Well, I hope he’s not been watching Collision Course (BBC2) of late, because it’s a programme apparently designed to nurture your existing paranoid fantasies and generate countless new ones in the process.
Officially, it’s described as a series ‘on the science and psychology of fatal transport accidents, revealing the decisions made seconds or decades before that will determine who will live or die’, but I reckon you could sum it up more accurately as ‘extreme rubber-necking’, ‘untertainment’, or perhaps simply ‘disasterporn’.
Last week’s edition examining the Southall rail crash is a case in point. Using a combination of survivor interviews, expert opinion (from rail-safety advisors through to psychologists) and – most upsetting of all – haunting computer-generated reconstructions of the accident itself, it picked apart the collision atom-by-atom, stretching an incident which lasted roughly eight and a half seconds into an hour of unrelenting terror.
In fact, the end effect is a bit like The Matrix for neurotic vultures: plenty of slow-mo ‘bullet time’ enactments of precisely the sort of calamity both myself and that bloke from Orbital spend so much time worrying about.
We learned how one woman’s life was saved because she decided to move to a different carriage when a group of noisy people boarded the train. We learned how a doctor was spared one of the grisliest fates imaginable when the carriage fell on its side – he broke six ribs landing sideways on a table which prevented him from plummeting through a smashed window at the bottom and getting smeared across the tracks (other passengers weren’t so lucky). And we learned that in moments of extreme terror, it’s not unusual for victims to see in black-and-white – because the brain decides that the processing power required to replicate colour would be better employed doing something else, such as locating the nearest exit or kissing your arse goodbye. But mostly we learned this: There Is No God.
You see, for all its gory details and eye-popping computer simulations, the single most disturbing thing about Collision Course is the way it lays bare the random cruelty of fate – in fact, it positively revels in it. The Southall edition ended by explaining that many victims of rail accidents often choose to travel exclusively by car afterwards, then gloomily pointed out this is an even more unpredictably dangerous mode of transport. ‘The decisions you make tonight could mean you die on the roads tomorrow,’ boomed the voice-over (Charles Dance, who seems to have gargled with some kind of special ‘doom pill’ prior to recording). Cue lots of meticulous reconstructions of shattered windscreens and twisted gearsticks for this Tuesday’s edition – a pile-up special. Thank Christ it’s only a three-part series or we’d all be too scared to leave the house by week nine (when they’d probably be calculating the likelihood of a hot-air balloon crashing into your face, recreating just such an incident in photo-realistic pixelvision).
All in all, nasty but compelling – my only question is this: why don’t they use all this moment-by-moment jiggery-pokery to create reconstructions of nice things for once? Like maybe an exhaustive hour-long recreation of a child being delighted by a jack-in-the-box? OK, so it wouldn’t have quite the same voyeuristic pull as a spine-splintering motorway pile-up, but if it helps a troubled nation sleep at night, who’s complaining?
Holby Prison [18 January]
Heavens to Betsy, where did that come from? Just a few weeks ago I was bemoaning the embarrassing efficiency with which American TV drama was kicking our collective national arse: they make The Sopranos and 24, we spew out identichangeable star vehicles for Ross and Martin Kemp (how long before they team up for a show called ‘Shop Window Dummy Squad’?).
Then suddenly – bam! Channel 4 wheels out a fantastic new series called Buried (C4). Set in the cheery confines of the British prison system, and hailing from Tony Garnett’s ever-reliable World Productions (This Life, The Cops, um, Attachments), it’s the polar opposite of the sort of bland-o-matic mush we’re usually spoonfed.
Had it appeared on BBC1, chances are it would’ve been called ‘Holby Prison’ and starred Leslie ‘Sofa-Mouth’ Ash and a cast of Hollyoaks deserters. The average storyline would involve a kindly old lag befriending a frightened young whippersnapper, interspersed with scenes of comic relief in which the prison pig goes missing and Officer Alan Davies has to track it down.
As it is, it’s late-night Channel 4, and it’s packed to the roof tiles with anger, violence, sexual assault and more casual usage of the f-word than the average south London school playground. Scathing and espresso-strong, then – but what’s interesting about it is that it’s very, very good: an intelligent script that constantly surprises and illuminates, coupled with uniformly excellent, entirely convincing performances from every single cast member.
