Adventures In IMDb Discussion Boards: Robin Hood And The BBC’s PC Agenda

A couple of weeks ago, a discussion was started on the IMDb boards for the current BBC version of Robin Hood, with the title “Ruined By PC Casting”. Since the beginning of the third season of the show, the casting of black actor David Harewood as Friar Tuck has caused some controversy, with the rightwing press spinning some bland utterances from historians into “fury”, and the inevitable online commenters railing against the BBC’s so-called “politically correct agenda”, which is supposedly to undermine historical fact and encourage the nation’s children to believe that Britain has always been a diverse and tolerant society. (Oh, the humanity!)



The IMDb has often been a hotbed of such discussions, and the first post in this thread covered familiar ground although taking a slightly different tack.

Robin Hood is an enjoyable show, but unfortunately it has been spoiled by yet another example of Politically Correct BBC casting.

One of the Merrie Men is clearly not the person described in the many accounts of Robin Hood's life. The BBC, with its agenda of encouraging multiculturalism, has cast an exotic actor in this role to indoctrinate children with the idea that people of all races and backgrounds have always been tolerated, or even welcomed, in England. The historical facts DO NOT SUPPORT this and it means the historical accuracy of the programme is completely skewed. This "update" of the Robin Hood story is basically a LIE.

The Merrie Men were not a diverse group. They were a bunch of local yeomen, bred in the environs of Sherwood Forest. For the BBC to suggest otherwise is patronising, arrogant and misleading. How are children meant to learn about our history when a supposedly historical programme like Robin Hood is based on falsehood and propaganda?

What I am saying is, everyone knows that Little John is ENGLISH and not SCOTTISH! And yet the role is clearly CALEDONIAN in this version of the legend. Surely GORDON BROWN is to blame!!

I (yes, I – did you see through my cunning obfuscation?) thought my point was fairly obvious. People complained about Harewood as Tuck but did not seem as upset about the casting of Gordon Kennedy as Sherwood stalwart Little John, despite his strong Scottish accent. And yet those people all claimed not to object to the fact that Harewood was black; they were up in arms because this casting was not “historically accurate” and smacked of “political correctness”. These protesters weren’t racists, you understand. They were simply standing up for truth, justice and the English way.



By using the same sort of language and arguments in reference to a seemingly unobjectionable piece of casting, I was trying to make it clear that the protesters were (a) ridiculous and (b) despite their claims to the contrary, racist. I was interested to see what the response would be to this (I thought) transparent bit of frivolous satire. User axtonuk quickly obliged.

How long will it be before your called racist?, I agree the BBC has bastardised the legend, its part of our English heritage, the BBC doesn't seem to care that Robin Hood is close to our hearts. The series is rather crap though, so will probably be forgotten in a few years!

Seems to me that the BBC is a mouthpeice for Labour and its multicultural dream. They don't think twice about rewriting historical facts, respect for other cultures doesn't extend to English people.

This sums up all the predictable, clichéd elements of internet discussion of the matter: accusing the BBC of being government stooges with an invidious agenda of multiculturalism; confusion over the distinction between “legend” and “historical fact”; complaints that English heritage is overlooked in favour of more exotic or trendy cultures, and that you can’t speak up for Englishness without being called a racist. I was gratified that my parodic opening post had been taken so completely at face value, and looked forward to many similar replies.

But then something odd happened. User crazy_girl2 posted the decidedly non-crazy response:

Does it really matter that much as long as the actors can act?! We all know Robin Hood wasn't a fox but that doesn't make the Disney version any less enjoyable.

The enjoyability of the Disney Robin Hood is debatable, naturally, but I was surprised to see this response appear so quickly. Such eminent good sense is not what I expect from teh internets! And then auroracat-1 blew my whole premise out of the water, exploding it point by point.

From the very beginning of this show the writers/producers said it would be a "modern" take on the Robin Hood Legend. I seriously doubt that children are watching this and thinking that it's historically accurate in any way. They've been off on the dates from the beginning, a casino, camafloge material, women wearing pants, black leather biker outfits,......the list goes on and on.

Given all this - I really don't have a problem with the casting anyone for any of the roles. (Remember to, that this is a lond tradition. Shakespears plays were originally performed with men in ALL the roles.)

The show is meant for entertainment purposes only it has never put itself out there as an educational/historical documentary type program.

Finally, Robin Hood is a legend and it has had many incarnations. It's not as if the subject matter has ever been hard fact.

