THREE FAMILIES + INSIDE NO. 9 + LINE OF DUTY

This article was originally published in The Courier on 8th May 2021.

NEXT WEEK’S TV

Three Families – Monday and Tuesday, BBC One, 9pm

The Abortion Act 1967 made abortion legal in the UK, but that legislation didn’t extend to Northern Ireland. This vital drama is based upon the true stories of some of the people involved in a campaign to reverse injustice and change society.

It begins in 2013. Theresa (Sinead Keenan) believes that abortion is a mortal sin, but then her teenage daughter becomes pregnant. She makes a decision, borne of a mother’s love, that could see her facing a prison sentence for breaking an archaic law. Meanwhile, a young couple are told that their baby is expected to be stillborn. They’re given no other option.

Sensitive and angering, Three Families is wreathed in authenticity. It hits hard. It lingers.

Unbeatable – Monday to Friday, BBC One, 2:15pm

This generic daytime quiz show is almost fascinatingly undercooked and lacking in atmosphere. Your host is Jason Manford, who goes through the motions with the genial confidence of a man who knows he’s landed a sweet and easy gig.

The rules don’t matter, it’s just a procession of general knowledge questions. The weird production details are of far more interest. Unbeatable is haunted by listless canned applause that sounds like it’s been beamed in from a crypt full of Ray Harryhausen skeletons.

I’m all for social distancing, but Manford is so far away from the contestants they may as well have stuffed him in a capsule orbiting the moon. But, you know, there are worse ways to spend an afternoon.

Between the Covers – Monday, BBC Two, 7:30pm

A cosy little show, Between the Covers is a televised book club in which Sara Cox and some celebs review the latest big releases while talking about their own personal favourites. The guests this week are Mel Giedroyc, Griff Rhys Jones, TV presenter Rick Edwards and Oti Mabuse from Strictly Come Dancing.

The tomes under review are The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett and The Fine Art of Invisible Detection by Robert Goddard. Meanwhile, Giedroyc heartily recommends all 900 pages of Les Miserables.

This is nothing more than an unpretentious piece of schedule filler, but sometimes that’s all you need. Also, it reminds me that Cox is an excellent broadcaster. She’s charming, funny and natural, a likeable presence.

Inside No. 9 – Monday, BBC Two, 9:30pm

I’m a big fan of Inside No. 9, but the latest series begins with an absolute misfire.

A parody of overly-stylised British heist thrillers combined with commedia dell’arte, it’s meta-textual to a fault. The fourth wall is constantly broken. “It’s series six,” smirks our nominal narrator, “you’ve got to allow for a certain artistic exhaustion.” Which would be funny if the episode as a whole wasn’t so terribly laboured and pleased with itself.

It exists purely to comment upon the expectations that Pemberton and Shearsmith have built up over the years. I get what they’re trying to do – it’s wilfully aggravating, which is an attitude I can get behind in theory – but as a post-modern experiment it goes too far in the wrong direction.

Oh well. Better luck next time, lads!

Hospital – Tuesday, BBC Two, 9pm

The latest series of this superior medical report was filmed in the Coventry hospital that delivered the world’s first Covid vaccine outside of a trial.

Nearly five million people in England are waiting to start treatment, forcing doctors into the difficult position of having to decide who should be treated first. It’s not a decision they take lightly. Patients who can’t afford to go private are stuck on a vast waiting list. NHS staff can only apologise – there’s nothing they can do.

This typically humane episode captures the intense frustrations of an NHS coping with the huge challenge of recovering itself one year into the pandemic. “It doesn’t feel like we’re anywhere near back to normal,” sighs one consultant.

Davina McCall: Sex, Myths and the Menopause – Wednesday, Channel 4, 9pm

In this commendable programme, McCall highlights the failings of menopause care and finds out what can be done to improve the lives of menopausal women.

The main problem is a lack of proper information and a continuing distrust of hormone replacement therapy (HRT), a stigma largely based on a misleading yet widely publicised report from 20 years ago. McCall meets experts who want to put those fears to rest. They also stress that anti-depressants are no substitute for the benefits of HRT. The key message is this: we must continue to talk, listen and learn.

“You don’t have to be menopausal,” says McCall. “You don’t have to be a woman. This is something everybody needs to know.”

Saved By a Stranger – Thursday, BBC Two, 9pm

As this compassionate series continues, we meet two more ordinary people who survived traumatic events thanks to the life-changing help of others. 

