Reality television. To some, the greatest thing to happen to the medium since Mr Motivator, to others, the worst thing to happen to the medium since Mr Motivator.
Courting controversy since its infancy, Reality TV has weathered many storms, from Ben Fogle's notorious "Reichstag address" speech on Castaway, to Hurricane Jade and the ethnic and intellectual cleansing of Big Brother - each series more shocking, each scenario and "high concept" more desperate and demeaning than the last. And yet, the genre endured.
With the arrival of self-parodying shows such as The Only Way Is Essex, pundits argued that the demise of true reality TV had begun. No more would the authentically shocking grace our screens - we had moved, to paraphrase Marx, from tragedy, into farce.
Or so it was assumed; that is, until The Adventures of Portland Bill.
In a recent episode, Bill's "assistants" do "a spot of cleaning"
The worst nightmare/nocturnal emission of every Daily Mail reader in the country, this unparalleled, revelatory despair has broken like a wave against our collective consciousness, washing away our tidy 21st century illusions and leaving the reality of Modern Britain bare, revealed in all its startling truth.
Ostensibly a documentary charting the lives of three lighthouse keepers, Portland Bill plots a far darker course, deep, deep into the nation's Heart of Darkness. Social and sexual mores are brutally challenged and overturned, threaded through with biting satire, cruel humour, and jam tarts.
To suggest that this unfolding drama is Pinteresque would do Bill a disservice; it may now be more accurate to call The Homecoming Portlandesque. Unlike Pinter's harrowing, truth-revealing art, however, Portland Bill is simply, harrowingly true. Too true for many.
With calls to reinstate the death penalty to bring these keepers of depravity to justice, the public has failed to appreciate that Portland Bill is a mirror, and that like Caliban and his master, it is we who are responsible for the existence of these desperate creatures. The Adventures of Portland Bill may have triggered a knee-jerk hate mail campaign, and even questions in Parliament, but in an age of apathy and ironic detachment, it appears that only the very worst excesses of behaviour can move us. And in our apathy, from the Lizard to John O'Groats, we have let these worst excesses breed.
Perhaps the programme makers should be praised, not letter-bombed, for their brave decision not to edit or censor even the vilest acts, having the faith in their audience that we would see these wrongs, and seek to change the circumstances that created them, not damn the messenger, or the true victims - Bill, Ross and Cromarty.
Or perhaps not.
TV bosses have turned a deaf ear to the expected cries of "Ban this sick filth", but this critic wonders if the Middle England brigade may have a point. Objective reportage is all well and good, but if scenes such as the "whitewashing" of a "lighthouse" are suitable to broadcast, where do we draw the line?
With The Adventures of Portland Bill already renewed for a second season, perhaps we shall find out -for example, perhaps the keepers will have a visit from an "inspector" on "lighthouse business".
No doubt Ross should have been cleaning the steps as opposed to fishing, leading to, brace yourself, "high seas highjinks".
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