When I posted again in an attempt to provoke a little more discussion along the lines of “The PC BBC is anti-Enlgish and rascist!!1!”…

The historical facts are well established. Everyone knows this. The BBC has simply ignored them. A Scottish Little John, really - whatever next?!

…I was quickly put straight by wieldy:

No they're not. The historical facts of Robin Hood are almost non-exsistant. No-one really knows who he was and what he did. All the 'robbing the rich to give to the poor', Nottingham forest, evil Sheffif etc etc is a romanticised legend based on a few scraps of evidence. Even the Major Oak in Sherwood forest, supposedly Robin Hood's hideout, is from the wrong era.

There is no truth about Robin Hood so the BBC hasn't taken any liberties with history. It's comparable to the Arthur legends, where there are a hundred different stories and very little tangible truth.

I could hardly gainsay this level-headed, intelligent post with any more ill-conceived rubbish. Fortunately axtonuk returned to do it for me.

The origins of Robin Hood come from: Hereward the Wake, Eustace the Monk and Fulk FitzWarin. All of those people existed! Either way Robin Hood is an old English legend set in a historical period, the BBC should respect that. They should also have respect for English heritage and culture. Its the English getting shafted again, we are supposed to respect everyone elses culture/heritage but no one respects ours!

Following this, a few posters picked up on other historical inaccuracies in the casting (Toby Stephens being too old to play Prince John) and the plotting (the show apparently named the wrong pope at one point), but pointed out that these either fell under the remit of dramatic licence or were too minor to affect anyone’s enjoyment of the programme. The killing blow came from theunderstudy1610, who stated:

Here we go again...

Look, if we're sticking to the original legend, then there should be no Tuck, or Marion (Robin would be too fixated on the Virgin Mary) and Robin wouldn't be some brave defender of Richard the Lionheart, or rival of the Sheriff. People have always been taking liberties with the legend.

Even the legend takes liberties with the history, sad to say that outlaws often weren't very nice people, killing, raping and robbing anyone who crossed them.

What the BBC have done is they've modernised it - they use modern cultural references (think the casino episode, biker gear etc.), Robin Hood wears a hoodie, Guy of Gisbourne eyeliner, and the women raid the foundation, they killed off Marion etc. etc. What's wrong with using actors of different races? There are plenty of other versions to watch if you don't like it.

It's not like it's historically correct anyway, more of a fantasy programme, if everything was historically correct (and they actually looked like 12th/13th century peasants) then maybe Tuck would stick out, but it isn't, and he doesn't. I'd hate to think there were any children out there who were learning their histoy verbatum from this show! Regardless of the race of the actor's there are just so many mistakes it would be ridiculous!

I just like that they've put a new spin on an old story - lets face it some of the classics would get dull if they weren't being presented in a different way. I don't care that David Harewood (Tuck) is black, same as I wouldn't care if he was aisian, aboriginee, or whatever, all I want is a good actor with a good characterisation, and I think David Harewood is delivering this.

Surely no-one can argue with any of that. In fact no-one did, and after a few more posts the thread petered out. I confessed to starting it as a joke, and was pleased when theunderstudy1610 admitted that he/she had fallen for it because my original post was so convincingly authentic:

I've just reread your post and yeah, I guess it does come across as more of a parody the second time around - sadly I know far to many people who say this stuff seriously AND for some bizare reson I never noticed that Little John was Scottish - hence I took it seriously, tbh, I read the first couple of lines and thought here we go again...

So what have I learned from this trivial but fun exercise? Mainly that the IMDb discussion boards are perhaps not as densely populated with anti-PC idiots and out-and-out racists as I suspected, and that there are numerous intelligent and reasonable people in this country who don’t act as if our birthrights are being sold when they spy a non-white face in a British TV programme set before the Empire Windrush docked. In fact, it seems from this – small but hopefully representative – sample that the people who are best informed about history are the least concerned about “accuracy” in history-based drama and the most prepared to allow licence in entertainment, preferring to criticise flaws in the writing or acting rather than searching for some pernicious hidden agenda.



I guess it’s something to bear in mind next time I see a news article about the “controversy” stirred up by a historical film or TV show. These controversies are often created by PRs in search of easy publicity and/or the media in search of an easy story, and the people who are offended are those who make a habit or even a career of being so. And the problem, of course, goes way beyond such trifling issues as BBC Saturday tea-time dramas.