David, a veteran of the Falklands conflict, was aboard the SS Atlantic Conveyer when it was set ablaze and sunk by an Exocet missile attack. Twelve men lost their lives. David now wants to reunite with some his fellow crewmembers as a way of stressing how important it is to talk when you struggle with PTSD. 

We also meet Darryl, who was four when his family fled Kenya for a new life in Britain. They discovered a country mired in vicious racism, but Darryl’s primary school teachers gave him the confidence to succeed in a hostile society.

LAST WEEK’S TV

Line of Duty – Sunday 2nd May, BBC One

So that’s that then. The revelation that “bumbling fool” Buckells was The Fourth Man should’ve worked as an angry comment on how corrupt chancers always rise to the top, but the whole thing was executed in such a flat and clunky way. A bore.

I’ve always enjoyed LoD for what it is – superior hokum with something to say about systemic corruption – but series six, despite occasional highlights, was hard work. Jed Mercurio’s laborious efforts to tie every last detail together sucked all the fun out of it.

I admire his wayward ambition and subversive intent: draw viewers into a populist show then hit them with a pessimistic political message. I just wish he’d managed to do that in a dramatically satisfying way.

Ian Wright: Home Truths – Thursday 6th May, BBC One

Ian Wright’s step-dad was a psychologically and physically abusive man. The family lived in constant fear of him. He’s never fully dealt with what he went through as a child, hence this frank and tender programme in which he examined the long-term effects of domestic abuse.

In the last year, 1.6 million women in the UK experienced domestic abuse. In 90% of such cases, a child is always present. Wright confronted some upsetting memories while talking to a psychiatrist and other people from similar backgrounds. He also met school pastoral carers and social workers who have been trained to spot signs that a child is struggling.

Hats off to Wright for making such an important piece of television.

 

KILLING ESCOBAR + LINE OF DUTY + THIS TIME WITH ALAN PARTRIDGE

A version of this article was first published in The Courier on 1st May 2021.

NEXT WEEK’S TV

Killing Escobar – Tuesday, BBC Scotland, 10pm

In 1989, Glasgow-born mercenary Peter McAleese was hired to assassinate all-powerful drugs kingpin Pablo Escobar. His mission didn’t go according to plan. This 90-minute documentary explains what happened while fleshing out the details of McAleese’s often troubled life. 

A grizzled raconteur, he understands why many may regard him, a hired killer, as morally reprehensible. But, he argues, “This is the profession I chose.” Killing Escobar makes for uncomfortable viewing. On the one hand it’s a gung-ho celebration of repulsive machismo, but on the other it’s a fairly nuanced study of a philosophical and rather lonely man whose early years were steeped in anger and violence. 

The film ultimately invites viewers to make their own judgement. It’s like an unusually wistful episode of The Professionals.

The Violence Paradox – Tuesday, BBC Four, 9pm 

“Has violence really declined?” asks esteemed psychologist Steven Pinker, who hosts this far-reaching study of the worst of human nature. 

That does, of course, sound like the sort of deliberately glib and unanswerable question Chris Morris would pose at the start of Brass Eye every week, but Pinker is serious: he really does think that we could be living in the most peaceful time in history. And he’s got a vast dossier of facts and research to support his controversial hypothesis. 

Whether he’s right or not – and the programme allows room for dissenting voices – it’s an engaging essay. Hey, maybe we’re not doomed after all. The vaguely hippie-ish Pinker, with his lovely fluffy hair and relaxation tape mien, is someone you want to believe in.

The Money Maker – Tuesday, Channel 4, 9pm

The star of this new series is big-hearted venture capitalist Eric Collins, who each week throws a lifeline to ailing British businesses. Collins, a suave American gentleman, exudes a sort of benign intensity; Zen and the art of trouble-shooting. 

His first port of call is a building repair and restoration company in Manchester. I zone out whenever business types start talking about equity stakes etc. – my brain isn’t wired to compute such information – but The Money Maker is more acceptable than the relentlessly sneering Dragons’ Den. At least Collins tempers his essentially self-serving impulses with a certain degree of empathy. 

But this is such a standard-issue TV format. We’ve seen it all before.

Johnny Vegas: Carry On Glamping – Wednesday, Channel 4, 10pm

In this amiable new series, the comedian and camper van enthusiast follows his dream of setting up a bespoke glamping site full of renovated buses from the 1950s and 1960s. 

Among his friends and family, Vegas is affectionately known as someone who is always coming up with big ideas before getting bored and abandoning them. But he’s keen to stress how serious he is about this project. It’s not just a lark. 

