Jack Off

There must be an art to TV scheduling, however doubtful that appears. If so, it’s a shame that all the hours spent staring, furrow-browed, at the big board, inevitably feels like the decision making came down to the toss of a coin or use of a blindfold and pin once programme titles were pulled out of a hat, before everyone clears their desks for the day and pisses off to the pub.

In the broader scheme there’s always a sense that summer schedules are the dumping ground for the gormless tat nobody will admit to commissioning. After all, aren’t audiences expected to be away from the sets, out gambolling in the sunshine? Which means that for folk deciding not to huddle on a windswept south-coast beach, be stuck in a traffic jam, or link arms with the beer-bellied baldies stomping down a high street bellowing out the name of their favourite team, pickings on the box are slim at best.

With so many additional seasonal sporting fixtures also barging their way onto the screen to greedily suck up the oxygen of airtime, the schedules are as dried up as a Mother Superior’s snatch purse. In fact the only consolation comes during international events when newscasts show the soccer louts, miffed at seeing their team subjected to a good trouncing, being tear-gassed in some European capital for smashing up a sidestreet café.

On the other hand, at this time of year, when people are still paying off Christmas or stuck indoors because a couple feet of snow has brought the country to a virtual standstill, the schedules are absolutely groaning with damn good television. In some respect it’s a shame that they’ve all pretty much arrived at once rather than be strung out across the year so at least there will be something good on, even if it’s rationed to one show a week.

Generation Kill has passed the halfway mark and Battlestar Galactica really is now down to the final five. At least there’s the second season of Mad Men and the final year of The Shield to tide us over when they disappear from view. But once they’re gone, then what? What will be left when all the Norbert Bumhat’s crawl out of the woodwork, soiling their underwear as they gush over the genius of Doctor Who and Torchwood, not realizing that making such erroneous pronouncements instantly identifies them as total dickheads.

Still, such concerns are for a later date. No doubt that will really be the time to whinge. In the meantime it seems disingenuous to carp on about some measly godawful piece of rot when there are enough riches on offer. In fact, in this situation, the nonsensical dramas I’d usually be spewing bile at can be watched simply for a bit of a laugh. Which is why for the past three weeks I’ve watched ITV’s utterly nonsensical Whitechapel. At least that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.

It wasn’t that I watched it in favour of Moses Jones, which was on the other side for the same three Mondays. I caught the BBC2 drama on iPlayer, where I could sit and concentrate on the story. Whitechapel, it was quite easy to determine, was just more filler for dead air, playing in the background while I ate my dinner and tidied up around me. A modern-day Jack the Ripper, artfully recreating the murders from 1888, might have seemed like a half decent idea but once again it proved to be a concept in search of a story.

With history repeating itself, there was bound to be no resolution: The murderer would remain an enigmatic cipher, the mystery, once again, unsolved. Where’s the real fun in that? So instead the story turned out to be about the fast-tracked, OCD-inflicted new DI and his team of old school, deodorant-free detectives (obviously still smarting at failing the Life on Mars auditions), putting aside their prejudices and finally working together as a team.

When it comes down to the inspector and his sergeant bonding over koi carp and lager, you know you’re onto a wrong ‘un. With the final victim saved, the hairless “John Doe” killer chucked himself into the Thames as penance for his failure, the detectives gathered together and, with a bit of playful joshing, walked off into the night. It wouldn’t have surprised me if one of them remarked to the other, “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” No wonder ITV is circling the drain.

From the outset I was trying to think of what Whitechapel could be compared to and to begin with the only thing I could come up with was a poodle squatting in a park on a blustery day, shaking as it bravely squeezed out a magnificent swirl of steaming dog toffee while it’s embarrassed owner looked away. In the end, the closest I could come up with was Messiah, based on Boris Starling’s novel, in which the police spend ages wracking their brains trying to figure out the link behind the series of ritualistic killings under investigation.

Even when the police eventually make the connection, all they have to go on is the name of the victim, his suggested profession and Saints Day date. In Whitechapel the contemporary of Abberline and his men are directed toward the pattern of killings pretty much from the get go yet, armed with the dates, locations, and description of the intended victims, these Keystone Cops still fail to stop further murders being committed during the next episode.

Whereas the camera in Messiah took in the sheer horror of the serial murders, the same scenes in Whitechapel looked like the Avid was commandeered by an epileptic during an earthquake. Was the staccato editing of the sodium yellow-drenched eviscerated bodies a stylistic device? Or, given the chirpy voiceover reminding viewers that ITV drama is sponsored by Sainbury’s, was the rapid jump-cutting simply a lame excuse for shying away from pushing the boundaries of taste?