Newsflash: Clone Wars Not Disaster Shocker

Some quick thoughts on Dave Filoni's Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Episode Two and Three Quarters: Battle Of The Space Wars: In Space, which I just saw along with a lot of old people and their grandkids.

• It's not terrible.
• It's not particularly brilliant either.
• I appreciate that this could have something to do with me having a baseline level of nerdery that means I get something out of even the most wretched sci fi movies, but seriously, this is not a catastrophe. It's a leaden but passable kid's film with a couple of fun action scenes. I'm glad I saw it, but I probably won't ever watch it again.
• The animation is quite stiff; characters move less fluidly than most in CG animated movies, but it's not a deal breaker. It might account for all of the cut-scene comparisons the film has been getting, though.
• I did like the character designs, though. Screenshots made their stylised features look silly, but seen on the big screen you can see lovely details. They look like moving clay statues that have been roughly painted, and as such almost have an analogue charm to them.




• The clouds of the various planets also look painted, resembling the slowly morphing backgrounds in the superb Xbox Live Arcade game Braid, though they are not as expressionistic. It's not a spectacular visual orgasm or anything, being made for TV and therefore being cheaper than Pixar movies, but the budget constraints haven't stopped Filoni and his animators making the most of what they've got in order to create something that looks interesting.
• The dialogue is quite dreadful, mostly comprised of flat exposition, bland jokes, and first draft clunkers, which is a very clever move on the part of the writers, as it exactly matches the dialogue in the Star Wars prequel trilogy. I have a feeling that a lot of the vitriol poured on this movie for having dialogue that works on a Age 5-8 level is that it reminds the audience that the prequel films, heavily anticipated and watched avidly by original prequel fans, were meant for kids first, adults second. Fans probably don't want to be reminded that they had invested a lot of energy in something that was not meant for them.
• Disclaimer: I was one of those fans. I'm right there with you, nerd brethren, but I'm over it now, thank God.
• All of the nerd-hatred poured out about Ziro the Hutt (i.e. the hatred not inspired by his perceived sexuality) might be justified if you are steeped in Star Wars continuity and are furious that he is meant to be the uncle of Jabba but ZOMG Hutts procreate asexually and only have one child each so how could Jabba's father have a brother?!!!?11!!?1!!@/@1!#???!! However, it's a really accurate impersonation of Truman Capote, which has struck many as a derogatory statement against homosexuals, but besides that is so out-of-place and eccentric (actually, "demented and immune to logic or rationality" sums up Lucas' decision-making processes) that it momentarily transcends sexual politics and ends up getting an astonished laugh from the audience (well, me, anyway).
• Ziro is a godawful and poorly-judged caricature, though. What the hell were they thinking?
• Lucas is apparently quite insane, and I think the Star Wars movies and forthcoming TV show would benefit from other celebrity impersonations, especially if it stops him creating characters that sound like awful racial stereotypes. Why not have a Neimoidian who sounds like Ed Sullivan? A Mon Calamari who sounds like Bette Davis? A Kaminoan who sounds like Groucho Marx? The Star Wars movies would have been so much more entertaining with more of these inexplicable whims from Lucas, the beardy-weirdy.




• Hey, Lucas, Amidala was boring, is boring, and always will be boring. Plus she gets rescued by C3PO. Space fail!
• Too! Much! Boring! Plot! (Again, keeping in line with the other prequel movies.)
  
• The biggest crime of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, one that I can't blame the actual filmmakers for, is that it is not Star Wars: Clone Wars, which, if you are filled with nerd blood, makes more sense than it seems. This movie, The Clone Wars, is unremarkable and overplotted (though watchable), while Clone Wars, directed by the incredible Genndy Tartakovsky, was magnificent. It moved as fast as a rocket, almost entirely eschewed lumbering plot discussions, and featured many of the most innovative and exciting sequences of the entire filmed Star Wars series.




• In fact, this might rank among my favourite moments of nerd cool ever committed to film and accounts for why my favourite Jedi ever is Mace Windu (well, that and the casting of Samuel L. Jackson, who I won't hear a bad word said against). Whenever people complain about ADD editing in action movies, complaining about Michael Bay and his ilk, I want to show them that clip to prove that there are still people who understand how to construct, block, and edit an action scene so that it not only makes sense but also generates the majority of its emotional charge through rhythm and escalation.
• There is nothing even vaguely as cool as that in the new movie, and by the end of the film I was falling asleep from the repetitive fight scenes, but early on there are some fun moments. As I said, I probably won't ever rewatch this, but I keep watching the Tartakovsky version over and over again because it is so unbelievably cool and fun and fast-paced and even, at times, epic in a way even the live-action movies forget to be. It's kind of an insult to the great man that Lucas never thought to bump his work onto the big screen, but was happy to do that for something that is bland and underachieving in comparison.
  




