Compile a list of the subjects you thought may be unsuitable for a sitcom, and it will almost certainly include a person with learning difficulties, assisted suicide and an army bomb disposal team.
Well all three of those now exist – Derek and Way To Go have just finished their first series on Channel 4 and BBC Three respectively, and on the latter channel last night Bluestone 42, set in the Helmand province of Afghanistan, made its debut. And while the makers may have had a modern-day M*A*S*H in their heads, they have some way to go before reaching that comedy's heights - they don't even reach the level of It Ain't Half Hot Mum.
It started with someone getting his brains blown out by a sniper, a loud-mouthed CIA observer (Mike McShane, pictured right) ("When I was in Fallujah...") who - inexplicably for someone who had seen decades of active service - took off his helmet while out on patrol. Soldiers simply don't do that, no matter how hot it gets, although it has to be said the response to Bluestone 42 from servicemen and women has so far been mostly positive. I suspect, however, those bloggers aren't serving on the frontline; as the excellent Our War taught us, war kills people, messily (IEDs in particular), and there is no way you can make a feelgood sitcom about that.
That opening may seem daring, until you consider that we didn't see even a drop of blood, and in making McShane's character a boorish American the writers, James Cary and Richard Hurst (who, incidentally, have written on Miranda), indulged in lazy stereotyping and what in some quarters is considered an acceptable bit of reverse racism. I daresay we won't be seeing a local meet his death in a similarly cartoonish way over the following seven episodes.
Other than that, Bluestone 42 followed standard sitcom lines, of a group of mismatched individuals thrown together in another workplace comedy complete with annoying bosses, wacky characters and piss-taking banter.
Captain Nick Medhurst (Oliver Chris) leads a bomb disposal team. He's wisecracking, good-looking and laidback and his men include his right-hand man Millsy (Gary Carr), wannabe officer Simon (Stephen Wight) and a double act of two Scottish dogsbodies, Mac (Jamie Quinn, pictured left with Oliver Chris) and Rocket (Scott Hoatson), whose sole purpose appears to be, well, being Scottish. The only female on the team is Bird (Katie Lyons) - "called Bird, but it's OK cos that's her name" - who can burp and swear as loudly as the blokes.
Last night, Mary (Kelly Adams) the new padre, joined the base and was immediately dubbed Sister Mary despite not being a nun. She has to be female, of course, because the writers have to introduce some sexual tension in proceedings for charmer Nick, who can't consort with a non-officer.
Oliver Chris is watchable in anything - he was the funniest Bottom I've seen - but the unsubtle writing demands that he and the other actors have to telegraph emotions by gurning, and the swearing (it's shown after the watershed) is nowhere near as offensive and inventive as it should be. The gallows humour was also missing, represented here merely by one sapper's references to the dead American being greeted by "shut up" by his colleagues, and his feeble (and clichéd) response of "too soon?"
It's an interesting subject for a sitcom and I hope it settles into something less predictable and bland. But unless it turns into the new M*A*S*H - an angry satire about the futility of war that was often laugh-out-loud funny - and the writers dare to portray the sometimes grim farce of war with wit and elegance, the question will remain whether Bluestone 42 was worth making at all.
- Bluestone 42 is on BBC Three on Tuesdays
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