Bonekickers

Bonekickers is a new BBC series that, judging from the previews, is the sort that as a writer I'd run down a side street to avoid. Maybe it has something to do with its self-consciously ethnic and gender balanced cast, painfully cliched "feisty" female lead and publicity stills that uses the dreaded Pose™ that says "We think we're tough and edgy with that indefinable rock-star vibe, though nobody over the age of 15 who doesn't live in their mother's cellar will agree." It looks predictably awful in that hideous trendy way that fills in for creativity these days and I'd probably put it with Torchwood, Robin Hood, and Hex in the Do Not Watch Unless Threatened By Lord Olivier With A Pair Of Dental Pliers file if it weren't for the fact that it is about a load of archaeologists.

This would have been worth a laugh because as a retired archaeologist I've very low expectations about how my field is portrayed in popular culture as a glamorous sort of licensed tomb-robbing and treasure hunting rather than the meticulous, often boring enterprise that it really is. I'm even willing to forgive that the average archaeologist is never shown in truth as a chronically skint bastard forever on the lookout for a decent job. True, according to the reviews, one character is shown as a hard drinker, but the fantasy lies in it being one character.

But I'll let that pass. Let them forever be Indiana Jones chasing after the Holy Grail or the True Cross or the Lost Bus Ticket and more power to them. There are worse ways for a profession to be portrayed (*cough* Casualty *cough*).

Even the BBC is willing to admit this by running an article that points out the... "heightened" nature of the programme. Except they leave one tiny detail out.

You'll notice that I said that it "would have been" worth a laugh. That was before I noticed the buzz on the Internet about the premiere episode that tried to be "contemporary" by having as the villains a load of crazed, white Christian fundamentalists who want to drive all other religions out of Britain and start off their reign of terror by decapitating a peace-loving Muslim.

Marvelous. One moment I'm anticipating a nice MST3K giggle and the next I'm confronted by the BBC using the licence fee to produce something out of an Al Qaeda recruiting video. Suddenly my sense of irony is lacking and I don't feel much like laughing.