Accompanied by his best pal and personal assistant Bev, Vegas searches for a site and travels to Malta to examine their first bus (he bought it online at 2am without checking the location). He also visits his mum, who’s glad he’s doing this instead of “filthy stand-up”.

Bloods – Wednesday, Sky One, 10pm

This new sitcom about paramedics, while fairly amusing, veers uneasily between likeable workplace shenanigans and self-conscious gallows humour – patients in episode one include a crack addict and some people involved in a car crash. 

Our odd couple protagonists are Maleek (Samson Kayo) and his new partner Wendy (Jane Horrocks). Maleek is a short-tempered fool with a high opinion of himself. Wendy is a kindly chatterbox who isn’t quite as naïve as she seems. Meanwhile, back at hospital HQ, the always watchable Julian Barratt plays a lonely widower who doesn’t seem to be aware that his boss is in love with him. 

Bloods isn’t bad by any means. It’s fine. But I will never watch it again unless someone I trust tells me that it significantly improves. And no one will ever tell me that.

The Dog House – Thursday, Channel 4, 8pm

As the latest series of this wet-nosed comforter concludes, we meet Stanley the Staffie, Ellie the Chihuahua and Zoe the effervescent Beagle. As usual, the staff at Wood Green Animal Shelters must manage that careful negotiation between matching these abandoned dogs with the right humans. 

The main storyline this week involves Dexter from Malaysia, who was shunned by his mother when he came out as gay. He’s now happily married to Aaron. If Ellie accepts him too, their lives could be complete. 

We all know that these programmes tend to favour neatly satisfying narratives - ah, if only life were really so straightforward – but The Dog Pound is a quietly profound little show. It has a good heart.

Britain’s Favourite ‘80s Songs: 1989 – Friday, Channel 5, 10pm

And so, this cheap and cheerfully pointless list show comes to an end. As we knew it always must. 

I suppose Channel 5 should be applauded for doggedly carrying on with the nostalgic pop culture rundown format, which even Channel 4 abandoned about ten years ago after trampling it into the ground. 

You don’t need to have seen previous episodes in this series to know what it involves: 1980s pop videos interspersed with talking heads trotting out all the usual clichés. That’s talking heads as in whoever they could round up at the time; David Byrne and Tina Weymouth don’t barge in to declare their love for Jive Bunny. 

A perfectly adequate way to while away your Friday evening. 

LAST WEEK’S TV

Line of Duty – Sunday 25th April, BBC One

For all its blatant flaws, Line of Duty is hard to resist. Those blatant flaws are part of its maddening appeal. 

To take it seriously is to miss the point; it’s entirely composed of red herrings, cliff-hangers, exposition and convoluted call-backs, but it’s all put together with a certain amount of flair. Case in point: introducing James Nesbitt as a surprise guest-star in episode five, then killing him off in episode six. He hadn’t even uttered a line of dialogue. That whole bait and switch routine was amusing. 

Nevertheless, it’s definitely time to end it now. It’s been a fun ride, but this series has shown clear signs of fatigue and Greatest Hits repetition. There’s nowhere left to go.

This Time with Alan Partridge – Friday 30th April, BBC One

Since 2010, Steve Coogan and co-writers Neil and Rob Gibbons have produced some of the very best Alan Partridge material. Mid Morning Matters, those two outstanding audiobooks and last year’s podcast From the Oasthouse were all premium Partridge. This Time is broader and doesn’t quite scale those heights, but it’s still a very funny show. 

Coogan as Partridge – one of the greatest comedy creations of all time - is an absolute joy to behold; an impeccable comic actor inhabiting a three-dimensional character he knows inside out. 

Last week’s obvious set-piece highlight was his time spent in a monastery, but I laughed more at the subtle cracking of his knees during a ludicrous display of ‘entering a conference room’ etiquette. I do love Alan so.

 

 

VIEWPOINT + SAVED BY A STRANGER + BABY SURGEONS: DELIVERING MIRACLES

This article was originally published in The Courier on 24th April 2021.

NEXT WEEK’S TV

Viewpoint – Monday to Friday, STV, 9pm

Another one of those stripped-throughout-the-week dramas designed to cause maximum social media impact, Viewpoint is deeply indebted to Hitchcock’s Rear Window and the paranoid claustrophobia of 1970s New Hollywood classics such as Coppola’s The Conversation. 

Noel Clarke stars as a CID surveillance detective tasked with solving the disappearance of a primary school teacher. While covertly stationed in a neighbour’s flat across the road, his professional distance becomes compromised by a growing sense of panicked moral responsibility. Viewpoint falls back on some standard cop thriller tropes, but it’s quite compelling and intense. 

