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AE on Telly News (NEW CONCEPTS)
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Mick Harper
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I am very impressed by Roger Stone (last night's Anderson Cooper 360 on CNN, required viewing at least while Trump is in office).
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Mick Harper
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I am prepared to accept a black thegn at the court of Macbeth, I am prepared to accept a black Marie Curie, but I am not prepared to accept a black house-guest in an Agatha Christie. Why not? Well, the whole point is to guess whodunnit and I cannot believe that Ms Christie would place a black adoptee in a fifties upper class household in one of her books. A maharajah's illegitimate son possibly but this character appears to be sui generis. So it must be a choice on the part of the BBC production team with a quota to fill. Would they choose a black actor to play the murderer's role? Not on their nellies, so she's out. But that means the bloke she's in cahoots with can't very well... Well, I won't spoil it for you.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Agatha wrote:
'Tina's always the dark horse…Perhaps it's the half of her that isn't white.'"


Bloody BBC have typecast this poor girl.

BTW they changed the identity of the murderer.....
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Mick Harper
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The producer dunnit.
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Hatty
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Channel 4 had a programme on the Roman town of Chester. It was a port at the north-westernmost edge of the Roman Empire and considered by some archaeologists to have been originally intended as the Roman capital of Britain. All very promising but it turned out rather boring. A bit of wall, street layout, not much to see.

Then, in 1929, archaeologists uncovered an amphitheatre, the largest so far found in the country. Nothing happened though for seventy-five years until in 2004 they began the excavation. The programme presenter, Prof. Alice Roberts, didn't ask about such an unconscionably long delay, extraordinary even allowing for the 1939-45 war. Perhaps archaeologists are bored too. The Romans must have left a good deal to excavate after staying four hundred or so years. The Anglo-Saxons considerably less after staying five or six hundred years.
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Mick Harper
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One thing rarely pointed out is that Chester can only exist as an important town in this precise location to service a flourishing trade with Ireland (and western Scotland). The Romans never bothered much with either place but the Megalithics did.
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Hatty
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A reconstruction of the recruitment process for Special Operations Executive formed in July 1940 included a rather beautiful black woman. SOE's remit was to drop agents behind enemy lines from where they would carry out sabotage, organise escape routes, relay messages and so on.

The programme-makers were at pains to make every detail authentic and assured us that SOE recruited women and people with disabilities, both of whom would be common enough everywhere, but a black woman in 1940's occupied Europe surely could never have escaped notice?
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Mick Harper
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Are you suggesting the Nazis used racial profiling?
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Mick Harper
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To understand the true professionalism of SOE you need only know the following statistic, mentioned in the programme (apparently with approval)

Up to 30% of candidates failed the course

Now given that the job involved skills that were not only of a high order but that by definition none of the candidates could possibly have had at the outset (and that the penalty for failure in carrying them out was death not just for the candidate but for any number of resistants) one would think that the failure rate ought not to be 'up to 30%' but more like 'over 95%'. But this is Britain in the Second World War. Amateur Hour for five and half years.
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Wile E. Coyote


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Hatty wrote:


The programme-makers were at pains to make every detail authentic and assured us that SOE recruited women and people with disabilities, both of whom would be common enough everywhere, but a black woman in 1940's occupied Europe surely could never have escaped notice?


You have to admire the genius of this SOE ruse, lesser minds would have opted for Aryan looking types to try and fit in, but that is exactly what the Hun would have expected the Brits to do.
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Hatty
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The programme's voice-over explained this was the first time that an operation of this kind was set up. The Germans weren't expecting the SOE. But is it true?
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Mick Harper
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That was the silliest statement I heard before giving up. The Germans themselves operated something similar, the Brandenburg Regiment. In fact everybody has some sort of capability in this direction. It's just that most people's enemies are not as foolish as the Germans i.e. occupying other people's countries indefinitely for no obvious purpose. Unless you're an empire of course and are doing so permanently.
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Mick Harper
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Salamander (BBC-4)

Why does everyone have better slimeballs than we do?
Why does everyone make better crime dramas than we do?
Funnily enough I've always wanted to be a Belgian. Too late now, I suppose. Young man's game.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Mick Harper wrote:

Why does everyone make better crime dramas than we do?


Probably because you only see the quality imports that BBC and Channel 4 have commissioned.

Your average Italian is most probably flicking TV channels wondering when his next Inspector Montalbano will be coming back for another series. He then boots his Tv across the room as the next best thing is Young Inspector Montalbano. Huh that's as creative as a Young Morse....

Then suddenly they hit on Gomorrah and......Maltese the Sicilian Detective, set in the 70s, all intrigue, nostalgia and the best moustache since Magnum, my god, he could be a young Mick Harper.

They have even recreated a fantastically hot sizzling .......Letizia Battaglia

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/feb/20/letizia-battaglia-best-photograph-mafia
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Mick Harper
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Probably because you only see the quality imports that BBC and Channel 4 have commissioned.

Obviously. My comment was largely rhetorical. But this raises some important points

1. Tiny televisual countries like Belgium and Denmark seem to be churning out good stuff over and above chance expectation
2. There are an infinite supply of crime dramas in the world and always have been, therefore there is a smaller but still infinite supply of good crime dramas in the world and always have been
3. Only in the very recent past has British TV recognised and exploited this fact (except in the case of American crime dramas)
4. But only for minority channels because of the subtitles factor
5. And yet most crime dramas could easily be shot simultaneously with the actors speaking local and English dialogue (as many feature films are)
6. There is also the (British) back catalogue which is mainly ignored. An eighties (I judge from the dialogue) G F Newman series Law and Order is currently going out at 10 pm Thursdays (BBC-4 of course). Best thing on telly.
7. It may be me but British crime drama is suffering from too much sociology. I think it probably is me because if the Guardian gives anything a rave nowadays it is unwatchable because of too many a) women b) blacks c) neurotics d) handicapped e) northerners. And that’s just the detectives.

Come on, programme-makers, look at the real world for a change. It’s wall-to-wall bent coppers and dodgy moguls out there. Stay safe.
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