• It struck me mid-way through the current Clone Wars movie that it's very odd to be watching a story told in this order. First the last three films, then two prequels, the previous Clone Wars series, the last prequel, and now another story set between the series and Revenge of the Sith. As a result we've had to deal with a lot of cognitive dissonance as we are expected to feel empathy for a bunch of Clone Troopers we know have been subconsciously programmed to kill Jedi on command, and overlook the fact that the hero of The Clone Wars, Anakin, has been given a Padawan trainee, the obnoxious Ahsoka Tano, who is only a little older than the "younglings" he massacres in Sith. I doubt that introducing a young character is a way to foreshadow that, as the film never hints that that is to come, and she seems merely to be an audience surrogate for the kids the film is aimed at, but it did make me a bit uncomfortable.
• Nice touch getting Christopher Lee back to play Count Dooku. He added some class to the proceedings. Sam Jackson, on the other hand, got to say nothing particularly interesting. Wasted opportunity.




• The conversations between Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Ahsoka are endlessly dull, going around in circles and never containing even an atom of wit. Midway through one of these seemingly infinite back-and-forths (many of which repeat information from earlier on, betraying its multi-episode TV origins), I realised that if the terrifying hyper-sensitive Political Correctness Gone Really Mad future world of Demolition Man ever came to pass, Lucas-style banter would be what replaces humour. It was an epiphany that chilled me to the bone, and made me want to see Pineapple Express and Tropic Thunder even more than I already do (i.e. a lot).
• Clone troopers know martial arts? Whuh?
• Er...
• That's it.

Oh, and Moriarty continues to be the best thing about Ain't It Cool News. Lucas should send him a bunch of flowers or a few hundred thousand unsold action figures for treating with such childish disdain. Lucasarts, though it might occasionally strike gold, has no class. ::Prepares for hissy fit from visionary director of THX 1138::

Ashes To Ashes Episode 1.1: Is There Life Beyond Mars?

Last week we got the opportunity to find out whether the BBC could replicate the success of Life On Mars with Ashes To Ashes. The verdict is very much yes and no, at least according to the media. Critical reaction varied wildly, from AA Gill in the Sunday Times and Sam Wollaston in The Guardian who hated it, to Hermione Eyre in the Independent On Sunday and Gerard O’Donovan in the Telegraph who loved it. In between, the Independent’s Robert Hanks thought it moderately good and Helen Rumbelow in The Times said it showed promise, while in The Observer Kathryn Flett deemed it quite poor. Here in webland, the forumers of Digital Spy largely wailed and bemoaned the new show, while over at Television Without Pity it was received, almost without exception, rapturously.

But as we’ve seen, it was the press who built Gene Hunt up as the star of Life On Mars and often ignored the more cerebral sci-fi aspects of the show in favour of lionising the 1970s, so we can safely assume that literally none of those people have any idea what they’re talking about (Wollaston, you’re not even trying – see me after class). Meanwhile, it seems the web denizens who disliked it did so mainly because it was not Life On Mars, which makes you wonder why they didn’t just spend the evening with their lovely Simmful Mars DVDs instead. Many reactions, even positive ones, compared episode one of Ashes To Ashes unfavourably with the original series, which considering Mars had 16 episodes – and bearing in mind it took a good six or seven of those to really hit its stride – seems unfair, not to mention pointless. Ashes has set itself up as a different show from the start and the first episode was a cracking success, albeit with one or two missteps.

Within the first ten minutes DI Alex Drake was established as a working single mother and clever police psychologist who has made a close study of Sam Tyler’s case and subsequent suicide. She was also called to a hostage situation, terrified, captured, taken to an abandoned boat on the Thames and shot in the head. No messing around. She awoke on the same boat in 1981, wearing a fantastic outfit that all at once demonstrated she was deep undercover, showcased the garish fashions of the time and allowed Keeley Hawes to show off her ace pins.


She was taken hostage (again – d’oh!) only to be rescued by Hunt and his sidekicks, at which point she went a bit funny. Several reviews have commented on Drake’s supposedly unprofessional behaviour, fainting and shrieking and crawling over the bonnet of an Audi Quattro in an unseemly manner. Presumably when these reviewers were shot in the head and transported 27 years back in time, they weren’t disoriented at all! After the whirlwind beginning, the middle half-hour of the episode was non-stop delight, as Drake was forced to deal with the old-fashioned coppers while she came to terms with having the same fantasy as her study subject.

