by The Jury: Trial of Murder (Channel 4) | channel4.com
Things You Should Do (BBC Three) | iPlayer
The Adventures of Dick Turpin completely free, (Apple TV+)
The secret world of sound by David Attenborough free, (Sky Nature)
You will find me in a state of low level shock. I can’t remember the last time I hated television so much. I’m talking about Channel 4’s The Jury: Trial of Murder, a four-part reality television social experiment that aired throughout the week. A true anonymous anonymous trial was re-enacted in the former Chelmsford courthouse, and two juries of real people delivered a verdict. Experts provide insights, while actors play advocates, the accused and witnesses. The jurors, who sit in closed court boxes, know they are being filmed, but no other jurors are there. For the first time, jury deliberations are accessible. It’s great TV but, as I say, hard work. Googling yourself might “move to another country” while you’re watching it.
The experiment focuses on whether the two juries will come to the same conclusion (states the series of research that estimates that 25% of court cases have wrong results), and whether these are consistent with the real-world verdict. The crime involves the sculptor “John”, a man with no history of violence, who killed his wife, “Helen”, first by strangling her and then smashing the sides of her head with an industrial hammer. Is he guilty of murder or manslaughter, pleading “loss of control” (which means a much lighter sentence)?
Immediately, I am bristling. The gruesome death of a woman being repurposed as… what exactly? A new form of true crime entertainment? Then again, it could be very useful to see what happens in such situations. Expecting grave scenes only, I am also irritated by the plays of underpowered witnesses, a whist of one of the murder mystery weekends that are held in homes and hotels. But it’s the jury deliberations that make the soul worse.
How unfit for purpose the show makes the UK judicial system look; how random, how fragile
Jurors are shown to take absurdly entrenched positions early and refuse to budge. Others cannot see their own memories of “red mists” (spent cups of tea; convoluted dramas involving cars), or their own irrelevant life experiences (one juror wants to hug John as it is also called fat).
Although Helen was clearly a troubled, volatile person with major mental health issues, there is sometimes victim blaming (“she didn’t deserve to die but she wanted to”) and turbo misogyny straight out of the Salem witch trial manual. . Tall, dominant characters (self-styled puppet masters) delight in swaying others. It seems worth punching the air.
Mindful of spoilers, I’ll leave it at that. Of course, he does not overreact. The Jury: Trial of Murder an experiment being made for television, and you can’t help but suspect that some of the biggest characters on the jury are mugging for the cameras. However, how unfit for purpose the show makes the UK judicial system look; how random, how fragile. This is exciting but disturbing television: The Traitors with real life consequences.
To better yourself, BBC Three’s new six-part comedy, Things You Should Do, created by and starring Lucia Keskin. Keskin (last seen as Kelly in Big Boys) plays Chi, a gen Z “stay-at-home daughter” who is out of the blue to a level that apparently requires urgent medical intervention. When her parents die, she is told that she can only inherit their Ramsgate house if she fulfills a list of conditions (learn to drive, read a book, etc). Meanwhile, her aunt “diagnosed uptight” (Selin Hizli from Am I Being Unreasonable?), called Karen (natch), circles like an exasperated suburban vulture, itching to get his hands on the house.
Keskin is well-known for his online sketches and impressions, and (Nigella, Claudia Winkleman) are sprinkled here, along with fantasy interludes (Chi as sperm). The main pulse is Chi’s spatial dysfunction: she reacts to her parents’ death like losing her favorite scrunchie. Elsewhere, she gets too involved with everyone from driving instructors to care home residents.
There is more than a handful of Philomena Cunk in Chi, and the close interaction with her cousin (Jamie Bisping) is echoed by Daisy May Cooper. This Country. Attempts to add slices of darkness and similarities (sadness, infertility) always fail. However, impish lies with limits of taste (kidnapping children, ethical masturbation) and epic fun (I especially love Chi’s parents as rubbish, half-hearted ghosts). With some tightening of the bolts, comic chronicles of the humdrum and inappropriate are more likely to emerge.
Another new comic: a six-part Apple TV period The Adventures of Dick Turpin completely free,. Created by Claire Downes, Ian Jarvis and Stuart Lane, it stars Noel Fielding as the 18th century highwayman.
Those accustomed to Fielding making comrades over flat sponges in his resident gothic role of The Great British Bake Off he will have to readjust his left-field comic persona. His Turpin is a “new-school” highwayman (“There’ll be less violence on my head – more charm, maybe even some panache!”); a peace-loving vegan with a penchant for flowing cloaks and peppermint tea in the pubs.
He and his hopeless gang (Marc Wootton, Ellie White and Duayne Boachie) must avoid hanging, imprisonment, nobility, warlocks, witchcraft and supernatural coaches. There’s also a corrupt lawman (Hugh Bonneville), whose threatening encounters with Turpin are still managed by his childcare issues (“dadI found a dead moth”).
The cast list is sprawling: Tamsin Greig, David Threlfall, Asim Chaudhry, Jessica Hynes, Paul Kaye and others. Connor Swindells does his part Sex Education comedy chops as a dandified arch rival who could be the Hansel to Turpin’s Zoolander. At times, it all feels like a slightly stony, costume-heavy panto of the 1990s/00s (and a heavily indebted Blackadder and Taika Waititi’s recent pirate comedy Our Flag Means Death) – but it’s pretty brash and silly, with a surreal, surrealistic kick.
Over on Sky Nature are the new three-part docuseries The secret world of sound by David Attenborough free,. Appearing early in the opening in a wood full of bluebells, the presenter examines how noise and vibration enable hunters and also protect the hunt.
Along the way, lions roar across the African Savanna (“One of nature’s great acoustic displays of power”), elephants feel rainstorms, and buzzing bees use to pollinate flowers. The flashing graphics showing sound waves aren’t really necessary (they look a bit gimmicky), but it doesn’t matter. Attenborough, with those rough, mellow tones that accompany him, is a shrewd master of the natural world who knows exactly how to excite the crowds.
Star ratings (out of five)
The Jury: Trial of Murder ★★★★
Things You Should Do ★★★
The Adventures of Dick Turpin completely free, ★★★
The secret world of sound by David Attenborough free, ★★★★
What else am I looking at?
Shogun
(Disney+)
This film stars Hiroyuki Sanada and is based on James Clavell’s cult novel from 1975 about Japanese feudal warfare in the 1600s. Epic and thunder (gunning to be East Asia Game of Thrones?) – but avoid if you’re squeamish about violence.
Formula 1: Drive to Live
(Netflix)
The sixth series of the exciting, cut-throat Formula One series where all the drama is on the track – except of course when it’s behind the scenes.
Spud
(BBC Three)
Slot for fans of Girls of Derry‘ Siobhan McSweeney (Michael’s Sister), who writes and stars in this must-see comedy about an ordinary woman.