Clarke and co-star Alexandra Roach hold it all together, though; their performances are nicely understated. You can believe in them if nothing else.

How to Save a Grand in 24 Hours – Monday, Channel 4, 8pm

Anna Richardson and a cavalcade of cost-cutting gurus get to work in this new series, during which they show families how easy it can be to slash bills, credit card spends and monthly subscriptions. 

The core message is this: do you really need most of the stuff you own and pay for? Speaking as someone who would probably be quite happy living inside a heated Perspex cube on an uninhabited Scottish island, it’s a philosophy I can get behind. 

The subjects this week are the Kofi family, who receive some advice on how run their household on a reduced budget. This isn’t must-see TV by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s perfectly benign and potentially useful.

Baby Surgeons: Delivering Miracles – Monday, Channel 4, 9pm

Please take heed: this intimate series is, while sensitively handled, heart-wrenching. Filmed in one of the UK’s leading foetal medicine units, it follows heavily pregnant mothers whose unborn children are in urgent need of care and attention. 

Becky’s baby has a lung tumour which requires prenatal laser surgery. Anne-Marie was pregnant with triplets, but one of them died after nine weeks in the womb. Randika, who has dwarfism, has suffered three miscarriages. Their surgeon is Professor Basky Thilaganathan, whose delicate bedside manner is frequently called into play while he explains the educated risks he must take to save the lives of his patients. 

There is, I assure you, some tearful joy to be had amidst the tragedy.

Our Yorkshire Farm – Tuesday, Channel 5, 7pm

The Owen family – mum, dad and their nine children – live on one of the most remote farms in Britain. This delightful series chronicles their daily lives. It’s The Brady Bunch in mud-caked wellies; Whistle Down the Wind without an escaped convict in the barn. 

A programme about nice people enjoying their idyllic life may sound rather bland, but I find Our Yorkshire Farm very comforting. It provides some generous respite from the horrors of the world. It also captures the innocence of childhood. 

This week, the kids go back to school after their time spent in lockdown; it’s five-year-old Clemmie’s first day in the halls of academe, and she enjoys every minute of it.

Bent Coppers: Crossing the Line of Duty – Wednesday, BBC Two, 9pm

The final episode of this propulsive series about police corruption in the 1970s revolves around that shady euphemism, “taking a drink”. Corrupt police officers and violent criminals made a tidy living from their mutually beneficial arrangements. And for the most part, those uniformed villains got away with their crimes. 

As the episode reveals, the real-life AC-12 – which had to be set up to cope with the problem - were ill-equipped to deal with such an overwhelming torrent of allegations. We also meet honest ex-coppers talking about the anguish of being trapped within a toxic institution. They felt helpless. 

And once again, that evocative archive footage positively reeks of stale cigarette smoke and urinal cakes.

Saved By a Stranger – Thursday, BBC Two, 9pm

Hosted by Anita Rani, this new series focuses on ordinary people who became caught up in some of the darkest events in living memory. It tries to reunite them with the strangers who came to their aid during times of dire need. 

Karl is looking for the woman who held his hand when they were trapped underground during the 7/7 attacks. In his panic to escape from the tunnels, he pushed in front of her and has struggled with the guilt ever since. Emina and her family fled from war-torn Sarajevo thanks to the efforts of a paediatrician. They want to thank her for saving their lives. 

It’s a humbling celebration of selfless humanity.

Intergalactic – Friday, Sky One, 9pm

This new British sci-fi drama is an unabashed blast of camp, clichéd hokum. And that’s why I’m recommending it. 

Set in 2143, it follows a young space cop with an unimpeachable record who is convicted of – you guessed it – a crime she didn’t commit. Sent into exile on a brutal prison planet, she has to prove her innocence while struggling to survive in an environment that doesn’t take kindly to law enforcers. It’s basically the first episode of Blake’s 7 on a big Sky budget and taken at a frantic pace. 

Highlights include Dot from Line of Duty as a sinister government official and metaphor-spouting beekeeper. If that hasn’t sold you on it, then nothing will.

LAST WEEK’S TV

Call the Midwife – Sunday 18th April, BBC One

I was amused by the all-conquering chutzpah of last Sunday’s evening schedule on BBC One. Call the Midwife followed by Line of Duty? Beat that, ITV (other channels may have been available). 

