Now, reports are suggesting that it is in fact BBC Two and BBC Four that are to be the hardest hit in the corporation's forthcoming budget cuts. Having said that BBC Four is safe from the chop, insiders believe the corporation will look to share content between the two channels, enabling them to reduce the total programming budget. The only great news on this is that the constant repeats of 2 Pints of Lager... will be shunted off to the TV glue boilers in the sky.

Think of a recent BBC comedy. Little Britain? Started on radio. Mitchell and Webb? Started on radio. The Mighty Boosh? Started on radio. Saxondale? Ok, that didn't start on radio, but you get my point. Even The Flight Of The Conchords had a BBC radio show, but, as blogger Dean has astutely pointed out, the Beeb are now having to pay HBO for a series heavily based on that original BBC radio show. Silly, huh?

My main point - I'm getting there - is that radio has provided TV with many of its comedy hits, and this documentary intends to highlight and celebrate that fact. It's part of BBC Four's 'Radio Week', but to be honest, most other programmes are repeats, or examples of shows which started on radio (Little Britain, Absolute Power, The League of Gentlemen and Dead Ringers are all being shown after the doc). So this is the one to watch. It charts the history of radio comedies which made the transfer; from Hancock's Half Hour, through the fabulous Hitchhiker's Guide, on to Mitchell and Webb, who take us behind the scenes of the new series of their sketch show. Barry Cryer, Marcus Brigstocke and Jon Culshaw all get their two-penneth in.

Set The Video - Gagging For It: TV's Hunger For Radio Comedy, Monday 1 October, 10pm

After last week's live-show taster of the New Zealand comedy duo The Flight Of The Conchords, the series proper started last night on BBC Four. You'll remember that FOTC comprises Jermaine Clement and Bret McKenzie (though the New Zealand accent had me convinced he was called 'Brit'...) and this HBO series follows them as they try to break America, and 'get girls'.

Like all good double acts, Jermaine and Bret have a natural chemistry that clearly has nothing to do with acting, but unlike most, there's not really a defined difference between them. They're both deluded, both outwardly convinced that they're great, and massively popular, and inwardly aware that they're not.