Although she quickly realised that the key to Hunt’s current case was the man who shot her in the “present” and used her modern analytical prowess to ensnare him, she hasn’t yet realised that – like Tyler – she has emerged from her trauma into a hugely significant period of her own “real” life. Whereas for Tyler it was the year his father left, for Drake it is several months before her parents died – an event mentioned by her captor in 2008. This is fine plotting. Not only did it give Drake a case to solve in episode 1.1, it gives the series a mystery arc that will no doubt be gradually revealed week by week.

The last 15 minutes were a bit wonky, unfortunately. The final showdown was set up by a transparently ludicrous scheme involving Chris Skelton and new cast member Shaz Granger (Montserrat Lombard from BBC1’s Love Soup), a ruse that might have been designed to get the young WPC abducted. During the gunfight that followed, I half expected Graham Chapman’s colonel character to wander on and order them to stop because it was getting far too silly.


And when Hunt, Skelton and Ray Carling turned up with machine guns on a BLOODY SPEEDBOAT to save the day (a day which in any case didn’t need much saving), the show surely tipped over into parody. But the resolution was nicely handled, particularly Drake’s understanding that she did not need simply to arrest her 2008 assailant just to get back home, prompted by Granger’s endearingly artless musings on death.


Despite the occasionally overdone 1981 touches – I think I could have done without the coppers singing Shaddup You Face to an Italian barman – the programme showed a sense for period detail as astute as that of Life On Mars; I especially enjoyed Drake’s white leather jacket, echoing Tyler’s ever-present coat in Mars. As for characters, WPC Granger (a nod to Harry Potter?) is already a decent addition – a sweet and down-to-earth figure similar to Mars’s Cartwright, but clearly meant as a love interest for Skelton – and I thought it was a nice touch to have the bluff Carling tell Drake about how Tyler had returned to them in 1973, which she couldn’t know because it was his death in 2006 that precipitated this. I was, however, a little disturbed by 1981-vintage Carling’s resemblance to Reed Rothchild.


He has other interests – he’s a magician! Dean Andrews handled this well. Philip Glenister was his usual larger-than-life self, although with a few reflective moments that suggest Hunt may have been through changes (or, as the programme would probably have it, ch-ch-ch-changes), and bounced nicely off Hawes, who was excellent in the main role. Some critics hammered her for all the shrieky stuff, seemingly forgetting that John Simm spent much of Life On Mars grabbing his head, talking near-gibberish and howling like a bereaved Noddy Holder. And for pity’s sake, she’s been shot in the head and sent back to 1981! Hawes did absolutely fine with everything the role threw at her, and even fleetingly displayed a hitherto unseen talent for comedy.


So episode 1.1 was by no means flawless, and at times it was trying a bit too hard to attract viewers, even for a pilot. Props to my girlfriend for pointing out that it also ignored its own internal logic by having scenes that did not feature Drake, which should be impossible if you accept that it’s her fantasy – unlike Life On Mars, which went out of its way to ensure Tyler appeared in every single scene. I suppose this might be due to the growing perception that Hunt is the real star (Glenister has also moved up to the top of the credits). But overall it was a great episode, both in itself and as a setup for the rest of the series, and I have every confidence that it can become as good as Mars did – and will possibly get there more quickly.

ETA: I feel I would be remiss if I did not mention Ashes’ replacement of Tyler’s test card girl with a clown, or strictly speaking a pierrot, from the eponymous David Bowie video. Although I don’t go along with the current coulrophobic consensus – seriously, it’s just a dude in a suit with some white slap on – I found this vision much more explicitly nightmarish than the little girl with the doll, especially when he took a run at Drake in the junkyard. I also liked that Drake was prepared to turn and face the pallid fiend, just one of the many subtle bits of character portrait that were scattered through the episode.


Hunt’s line of the week

Has to be his opening line, delivered to the sleaze who takes UndercoverDrake hostage:

Today, my friend, your diary entry will read, ‘Took a prossie hostage, and was shot by three armed bastards’!

