on 30 June 2009Alexander Armstrong and Martin Freeman are to star in a new BBC4 factual-based comedy drama about the rise and fall of the home computer market in the 1980s [...] ‘Syntax Era’ [...] is described as an ‘affectionately comic account’ of the race for home computer supremacy, with Sinclair’s ZX Spectrum and C5 battling Curry’s BBC Micro.
The trouble about making TV for geeks is that geeks insist on you getting stuff right. When the heck did the Speccie compete with the BBC Micro? They were in completely different price brackets, for a start. The main rival to Sinclair was Commodore. You can’t turn a multi-vendor market into a duel just because the BBC and Sir Clive were both British. And why is the main Beeb character Curry, not Hauser? Did he not fit the Brit thing? (Cue endless Curry-Hauser/Jobs-Woz/marketing-product debate.)
I’m looking forward to this, though. The casting is good (Armstrong and Freeman are both annoying and overrated, lol). And – there’s a BBC4! Who knew?
adambanksdotcom They might as well call this Abu Dhabi thing The Festival Of Just Not Getting It