The tenth series began with a typically affecting episode; Call the Midwife is reassuringly old-fashioned in the way it weaves at least four storylines into a neat thematic whole. This one encompassed a crisis of faith, a family tragically affected by radiation poisoning, a young black couple struggling to build a new life for themselves, and a compassionate case in favour of the NHS vs exclusive private health care. 

Even after nine years and 80 episodes, this restorative formula hasn’t run dry.

Line of Duty – Sunday 18th April, BBC One

As expected, the latest episode of this uneven series revealed that Jo Davidson is the daughter of deceased OCG boss Tommy Hunter. That was such a foregone conclusion, writer Jed Mercurio tossed it out of the way before moving swiftly on. 

But it did contain at least one decent surprise – the introduction of James Nesbitt as a senior police officer embroiled in the overarching conspiracy plot. Line of Duty is an enjoyable puzzle powered by admirably righteous anger (the Stephen Lawrence case was woven in last week), but it feels like Mercurio is now hastily ticking off everything he’s ever wanted to say at the expense of narrative cohesion. 

I’m still watching, obviously. He’s some kind of dastardly hypnotist.

 

 

GRETA THUNBERG: A YEAR TO CHANGE THE WORLD + TOO CLOSE

This article was originally published in The Courier on 10th April 2021.

NEXT WEEK’S TV

Greta Thunberg: A Year to Change the World – Monday, BBC One, 9pm

The world-renowned environmental activist has galvanised millions in the fight against climate change. Towards the end of 2019, she took a year off school to examine the effects of global warming first-hand. A co-production between the BBC and PBS, this vital series follows Thunberg as she travels around the world – by boat – to meet leading climate experts. 

In Canada, she encounters melting glaciers and evidence of our biodiversity crisis. She also witnesses the devastating after-effects of California’s worst ever wildfire. 

Meanwhile, Thunberg and her supportive father discuss the pressures they’re under, although she’d clearly rather not talk about herself at all: “I don’t want you to listen to me, I want you to listen to the science.”

Too Close – Monday to Wednesday, STV, 9pm

Emily Watson stars in this morbid psychological thriller as Emma, a forensic psychiatrist tasked with assessing a woman branded in the tabloid press as a ‘yummy mummy monster’. Connie (played with considerable intensity by Denise Gough) tried to kill herself, her daughter and a neighbour’s child by driving into a river. She claims to have no memory of the incident.

Connie is arrogant, angry, cynical and manipulative. The scenes between her and Emma inhabit familiar territory: the intelligent patient/prisoner turning the tables on their interrogator. 

I only had access to episode one, but Too Close is quite intriguing and almost admirably bleak. I’m always suspicious of dramas about mental illness, they’re often quite tawdry and insensitive, but we’ll see.

All That Glitters: Britain’s Next Jewellery Star – Tuesday, BBC Two, 8pm

Comedian Katherine Ryan hosts this new “TV competition slash talent search format.” How deliciously ironic. I actually prefer it when derivative TV shows just plough ahead with the job at hand, instead of drawing attention to themselves with a knowing wink. It’s a cheap get-out clause. 

Anyway. This one finds a bunch of up-and-coming jewellers working on bespoke pieces that could last for centuries. You know the drill: they’re set a series of challenges while being judged by soundbite-spouting experts. 

Even if you have no interest whatsoever in jewellery, this is a fairly pleasant way to while away an hour of your life. But it is, like most programmes of its ilk, clearly better suited to a daytime slot.

Stacey Dooley: Back on the Psych Ward – Tuesday, BBC Two, 9pm

Last year, Dooley made a programme about life on an NHS mental health ward. This is her follow-up report. 

With characteristic sensitivity, she spends time with staff and patients to find out how they’ve been coping during the pandemic. Since COVID, the demand for beds has shot up. For so many people with pre-existing mental health issues, the isolation has been impossible to deal with. Young people have been affected more than any other age group. 

I don’t want to go into the specific details of what the various patients that Dooley meets are struggling with, as those details may prove triggering to some readers, but suffice to say it’s a programme made with the utmost care and integrity.

Paul O’Grady: For the Love of Dogs – Wednesday, STV, 8pm

During this week’s visit to Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, O’Grady meets some pooches in desperate need of TLC. Staffie-cross Roxi has far too much nervous energy to burn, so the staff try to calm her down with a gentle regime of stroking and exercise. 

The other star of the show is Dottie, a bulldog with the saddest face. Dottie has been overbred by her former owners; she’s exhausted and scared of pretty much everything. But then she’s paired with another lonely dog in need. 

