Sunday 4 May 2008

‘read this carefully.
i am going to kill you.
yes. that does mean you.’

(found haiku discovered on the wall of a cubicle in the men’s toilet in Shepherds Bush Precinct)

Oooh! New ITV drama! Not just drama but apocalyptic drama. I love my apocalyptic drama, especially if it’s stretched over four hours with special effects and big names. ‘Flood’ certainly had its big names, David Suchet, Robert Carlyle, Ralph Brown and Sir Tom Courtenay, not to mention Nigel Planer, stretching his acting skills by playing a mournful-faced loser (from the Met Office) for a change.
David Suchet, who is brilliant in everything, was a very credible Deputy Prime Minister who discovers that a gynormous storm has flooded part of Scotland and is moving down the English Channel.
The Met officers assure him that it’s unlikely it will move toward the South Coast, but of course, it does, with three hours notice, and threatens to drown London.
In these sort of disasters there is always a disgraced scientist whose theory was laughed out of the lab years before and who was actually right all the time.
The disgraced scientist in this case is Professor Morrison (Sir Tom Courtenay) who just happens to be the father of Robert Carlyle, heroic marine engineer. As is usual in apocalyptic dramas, the two are estranged, in this case because years ago their entire family was torn apart over an argument about the Thames Barrier (I kid you not).
At this point I began to think that things were getting a little silly.