It’d be a crying shame if Buried were overlooked by its native audience, so I urge you all to do your civic duty by tuning in and watching the damn thing. That’s an order. Don’t worry if you missed last week’s opener – there’s a quick recap at the start and once you’re in, you’re in (rather like prison itself, actually). It’s a measure of how good Buried is that, despite being relentlessly grim, frightening and, yes, profoundly depressing, you won’t want it to end. And if for some mad reason you feel the show itself fails to live up to my histrionic praise, I apologise – it’s not often I find myself utterly blown away by a preview tape and it’s nice to get carried away in a positive way for a change.
Another recommendation: Without Prejudice (C4) which on paper sounds like it could be incredibly rubbish, but in practice is jaw-dropping, infuriating, intelligent and hilarious. The format’s simple enough – a panel of average Joes decides which of five other average Joes should receive £50,000 on the basis of whatever character information they can glean from them. If this was ITV2, they’d be quizzed on their bedroom antics, asked to do impressions of Joe Pasquale, balance spoons on their nose or do something equally arse-minded. Instead Without Prejudice wisely concentrates on the kind of red-hot ethical issues that could provoke a furious argument between identical twins – animal rights, same-sex marriages and capital punishment. It’s high-stakes Kilroy, in other words, but immeasurably better than that sounds (and minus Kilroy of course, which is always a bonus).
The interesting thing is that while the studio panel is judging the contestants, the audience at home can’t help judging the panel – and the findings are usually unfavourable. If you’re looking for televised proof that power corrupts, here it is – the torrent of self-righteous smuggery that pours from the temporary cash committee is astonishing. Ugly opinions, knee-jerk reactions and plain old-fashioned ignorant blatherings – all receive an exhaustive airing, and if this is how the average Brit behaves when handed even a fleeting taste of authority, we’re clearly doomed. How Liza Tarbuck resists the urge to kick the table over and start slapping them around is beyond me.
Here’s hoping they sell the format round the world, so we’ll eventually get to see a demented South American version in which the host does precisely that. While dressed as a giant cat or something.
Pretty Bleedin’ Pedestrian [25 January]
Q: When is a British Transport Police officer not a British Transport Police officer?
A: When he’s a ‘Rail Cop’.
‘Rail Cop’ sounds more exciting, you see – or at least the producers of Rail Cops (BBC1) seem to think so, because that’s how their voice-over track routinely refers to the Transport Police. A clever ruse, with only one drawback – whatever you call them, the job itself is still pretty bleedin’ pedestrian. Drunkard pissing on the line? Send in the Rail Cops. Person under a train at Bethnal Green? Here comes a Rail Cop with a body bag and a mop. And when a commuter snaps at Liverpool Street station and starts screaming and crying and defecating on the floor, it’s the Rail Cops’ job to contain the situation before everybody else joins in. Woo and hoo.
It isn’t a patch on those documentaries about American police – the ones with cars flipping over and people blowing their own knees off with shotguns.
For instance, much of this week’s episode concerns the efforts of a Welsh Rail Cop who’s spotted some kids trespassing on the line. Now, if this was America, he’d abseil from a helicopter, bundle them to the floor and start kicking them in the spine or something – y’know, being inhumane but entertaining. Instead our British Rail Cop drives around ponderously, talking to camera in a Welsh accent until it eventually dawns on you that you’re essentially watching Marion and Geoff. To cap it all, when he eventually catches up with the kids in question, they don’t even get a clip round the ear, just a mild talking-to.
To be fair, there is one interesting bit where a Rail Cop-in-training loses the plot during baton practice and almost beats a man to death on camera, but since his ‘victim’ is wearing heavy padding we don’t even get any blood or anything. Boo.
The BBC should invent a whole new branch of the police, and film that. How about ‘Tiger Squad’ – a unit that uses specially trained tigers to maul suspected paedophiles to death. Or a team of homicide detectives who force-feed suspects LSD and interrogate them wearing masks, on a trampoline.
Anything but bloody Rail Cops, basically.