I tend to get moist-eyed at the most ridiculous things, but For the Love of Dogs really is such a lovely, uplifting show. It makes the world feel like a slightly kinder place.

The Great British Sewing Bee – Wednesday, BBC One, 9pm

It’s back! From their new home on the banks of the Thames underneath London’s last surviving lighthouse, Esme Young from Central Saint Martin’s School of Fashion, Savile Row tailor Patrick Grant and cuddly host Joe Lycett welcome twelve new sewers competing for this year’s prize. 

A likeable bunch, they include a Bowie fan and former dinner lady, and a Frenchman who plays lead trumpet for London’s Gay Symphony Orchestra. 

It’s jolly old business as usual, during which they must design a loose-fitting buffet dress, a collarless 1960s-style blouse and transform a standard t-shirt into an imaginative item of clothing for any age or gender – one of the bold designs sends Grant into a giggling fit.

Bent Coppers: Crossing the Line of Duty – Wednesday, BBC Two, 9pm

With trust in the Metropolitan Police currently at an all-time low, this timely documentary travels back to an era when the public regarded the fuzz as an unassailable paragon of virtue. But as we now know, bent coppers exploited that myth for their own benefit. 

In early 1970s London, a secret network of corrupt CID detectives inhabited a murky world of extortion, fit-ups and racist violence. They preyed on defenceless working-class people and ethnic minorities, as well as tofu-munching political activists such as Caroline Coon. 

Propelled by a funky cop soundtrack and evocative archive footage, the episode also features covert recordings of bent coppers colluding with criminals: “We’ve got more villains in our game than you’ve got in yours.”

LAST WEEK’S TV

Freddie Mercury: A Life in Ten Pictures – Saturday 3rd April, BBC Two

This touching account of Sir Fred’s life featured contributions from some of the non-famous people who knew and loved him. They pored over private and professional photographs of Mercury as a way of providing insight into what he was really like. 

It began with the earliest known image of him, as an infant in Zanzibar, and ended with a photograph taken just a few months before he died. 

Although the story of Mercury’s life is familiar, the programme managed to untangle the private man from the self-made myth. A sensitive soul, he was an introverted extrovert who craved companionship. He was also a gay immigrant who overcame the odds stacked against him. Intimate and honest, the programme did him justice.

Line of Duty – Sunday 4th April, BBC One

Now we’re sucking diesel. This series began with an uninspiring, poorly-paced episode, but it has ramped up considerably since. 

Episode three contained one of those great LoD set-pieces: corrupt copper Ryan, who we first encountered as a terrifying child in series one, attempted to bump off Terry, the framed young suspect with learning difficulties, by staging a car crash in a reservoir. Terry survived, but Ryan drowned the other officer who was in the car. Brutal. 

LoD is essentially a daft yet compelling melodrama made up on the hoof, but I do admire the way it confronts contentious real-life issues such as the murder of Jill Dando and Jimmy Savile’s connections within the highest echelons of power. Why, it’s almost subversive.

 

TV Review: LINE OF DUTY + BRITAIN'S NUCLEAR BOMB: THE INSIDE STORY

This article was originally published in The Dundee Courier on 6 May 2017.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

LINE OF DUTY: Sunday, BBC One

BRITAIN’S NUCLEAR BOMB: THE INSIDE STORY: Wednesday, BBC Four

Jed Mercurio is a crafty swine. I swear he must write LINE OF DUTY while cackling up his sleeve, like a cruel child who can’t resist incinerating ants with an elaborate rig of magnifying glasses.

The latest series of his incomparably entertaining cop drama climaxed with the blatant suggestion that gruffly lovable police chief Ted Hastings might somehow be involved with the overarching thread of deeply sordid establishment corruption.

Mercurio timed this twist to perfection, as Hastings – played by the excellent Irish actor Adrian Dunbar – has gradually secured his place in the pantheon of much-loved fictional TV sleuths.

A no-nonsense copper in the old-school mould, his paternal decency and dogged determination has transformed him into a kind of wish-fulfilment folk hero. It’s comforting to believe that reliable policemen such as Hastings still exist – if, indeed, they ever did – to protect us from the evil deeds of all-powerful elites.

Hastings curtly undermining a smug suspect by calling them “fella” or gently referring to a young female murder victim as “that wee girl” - he's no more sexist than your affable, well-meaning dad - has become a source of national pride, as well as a fun-for-all-the-family drinking game. What’s not to love about the man?  

