I’m going to lay this down and back away guiltily: I think American TV is superior to ours.
Oh sure, we’ve had the likes of The Office, Peep Show, Spaced, Sherlock and Black Books, but who can honestly think of a British show that has the complexity and visceral power of modern American drama? I certainly can’t. That’s not to say I blame a lack of talent – if anything British writers have proved again and again to be some of the most innovative in the world.
But the fact remains that we live in a country with a production culture that is neither conducive nor encouraging to creating really memorable drama.
Lack of upfront funding, short seasons and a far smaller and more centralised group of production companies mean that writing and producing long plot arcs is particularly difficult. In America, shows can run for 12, 13 or even 20 seasons. Sometimes, this can result in derivative crap, but other times it can lend a freedom and vitality to a show that makes it practically canonical.
More than anything, what American TV does well is that it establishes an emotional rapport with its audience. The reason that people are still watching in Season 8 isn’t purely down to successful writing, it’s also a consequence of having an exceptionally solid sense of what people are watching for. It’s brand management at its best and most refined, and we ought to take note.
The Classic
This might be cheating a bit considering it hasn’t yet finished, but given that it could easily warrant a Nerding Out On of its own, I don’t care. Breaking Bad is the best TV series of all time, period. The only show that comes close to its greatness is The Sopranos, but even that might soon be eclipsed by its final half-season.
Why? For the simple reason that it has never put a foot wrong; every episode is perfectly crafted, complex, surprising and daring. In Walter White, Vince Gilligan has created one of the best protagonists of any drama, TV or otherwise. He is an embodiment of American confliction; alternatively loving, sympathetic and brutish. Nor in fact do any of the characters feel clichéd. Special mention has to go to Gus Fring, played by Giancarlo Esposito – you won’t find a more horrible or polite villain anywhere else.
The Cult Favourite
If you lived through the nineties and you were above the age of 16, then you probably couldn’t miss Twin Peaks. Nonetheless, for the younger and the unacquainted amongst us, let me introduce the strangest detective drama you’ll ever see. If dancing dwarves, mysterious apparitions and a personified log all sounds a bit much, trust me, you’ll get used to it. Though only two seasons were ever made, it’s impossible not to become invested in the plight of Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) and his attempts to understand a high school student’s brutal murder. What David Lynch succeeds in doing here perhaps more than he ever did is to make his surrealist style approachable and fitting; the characters are thoughtful, their dialogue is witty and the subplots frequently moving. It also has a corker of a theme tune.
The Runt
The massive anti-climax that was Scandal is testament to the fact that wherever good TV happens, bad TV will follow. The promise of a decent cast led by Kerry Washington and the production team behind Grey’s Anatomy fell flat on its face when it combined to make this steaming bowl of incomprehensibility. It was all the cast could do to make a decent turn out of the script, which was so erratically put together that it wasn’t always clear if we were watching a political drama or a montage of people speaking in run-on sentences. The lesson to be learnt from Scandal is that trying to recreate a previous show’s success will inevitably fail, because the power of drama lies in its ability to keep us guessing.
The Verdict
Whilst I sincerely hope that one day the Brit industry catches up with its counter-part across the pond, until that time I must declare myself a televisual traitor. We are a nation that produces short-lived and therefore poignant brilliance, but we have yet to create a sustained drama that really flexes our abundant talent. Unless the BBC can create a robotic David Suchet, we need to start investing time and money into new talent before the best are cherry picked by Hollywood. Actually, Suchet as Robocop might have something in it – let me write that down…
Jess O’Kane, Senior Screen Reporter
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