Speaking of which…

Sleaze of the week

Life On Mars had a few memorable villains, notably Marc Warren in episode 2.1, but for me Ashes has already beaten them hands down by casting Adam James – last seen in the Extras Christmas special as slimy agent Tre – as a City boy/drug dealer. James almost smells of the 1980s; he could, and possibly does, teach a degree course in Advanced Sleaze at the University of Sleaze:


Eugh.

Most disturbing announcement by a one-handed childhood icon of the week

Zippy: Forget your mum, Molly. She’s never coming back.

Gorgeously cinematic/silly/genius/hilarious/unbearably pretentious shot of the week



Amusing 1981 reference of the week

Drake: There’s nothing on this hard drive but the time and date.
Hunt: Pong! I’ve got Pong.

Inappropriate Hunt moment of the week

It would be his pronouncement that an armed Drake in leather gave him “the horn”, had it not been for his reaction to Drake’s feeling of his heartbeat. Which was somewhat different from Cartwright’s when Tyler did the same to her in Life On Mars.



Speech we’d better get used to hearing over the opening credits every week of the week

My name is Alex Drake. I’ve just been shot and that bullet has sent me back to 1981. I may be one second away from life, or one second away from death. They say that as you die, your life flashes before you. All those memories and mistakes that form us. Well, bring it on. My life can flash away as much as it likes because I am not going to die. I’m coming back to you, Molly.

Complex Sci-Fi/Fantasy Is From Mars, Gritty Police Drama Is From Venus

I’ve spent the last week and a half watching the BBC show Life On Mars, the first series DVD box set of which was a gift from friends this Christmas. (We introduced them to Veronica Mars last Christmas, so there was a certain symmetry to this.) My girlfriend and I were sceptical about the show at first. We reasoned that it had never appealed enough to encourage us to watch it when it was on TV, and that we generally find current British drama uninspiring and inferior to US programmes. We also heeded the words of Admiral Neck, who had not watched much of the show but mentioned how much Britain’s rightwing newspaper pundits loved its supposedly joyful evocation of policing in 1970s, largely free from such “politically correct” concerns as sexual equality and citizens’ rights. Meanwhile leftwing groups such as the NASUWT condemned its use of homophobic language. Despite the assurances of the friends who gave it to us (whose recommendations are normally reliable), it didn’t seem an attractive prospect.

It took us a few weeks to get around to it, but when we did crack open series one, it lasted a matter of days, and we immediately bought and consumed the second series too. It is terrific for a number of reasons, but the main one is that it’s a thoughtful slice of complex sci-fi masquerading as a knockabout police show. And its creators got it on BBC1 in prime time. And it was a huge hit. This was an astonishing achievement.

DCI Sam Tyler, the modern Manchester copper who wakes up in 1973 after he is hit by a car, is not the simplistic Connecticut Yankee the premise might suggest. I assumed there would be some ambivalence throughout about whether Tyler was really stranded in the 1970s or imagining it, but it quickly becomes apparent that he is in a coma – he hears the beeping of the life support machine and the voices of doctors and family members imploring him to hold on – and we are left in no doubt that Tyler’s journey is about finding a way “home”, or back to his real life. Whether his comatose fantasies would really take place in traditional hour-long three-act form is beside the point. Creators Matthew Graham, Tony Jordan and Ashley Pharoah have delivered a classic sci-fi/fantasy platform used by everything from The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz to ET: The Extra-Terrestrial to 12 Monkeys to The League Of Gentlemen: the stranger in a strange land, trying to negotiate the unfamiliar and get home safely. They do this to enable the show to perform that other classic function of science fiction, especially when it’s time travel-based: portraying, and satirising, a clash of civilisations.


The conflict in Life On Mars comes mainly, as you’d expect, from the difference between sensitive, educated Tyler’s approach to police work and the instinctive, often brutish methods of his boss Gene Hunt. (Tyler’s presence in the station is explained by a convenient “transfer from Hyde”.) But the aforementioned rightwing columnists were wrong to suggest that the show delights in the, ah, direct methods employed by the 70s cops. Rather, these are employed as blackly comic relief – we’re invited to sympathise with Tyler, even despair along with him, as Hunt or his sidekick DS Ray Carling takes pleasure in kicking in a “nonce”.

Tyler occasionally admits that the 70s way is better in some respects – it gets results and is certainly speedier than the tedious bureaucracy of the 21st century – and, in the series one finale, he’s exposed as a hypocrite: he trusts his instincts and desires rather than the cold facts when his own father, whom he meets as a young man, becomes a suspect. This isn’t a one-way street, either. Hunt may be boorish and sometimes thuggish but he’s not stupid, and he frequently appreciates the logic and clearsightedness that Tyler brings to the job (not that he likes to admit it). It’s usually left to the virtually stone-age Carling to provide the quaint values we associate with the era, such as casual racism and suspicion of anything resembling good sense.