Well, this blanket adoration has clearly become too cosy as far as Mercurio is concerned. He’s occasionally dropped hints that Hastings might not be as trustworthy as he seems, but that’s always felt like the kind of red herring misdirection he’s so fond of.

When the dodgy senior police officer – played with a dodgy English accent by Scottish actor Paul Higgins - attempted to frame Hastings in the penultimate episode, we didn’t believe it for a second. He was obviously trying to divert attention from himself. Turns out there may be some truth to his accusation after all.

Despite knowing that two more series have been commissioned, I actually wouldn’t mind if Mercurio left us with the tantalising fear that Hastings was behind everything from the start. That might seem like a cheap trick – it probably is – but it would still work as a sly summation of the show’s cynical, paranoid message. No one can be trusted.

As for the rest of this year’s storyline, it unfolded – somewhat disappointingly – more or less as expected. Roz murdered Tim, but not as part of any grand involvement with Balaclava Man/Men.

The main buzz from Roz’s weary confession came from imagining that her oily lawyer, played by Patrick Baladi, was Neil from The Office failing hilariously after training as a lawyer post-sacking from Wernham-Hogg.

I hope, when they make the final series, the ultimate twist is that Hastings is one of the few trusted ‘70s/’80s establishment figures who wasn’t a wrong ‘un. Now that would be subversive, fella.

Space precludes me from rewarding BRITAIN’S NUCLEAR BOMB: THE INSIDE STORY with the detailed praise it deserves, so I urge you to watch this fascinating documentary on iPlayer.

As the world teeters on the brink once again, it whisked us back to a simpler, gentler time when nuclear Armageddon first became a harrowing reality. Our first atomic bomb was invented, tried and tested by men – now dapper, aged and charming – who still lived in fear of post-war German retaliation.

If they could've foreseen Brexit, we'd all be dead by now.

Despite the literally devastating subject matter, the programme managed to scrape some dark, dry humour from our typically parochial flirtation with the apocalypse. They almost destroyed Dorking during test runs. 

Almost restores your faith in hapless British ingenuity, doesn’t it? 

TV Review: LINE OF DUTY + MRS BROWN + DECLINE AND FALL

This article was originally published in The Courier on 1 April 2017.

LINE OF DUTY: Sunday, BBC One

ALL ROUND TO MRS BROWN’S: Saturday, BBC One

DECLINE AND FALL: Friday, BBC One

The greatest British crime drama of the last ten years, LINE OF DUTY showed no signs of fatigue as its fourth series began. On the contrary, this former BBC Two blockbuster celebrated its promotion to BBC One with breakneck brio and commendable confidence.

The basic formula may be familiar by now – an ambiguous senior police officer is investigated by the dogged anti-corruption unit that links each semi-standalone series – but writer/director Jed Mercurio still takes evident delight in grabbing our attention with tantalising mysteries and shocking twists.

It’s essentially a propulsive thrill ride anchored by a solid base of research-driven authenticity: a practically seamless fusion of sombre reality and borderline deranged melodrama.

So, while this year’s intriguingly topical theme appears to be the inherent dangers of “post-fact” duplicity – Line of Duty has always fed off our gnawing fears about establishment corruption and cover-ups - episode one kicked off with a literally explosive hunt for an alleged serial killer, and climaxed with a shady forensic co-ordinator (the great Jason Watkins) attempting to chop his apparently dead boss (Thandie Newton) into pieces, before she suddenly awoke as his electric saw whirred inches from her skull.

Mercurio is notorious for misdirecting viewers with such audacious cliffhangers, but they still work beautifully (even if they don’t quite stand up to logical scrutiny).

The episode wasn’t perfect – some of the exposition was needlessly heavy-handed, the physical encounter between Watkins and Newton was awkwardly directed, and Scottish actor Paul Higgins continues to struggle with a stiff, unconvincing English accent – but these are mere quibbles in the face of its tightly controlled tension and sheer entertainment value.

A nail-bitten nation will doubtless become hooked all over again for the next six weeks.

Brendan O’Carroll is clearly some kind of genius. Not when it comes to comedy – he’s a dreadful, lazy chancer - but for the way he’s managed to vigorously milk the Mrs Brown cash cow far beyond its natural shelf-life as a tawdry touring theatre production.

Despite being reviled by most critics and discerning comedy fans, he’s one of the BBC’s most popular entertainers. Despairing of his success is as futile as moaning about wretched weather. It’s an immovable fact of life, you may as well accept it.

But that doesn’t mean you have to accept his latest vehicle, ALL ROUND TO MRS BROWN’S, as anything other than a post-Brexit vision of Hell.

