Friday Five: More TV

Here is a sample of some more TV series I've been watching - some are better than others, but they have all kept my interest up to a point. I've been keeping a list over the past year or so, so not all of these are bang up-to-the minute, but they are all on free-to-air services.

The women of The Split

5 Recent TV Shows I've Watched

1. Cardinal (SBS On Demand) - There are four seasons of this Canadian series (each of six episodes) which are thoroughly enjoyable in a classic crime-drama fashion. The series adapts the novels of crime writer Giles Blunt, focusing on police detective John Cardinal (Billy Campbell) and his partner, Lise Delorme (Karine Vanassa). They investigate crimes in the fictional city of Algonquin Bay, involving corruption, drug dealers, serial killers, politics, suspicious deaths of family members and all the usual tropes. It is the pace and the setting that make this stand out; it is cold and so everyone is careful and needs to plan ahead, while the lead actors are thorough and understated rather than displaying any of the histrionics and hyperbole one would expect from a US equivalent.
2. Cobra (BBC First) - I'll watch almost anything starring Robert Carlyle (*cough* Once Upon a Time *cough*), and so I was automatically drawn to this political drama. It's tonally a bit odd at the beginning when the UK's power is wiped out by a solar storm causing planes to fall from the sky and we're not sure if it's a thriller or a disaster series. Carlyle is the relatively new Prime Minister, Robert Sutherland, who has to deal with this crisis, as criminals and rioters take advantage of the situation and his daughter becomes embroiled in a drug scandal. Instead of working together, there are factions in the cabinet (mainly between Victoria Hamilton as Downing Street Chief of Staff and David Haig as Home Secretary) that attempt to score points rather than save community. Sound familiar?



3. Last Tango in Halifax (ABC iview) - It is a joy to see great actors (Sarah Lancashire; Nicola Walker; Anne Reid; Derek Jacobi) playing great characters with well-written, humorous dialogue in credible and entertaining situations (series created and written by Sally Wainwright). Set in the beautiful but bleak Yorkshire and Lancashire country and towns, it could probably be described as following the fortunes or otherwise of a blended family. The central couple (both widowed and in their seventies) reunite and act upon their past youthful affection for each other, and the series was praised by critics and endorsed by the charity, Age UK as, 'a triumph against TV's ageism'.
4. The Split, Season 2 (ABC iview) - This was a welcome return after Season One a couple of years ago - I was happy to see Nicola Walker back in her family of divorce lawyers and misfits. Supporting cast members of Stephen Mangan, Deborah Findlay, Annabel Scholey, Fiona Button, Meera Syal, and Anthony Head,  bring kudos to the series. The writing is still excellent (as one would expect from Abi Morgan), and it's refreshing to see a female-led series, but the will-she-won't-she storyline started to drag a little, and I would have liked to see more of the client drama - as apparently the legal focus is to protect women and ensure they get what they deserve from their divorces.
5. Wild Bill (7 Plus) - Rob Lowe is similar to Robert Carlyle in the 'must watch' stakes to me, so I gave this series a chance, which is more than ITV did (they pulled it after one series). Lowe is an archetypal American who arrives as chief constable in Boston, Lincs, tasked with cleaning up crime, which he sets about doing through statistics and a whiteboard. No one really likes the arrogant Yank except salt-of-earth farming type, Muriel (played by Bronwyn James, last seen by me in Harlots). There is some understated British humour and sarcasm, which grates against the American schmaltzy daddy daughter relationship scenes, indicating the potential difficulty in pitching this to the right audience.

There's Method in It: The Psychopath Test

The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry by Jon Ronson 

Riverhead Books

Pp. 272

We have a lot of examples in popular culture of what it looks like to be ‘mad’. The mental health industry has become increasingly prevalent and topical. Journalist Jon Ronson explored this phenomenon through a series of interviews and other research methods to publish this highly accessible study in 2011. While many people now self-diagnose, due to the availability of tests and checklists, others exhibit psychopathic behaviour almost undetected, and often end up running companies or countries.

He begins with the premise that it can be harder to persuade people you are ‘sane’ than it is to convince them you are ‘mad’. Ronson is allowed access to one of the most notorious psychopaths, incarcerated in Broadmoor Clinical Lunatic Asylum, Tony, who is allowed to read his own medical files and pass them on to Ronson. Tony claims that he faked madness and now no one believes he is sane when he tries to deny it. “Tony said faking madness was the easy part, especially when you’re seventeen and you take drugs and watch a lot of scary movies. You don’t need to know how authentically crazy people behave. You just plagiarize the character Dennis Hopper played in the movie Blue Velvet.”

Often psychopaths can present as totally charming, which makes it difficult to detect. Ronson says, “The moment I’d first seen Tony, he had strolled purposefully across the Broadmoor Wellness Centre in a pin-striped suit, like someone from The Apprentice, his arm outstretched.” (That particular TV reference is unintentionally relevant). Dressing smartly and being personable (“Glibness/ Superficial Charm”) is the first indication on the most available test; the twenty-point Hare Checklist, devised by Canadian psychologist Bob Hare, “the gold standard for diagnosing psychopaths.” The checklist is included in the book , so that readers can take it for themselves. Find it here: http://www.clintools.com/victims/resources/assessment/personality/psychopathy_checklist.html

It is common to redefine the psychopathic traits on the checklist as Leadership Qualities and the crossover can be a very fine line. In examining ‘lack of remorse or guilt’ and ‘callous/ lack of empathy’, Ronson highlights CEO Al Dunlap, formerly of Sunbeam. It is evident that if this book had been published ten years later, Donald Trump and Jeff Bezos would have been prime case studies. Ronson wonders whether highly driven and successful people are actually insane, and if what makes psychopaths so scary – no fear, filter, no conscience – also makes them good executives. Hedge funds, pension funds and investment banks advise their clients which companies to invest in, and they rejoice in job cuts and applaud as research facilities, tech areas and training centres get destroyed. Psychopathic behaviour is on prominent display on Wall Street.

Mental health disorders are listed in the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), which lists mental disorders. It is used by clinicians, researchers, psychiatric drug regulation agencies, health insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, the legal system and policymakers. Robert Spitzer, who worked on DSM-III explained that the idea was to list potential new mental disorders and a checklist of their overt characteristics. “It seemed a foolproof plan. He would eradicate from psychiatry all that crass sleuthing around the unconscious. There’d be no more silly polemicizing… Instead it would be like science. Any psychiatrist could pick up the manual they were creating – DSM-III – and if the patient’s overt symptoms tallied with the checklist, they’d get the diagnosis.”

DSM-III sold more than a million copies, mainly to civilians rather than professional psychiatrists. “All over the western world people began using the checklists to diagnose themselves. For many of them it was a godsend. Something was categorically wrong with them and finally their suffering had a name. It was truly a revolution in psychiatry, and a gold rush for drug companies, who suddenly had hundreds of new disorders they could invent medications for, millions of new patients they could treat.” As one psychiatrist Ronson interviewed confirmed, “A surfeit of checklists, coupled with unscrupulous drug reps is a dreadful combination.”

Ronson can’t help but test himself and starts to worry that, as a journalist, he might meet some of the criteria. One of his interview subjects tells him, “Finding patterns is how intelligence works. It’s how research works. It’s how journalism works. The search for patterns.” He also considers that in the very act of researching and writing this book, he might be contributing to the way that madness is packaged and presented for entertainment. “I was writing a book about the madness industry and only just realizing that I was a part of the industry.” He probably doesn’t think about the paradox too deeply. After all, that way madness lies.