All the while Tyler is struggling to make sense of the world around him, both the apparent reality of Hunt and the hallucinations he suffers – as well as hearing voices, he is visited in dreams by the TV test card girl, offering cryptic advice and scaring the bejesus out of him. Tyler confides in WPC Annie Cartwright, a down-to-earth sort who demonstrates remarkable patience as well as considerable intelligence, leading to her promotion to detective in series two (at Tyler’s instigation and against Carling’s wishes, naturally). He also builds a rapport with young detective Chris Skelton, who is open to “modern” ideas, and Nelson, the black barman of the local pub who covers his Yorkshire accent with a Caribbean lilt that he thinks will comfort his regulars. Each episode starts out with a standard police-drama plot – a dead body, a hostage crisis, a bomb threat – but Life On Mars uses these as a framework for skilfully woven drama that examines the culture clash astutely, again in the best sci-fi tradition.


We are never allowed to forget Tyler’s desire to get home, although Mars slips up with this strand occasionally. Some clunkingly awful dialogue reminds the audience that he is trapped in the “wrong” time: when Skelton refers to someone as being “like David Janssen in The Fugitive”, Tyler says, “You mean Harrison Ford”. This in the tenth episode! When Tyler has been going on about being stuck in 1973 for months! Of course he doesn’t mean Harrison Ford, you idiot! Tyler is also unnecessarily smug at times, even bearing in mind that he has three decades more progress under his belt than the other officers. It takes an intensely charismatic performance from a likeable actor to get you on Tyler’s side, and not surprisingly John Simm delivers. He’s thoroughly convincing as he swings between confusion and terror on one hand and dignified professionalism in adversity on the other. He’s also pretty sexy, something I didn’t believe until I watched this.

It’s Philip Glenister as Hunt who has proved the breakout star of the show, though, and this isn’t surprising either. I expected Life On Mars to be more of an archetypal two-hander, a classical dialogue between the enlightened man and the fool, but it’s Simm’s central turn that carries it. Even so, Glenister casts the longest shadow with a peformance of rare energy and wit. Sometimes the show lacks the courage of its convictions – it tries to address racism in series two and dares to use the term “Paki” but shies away from any stronger insults, which must have been in currency – but Glenister never does. Hunt truly believes in his methods and his motives, and you don’t doubt it for a moment.

Life On Mars isn’t perfect. As well as the aforementioned daft dialogue (the prosaic Hunt improbably refers to himself in the third person as “the Gene Genie” for no other reason than to continue the David Bowie motif) and occasional reticence about the big issues, some episodes are oddly directed and – especially early on – somewhat flabby and overextended. During series one, I often felt it would have benefited from the 45-minute runtime of a Doctor Who rather than a full hour. (I did come to find some of the flaws endearing, particularly the clunky expositionary lines, which reminded me that this was broadcast in primetime on BBC bloody One.)

But the show’s problems are largely corrected in series two, especially by the time it reaches the final three episodes. Episode 2.6 is close to being my favourite, not only because it guest-stars the breathtakingly hot Alex Reid – last seen getting really, really stabbed in the neck during the most horrific caving trip in history (she definitely would not rather be spelunking) – but also because semi-legendary comedy writer Guy Jenkin provides the cracking dialogue.

Skelton: I wonder what killed him?
Hunt: That’ll be the bloody enormous hole in his chest where the bullet went in!

Cartwright: Boss? There’s a viscous yellow liquid in his ear.
Hunt: No, that’s a drip from my fried egg butty, love. Well done, Miss Marple. That’s why we need women detectives.

Tyler: I think we need to explore whether this attempted murder was a hate crime.
Hunt: As opposed to one of those “I really really like you” sort of murders?

Hunt: Now, yesterday’s shooting. The dealers are all so scared we’re more likely to get Helen Keller to talk. The Paki in a coma’s about as lively as Liberace’s dick when he’s looking at a naked woman. All in all, this investigation’s going at the speed of a spastic in a magnet factory.
Tyler: I think you might have missed out the Jews.