With minimal effort he’s tweaked his knicker-dropping, feck-spewing, single entendre sitcom by adding sketches, games, a cookery segment, easily pleased audience interaction and dynamite celebrity guests of the Pamela Anderson, James Blunt, Louis Walsh, Judy Murray and Judy Murray’s mum variety.

As usual, it’s staggeringly charmless, depressing and unfunny, but his target audience will lap it up. The rest of us are merely baffled bystanders in O’Carroll’s all-conquering world.

As if to prove that comedy of wit and distinction still has a home on BBC One, a new adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s darkly satirical novel DECLINE AND FALL introduced itself with reassuring aplomb. Despite being written in 1928, Waugh’s astringently comic assault on elitism and prejudice feels fresher than O’Carroll’s grimly old-fashioned revue.

A perfectly-chosen cast of peerless character actors is led by Jack Whitehall as a hapless young schoolmaster drowning in a quagmire of corrupt, dissolute British eccentricity.

Deftly performed, written and directed – you can practically taste the stench of whisky, lunacy and crumbling despair - it’s a genuinely funny farce of the type they supposedly don’t make any more.

Granted, it’s based on an 89-year-old novel, but any primetime BBC comedy involving an alcoholic schoolmaster shooting a pupil in the foot with a starting pistol is all right by me.  

TV Review: BABYLON and LINE OF DUTY

This article was originally published in the Courier on 15th February 2014.

http://www.thecourier.co.uk/lifestyle

Babylon: Sunday, Channel 4

Line of Duty: Wednesday, BBC2

Given the current weight of controversy surrounding police misconduct and media chicanery, you'd think an incisive black comedy satirising the whole sorry mess was just begging to be made. Unfortunately, Babylon isn't it.

Billed as a comedy-drama, the pilot failed to make much impact as either. Although clearly not intended as a rib-tickling farce, the stabs at humour were curiously mannered and self-conscious.

A scene in which Metropolitan Police chiefs were confused by incoming reports of a shooting spree was particularly laboured. And James Nesbitt, as a beleaguered police chief, delivering a convoluted description of what would befall him if he erroneously issued a citywide lock-down felt like an awkward barrage of watered-down The Thick of It.

This is hard to forgive, seeing as Babylon was written by Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain, both of whom worked on Armando Iannucci's exemplary political satire. It was like a weak tribute to their own work. Creators of the excellent Peep Show, they also collaborated with Chris Morris on his thoughtful suicide bomber comedy Four Lions. Their CV speaks for itself.

And yet Babylon took tantalising elements from their previous efforts and squandered their potential. Poorly plotted and characterised, it was a tonally confused, boring mess.

Largely set in the Met's communications department, its tackling of PR, spin and corporate gobbledegook felt awfully rote and familiar. Lines such as “This is so far off the record even I don't know I'm saying it” were the stuff of half-hearted fan fiction.

Director Danny Boyle – yes, that one – did at least succeed in providing a surface sheen of energy to Babylon's hectic world of rolling news, camera phones and Twitter And the overall point about the police struggling to project an image of honesty and transparency in a world increasingly monitored by the media and a tech-savvy public was, while crushingly obvious, adequately delivered.

As a state-of-the-nation address, however, it was limp and underwhelming: a missed opportunity. Its depiction of the police may be fair – like any sprawling institution, it's populated by terrible idiots and well-meaning professionals – but Babylon rang hollow as comedy, character drama and social commentary.

By sheer coincidence, the ethical failings of the police were addressed in another TV highlight this week. But Line of Duty is a far more assured and enjoyable affair.

A satisfyingly self-contained story, series one of this dynamic thriller was hardly begging for a sequel. But on the evidence of episode one, series two promises to be just as compelling.

Once again based around a British police force anti-corruption unit, it introduced Keeley Hawes as an apparently conscientious officer suspected of involvement in the violent death of three colleagues and a mysterious witness.

As before, writer Jed Mercurio established an intriguing guessing game riddled with unexpected twists. The biggest shock of all, and one that left me grinning from its sheer audacity, was the cliffhanger death of Call the Midwife's Jessica Raine, who'd only just been introduced as a major new character.

Although I should've seen it coming – Mercurio pulled off the same trick in series one with Gina McKee's character – it still worked beautifully as a devilish bit of rug-pulling.

That barely controlled yet confident sense of anything-goes mania is what sets Line of Duty apart from the vast majority of UK cop shows. It shows Babylon how it's done.