Thank you so much - reading the user reviews here was the funniest half hour I've had in ages I was weeping with laughter which is more than I can say for the experience of watching a couple of episodes of the show itself. There's nothing like a truly terrible show to bring out the wit and brilliance in people's writing.
I'd love to have agreed with those "so bad it's good" reviewers who enjoyed it like an illicit substance but I was mostly just dumbstruck. The problems started and ended with the script: this isn't the first show to be made on a shoestring, and the actors really did throw themselves into their parts but come ON! Maybe those responsible for creating and greenlighting it were on some miraculous substance themselves. Lots of shows have a preposterous premise, dodgy "science", poor story lines and so on and so on but they don't all end up like this. The scriptwriters should get together with Guy "Revolver" Ritchie and make the World's Most Dreadful Psycho-Drama Ever. I'll be there, weeping.
But, oh Adrian Lester, what were you thinking?! I know, actors have got to eat and all that but couldn't starvation have been at least a temporary alternative? You're better than this!
One final gripe: I've got to take up the reviewer who was disgruntled at the existence of, not one (gasp!), but TWO (GASP!), black archaeologists in this show. I'm getting strange flashbacks here "55 Degrees North" took hits from cynical reviewers who saw only the PC brigade where they should have seen something better-natured. Gosh, don't you think that it would be pretty great if the presence of two, whole, black archaeologists on this show inspired even ONE budding young non-white 'bonekicker' of the future to alter the racial imbalance in this field - an imbalance this very reviewer admits to?! But of course this isn't what the BBC should be doing, is it? The BBC should be doing nothing but entertain (white) people. Which they've done very effectually for a very long time. Now it's time to reflect the viewers they actually have, even at the expense of so-called "accuracy". So get used to this, quickly: not everyone in Britain is like you: perhaps the stultifying world of archaeology needs just this reminder from the BBC, no less of its own long overdue obligation to seek a wider academic spread and fanbase.
I'm off to think about how this show could have been any worse. Perhaps if Worzel Gummidge were in it...no wait - a song & dance sequence!
I'd love to have agreed with those "so bad it's good" reviewers who enjoyed it like an illicit substance but I was mostly just dumbstruck. The problems started and ended with the script: this isn't the first show to be made on a shoestring, and the actors really did throw themselves into their parts but come ON! Maybe those responsible for creating and greenlighting it were on some miraculous substance themselves. Lots of shows have a preposterous premise, dodgy "science", poor story lines and so on and so on but they don't all end up like this. The scriptwriters should get together with Guy "Revolver" Ritchie and make the World's Most Dreadful Psycho-Drama Ever. I'll be there, weeping.
But, oh Adrian Lester, what were you thinking?! I know, actors have got to eat and all that but couldn't starvation have been at least a temporary alternative? You're better than this!
One final gripe: I've got to take up the reviewer who was disgruntled at the existence of, not one (gasp!), but TWO (GASP!), black archaeologists in this show. I'm getting strange flashbacks here "55 Degrees North" took hits from cynical reviewers who saw only the PC brigade where they should have seen something better-natured. Gosh, don't you think that it would be pretty great if the presence of two, whole, black archaeologists on this show inspired even ONE budding young non-white 'bonekicker' of the future to alter the racial imbalance in this field - an imbalance this very reviewer admits to?! But of course this isn't what the BBC should be doing, is it? The BBC should be doing nothing but entertain (white) people. Which they've done very effectually for a very long time. Now it's time to reflect the viewers they actually have, even at the expense of so-called "accuracy". So get used to this, quickly: not everyone in Britain is like you: perhaps the stultifying world of archaeology needs just this reminder from the BBC, no less of its own long overdue obligation to seek a wider academic spread and fanbase.
I'm off to think about how this show could have been any worse. Perhaps if Worzel Gummidge were in it...no wait - a song & dance sequence!