Sky Atlantic - The advert channel.

Tuesday marked the launch of Sky’s new TV channel ‘Sky Atlantic’ so as a Virgin Media customer that was a hard day to get through.

The new channel is exclusive to Sky TV customers (not us mere Virgin customers) and is the home to new shows such as Boardwalk Empire and Blue Bloods but I’m not upset about missing these shows, you can’t miss what you’ve never had. It's the other shows I’ve become accustomed to watching that are now unavailable to me, which bothers me the most that I am going to miss. Shows like: Curb Your Enthusiasm, Weeds, 24, Prison Break, Breaking Bad and worst of all Mad Men.

After 4 seasons of watching Mad Men on BBC4, it has finally gone behind a pay wall. I knew it was coming; good shows like MM always go behind pay walls. I have no problem with shows going behind pay walls, I don't mind paying for good quality shows, I just wish it were behind a pay wall that I had access too. Sky say they will treat Mad Men with the respect it deserves and show it at a decent time (unlike BBC4's shocking treatment of it) but what they have failed to mention is that Mad Men will now be littered with adverts. (something no UK Mad Men viewer will be used to) Very little, if anything happens in an episode of Mad Men so there wont be any exciting ad break cliff hangers. Perhaps Sky could fit an advert in after Don tells Peggy she has to work late again.

Really I’m just being bitter that I can’t get the channel. Living in a flat prevents me from having a dish on my building, hence why I have Virgin Media. In fact I would have said six months ago that Virgin was probably better value for money due to their film and TV on demand services, but seeing as I don’t have Sky Atlantic I am slowly changing my mind.

Luckily I have parents with Sky TV so watching these shows isn’t impossible, but when you pay for cable television you expect to have all shows and channels avaliable to you.

There have been some rumblings on Twitter that the Sky and Virgin are in talks, but no one is sure if and when the channel will become available to Virgin customers. You have to hope that the two do sort this mess out as soon as possible. It’s clearly only a matter of time before Sky start poaching the likes of Dexter and True Blood from FX, leaving Virgin viewers with literally nothing to watch (and if that happens then maybe I’ll have to think about moving) Until then I’ll have to keep changing the channel whenever that bloody advert with Dustin Hoffman comes on!