But it’s the superb final two episodes that crystallise what Life On Mars is about. In 2.7, Hunt is accused of murder and while he’s banged up, acting DCI Frank Morgan (a splendidly creepy turn from, of all people, Ralph Brown) tells Tyler that the reason Tyler is there is to force Hunt out. Once he does, he can come back to Hyde. Tyler seizes on this, believing it to be his subconscious’s way of telling him how he can wake up, but he finds he can’t help but prove Hunt innocent. This raises all sorts of questions – can Hunt’s means-to-an-end methods be justified? What does Tyler believe in? Where does he belong? Is Morgan the surgeon from the hospital where Tyler is lying comatose? Does Tyler owe his 1973 colleagues loyalty even if they’re figments of his imagination?

Before these are answered, Morgan tells Tyler – in a clear echo of Terry Gilliam’s superlative time-travel fable 12 Monkeys – that everything he thinks is wrong. He is not in a coma in 2006; he has amnesia; his persona is an undercover one they constructed between them using names from gravestones; and that this, 1973, is reality. Tyler has no way of knowing whether this is truth or his mind telling him that he is slipping away, that he has accepted his fate. The questions are still unanswered when he awakes – at the worst possible moment. Episode 2.8 is a thrilling, dizzying, heartbreaking, ferociously intelligent hour of TV that should stand as an exemplar to everyone else making drama in this country.

The review quotes on the DVD boxes say “The best police drama since the 70s” and “A thumpingly enjoyable piece of television”. Neither is wrong, but they don’t even come close to describing the triumph of the show. Obviously I meant the title of this post as a rather convoluted bit of punning whimsy, but it does apply. Just as men and women can learn to live together (despite those oh-so-significant differences!), Life On Mars is a wonderfully harmonious marriage of sci-fi and police drama. So harmonious, in fact, that – at the risk of repeating myself – it drew between five and seven million viewers to BBC1 at 9pm, even when up against the ratings behemoth of Champions League football on ITV. The end of series two was watched by 7.7 million. Such a large mainstream audience must have included a large number of people who never thought they’d watch sci-fi, let alone such complex, thought-provoking sci-fi.

The spin-off/sequel to Life On Mars, Ashes To Ashes, starts this Thursday. It’ll be fascinating to see how the show will do without Simm. I’m a fan of his replacement, Keeley Hawes, and making the central character a woman should certainly provide a welcome twist, as will shifting the action to Thatcherite London in 1981. But can it survive the artificial recreation of its original premise with a different character? Possibly. Let’s face it, the concept is artificial enough as it is, and I hear that the writers have got around the problem of why Hawes’s Alex Drake ends up in the same fantasy as Tyler by making her a student of Tyler’s case. But there’s a danger Ashes won’t thrive in its Simmlessness; Hawes, though talented, has never demonstrated comparable warmth and presence, and it remains to be seen whether she can carry off the deranged, dislocated despair that lies at the show’s heart, or whether she’ll even be asked to. I’m hopeful, though, and I’m remembering that I didn’t expect much from Life On Mars.

Puppet Angel PWNs Halo 3 (Updated)

And bodyslams Warren Ellis, apparently.


As reported everywhere, the collectors edition has a knackered supplementary disc thanks to it popping out of place in transit and sliding around, so I have to take it back. That was the same thing that happened with Warner Bros.' Superman special edition, wasn't it? Whatever. I'm just enjoying the game right now. Brutes may growl and shake their heads in anger at me, but I've got a hammer, a power drain, a fully loaded assault rifle, four grenades, and a backup squad of chatty Marines, so I'm not scared no mo'.

And will someone hire Martin O'Donnell to score a movie, for crying out loud??!?!? I see he's listed as composer on the abandoned Halo movie, which is fantastic news. Shame it's not being made right now. Here's hoping huge sales change the minds of the movie moguls.

I got my copy yesterday morning, and the guys in the shop told me a queue started at 3 in the afternoon the day before. A guy had made a sign saying, "Queue starts here". Funny. And then he got moved on by the town's shocktroopers as he was causing an obstruction. Killjoys. Political correctness gone etc.!!!

ETA: I was wrong about Edge. They gave it one of their hallowed 10 ratings and acted like it was the best game ever. Perhaps it is in the multiplayer mode, but even just single player, it's still amazing. A raucous battle involving Mongooses (futuristic Earth motorcycles) and pillion-riding, rocket-launcher-using Marines shooting down Banshees was already wonderful before an enormous Scarab turns up to kill everything in sight, prior to Master Chief leaping onto it and destroying its reactor. Thank you, Bungie, thank you for making my heart sing!