Ho Ho Ho [8 February]
In 1965, the critic Kenneth Tynan made history by saying the f-word on BBC3. Civilised society was stunned; a Norfolk farmer punched his entire herd to death with disgust. Tynan was sentenced to 48 decades in prison and had his gob washed out with soap by Prime Minister Disraeli. The BBC3 in question wasn’t a channel, but a satirical comedy show starring Bird and Fortune. Only now, 38 years later, does the BBC dare to launch an actual channel with the same name, largely because Tynan’s no longer around to fuck it up with his potty mouth.
BBC3 replaces BBC Choice, the digital station that forged a name for itself as the place to come for EastEnders repeats and rubbish Ralf Little vehicles. Choice was undistinguished, sullied by a demented belief that what the viewers wanted was an endless torrent of vaguely ‘yoofy’ B-list celebs fronting ill-thought-out programmes – Mark Owen’s Celebrity Scooters, Dermot’s Sporting Buddies and possibly the worst programme ever broadcast by the BBC, LA Pool Party.
To be fair, Choice also endured low budgets, which explained the reliance on cheap-to-make schlock like the above (a lack of funds was also responsible for leaving one of Choice’s potential stars – Simon Munnery, aka The League Against Tedium – floundering in a sketch show whose budget couldn’t keep pace with his imagination). Now, with a fresh cash injection, Choice is about to transmogrify into BBC3 – but is it any good? Well, it’s certainly more watchable: while you can use cheap DV cams to knock out a broadcast-quality TV show, the content needs to be of Jackass-level stun value to make it worth sitting through, and most shows aren’t that interesting. More money equals proper DigiBeta crews and proper programmes.
On TV, surface quality makes a huge difference. Bigger bucks also equals bigger scope, which means in come a slew of new shows on a diverse range of topics: twenty-something drama Burn This, documentaries on Vinnie Jones and Fatboy Slim (the latter rendered somewhat haunting thanks to repeated scenes in which Zoë and Norm coo all over each other) and Body Hits – a series in which telegenic Dr John Marsden ‘investigates the culture of excess’.
Body Hits number one tackles booze, and includes a bit in which Marsden downs seventeen shots of tequila and ends up flailing around on the floor. A forthcoming edition investigates cocaine, so maybe we’ll get to see him joining the snaking queue outside the toilet cubicles at the next BBC ‘wrap party’ he’s invited to. Or maybe not.
Then there’s Dreamspaces, a new architecture show presented by Charlie Luxton, David Adjaye and – weirdly – Justine from Elastica. Essentially Top Gear for building fetishists, Dreamspaces is almost ludicrously glossy, shot like a cross between Gattaca and The Matrix: the overall effect is like having a copy of Wallpaper magazine slowly injected into your eyeball while listening to a Royksopp CD.
Most promising is BBC3’s commitment to comedy shows, which have lacked a decent home at the Beeb since BBC2 decided to concentrate on lifestyle makeovers and cookery instead.
The launch night alone features five new comedies: Lucas and Walliams’ excellent Little Britain, This Is Dom Joly (which, er, might grow on me), a new Paul Calf one-off from Steve Coogan, Monkey Dust (a disappointing, self-consciously ‘dark’ cartoon sketch show) and, to round things off, 3 Non-Blondes.
The latter is a female Trigger Happy TV with a rather dispiriting reliance on pussy jokes. If they can ditch the lame shock tactics and concentrate on the good-natured absurdities (such as the skit in which a street altercation turns into a dance routine), there’ll be a better show at the end of it.
Mind you, for a supposedly shocking, ‘streetwise’ show starring three black comedians, they could at least have had the nerve to call it either ‘Black the Pony’ or ‘Ho Ho Ho’.
Peril and Cleavage [15 February]
Rejoice! Time for the second series of 24 (BBC2). And here’s where things stand at the start …
It’s one year on and following the murder of his wife, heroic Jack Bauer’s gone off the rails. In case we’re in any doubt about just how far he’s fallen, there’s a hideous ginger beard sprouting round his chops, which makes him look like a piece of Shredded Wheat impersonating Kris Kristofferson. Clearly, any sane man would’ve reached for the razor some time ago, but Jack’s so despondent he probably doesn’t keep sharp objects in the house in case he’s tempted to slice up his forearms for funnies.
Jack’s daughter Kim (hobbies: peril and cleavage) doesn’t want to see her dad because the mere sight of his beard dredges up memories too painful to contain. Besides she’s busy working as an au pair for a too-good-to-be-true Californian husband-and-wife team and their whiny blonde daughter (whom Kim presumably relates to on a fundamental level). All very idyllic … but wherever Kim goes, contrived danger is sure to follow, and before long we sense there’s something not quite right about the daddy of the household, a Gillette-model type who spends rather too long ogling Kim’s body – as indeed will every heterosexual male in the nation, since she helpfully starts the episode clad in a tight vest and skimpy knickers. FHM readers and/or chronic masturbators will be relieved to hear that, just like last time, Kim is destined to spend most of this series running around in a low-cut top.
Meanwhile, there have been a few changes over at CTU. Jack’s left, Grumpybones Mason is in charge and they’ve hired Darlene from Roseanne to clean fluff off the mouse balls. Most significant of all, smoulderin’ Tony Almeida has shaved off the bizarre little Hitler moustache that used to live below his lower lip (presumably because he’s upset about Nina’s deception and because, like Jack, he tends to signal changes in his emotional state by altering his facial hair). This being a high-octane thriller, it isn’t long before the tranquillity of the office (which, as before, looks more like the HQ of a poncey Hoxton lifestyle magazine than a government agency) is shattered – courtesy of a hot bit of intel claiming that terrorists are planning to set off a nuclear device! In Los Angeles! Today! Professionals that they are, the CTU team manage to take this impending Armageddon in their stride and focus on the important things: preventing the tragedy and casting meaningful looks at one another.
So far, so good. But I know what you’re thinking. Since the end of the first series you’ve been lying awake at night, worrying about the relationship between Senator Palmer and his son Keith. You tossed and turned, unable to contain your excitement at the prospect of more scenes in which Keith gets upset and Palmer says he loves him and Keith says he doesn’t and Palmer says he does and they make up.
Well, sorry, bad news: we do see Keith at the start, enjoying a fishing trip with Pops (who’s now President Palmer), but he’s soon nudged out of the storyline – I fear we won’t encounter him again; pity, because I just couldn’t get enough of those mutual-respect chinwags they had last time. Here’s hoping Fox produce a spin-off series called ‘Keith’s Fucking Problems’, in which the drippy-eyed jerkwad
sits on a fence post pouring his heart out to passing strangers.
So Keith’s out, but don’t hang up the bunting just yet – there’s an irritating subplot involving a wedding which provides ample opportunity for agonised heart-to-hearts between a pair of blonde sisters. You’ll know when to put the kettle on. That gripe aside, it’s a case of more, more, more. More intensity, more brutality and, best of all, more George Mason. Oh, and episode one lasts a full hour thanks to a product-placement deal with Ford, which meant it played minus ad-breaks in the US. The most addictive show on TV is back, and it’s better.
Of course the real world’s probably going to end before the series does, but you can’t have everything.
Human Suffering Equals Big Guffaws [22 February]
OK, before launching into the coming week’s telly, a quick word about a programme that got me all angered-up last Saturday – The Luvvies, ITV’s light-hearted anti-awards show, which doled out joke gongs to celebrities for categories such as Most Likely to Turn Up for the Opening of an Envelope and the like. An epoch-shatteringly hysterical concept, I’m sure you’ll agree.
What specifically enraged me was the section in which awards were shelled out for ‘going off the rails’ – a category in which Barrymore, John Leslie and Matthew Kelly were conspicuous by their absence. No, instead the award went to easy target Les Dennis, whose wife – ha ha! – has left him, leaving his personal life – tee hee! – in tatters. This was hilariously illustrated with footage of him in the Big Brother house crying his eyes out. Hoot! Just in case that wasn’t rib-tickling enough, it was followed by a Cook Report-style sequence in which a Luvvies camera crew chased Les down the road, up to his front door, and – please, my aching sides – tried to give the award to his housekeeper.
Charlie Brooker's Screen Burn Page 25