Remote Control: Saturday 17 January, 2015

Everyone loves Broadchurch right? Not to be absorbed by this most British of television dramas means you are as culturally bereft as Luxembourg.
Olivia Colman and David Tennant in ITVs hit drama BroadchurchOlivia Colman and David Tennant in ITVs hit drama Broadchurch
Olivia Colman and David Tennant in ITVs hit drama Broadchurch

Well, I am afraid that I have no interest in jumping on this particular bandwagon. Does this make me as much of a social outcast as Ken Morley?

I don’t care, as I am not buying the claim that this is the biggest things since Thorn Birds kept my mum and her bubble perm gripped for weeks on end some 30 years ago.

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That is not to say that some of the acting on ITV’s most popular drama is nothing short of sensational – I suspect I would watch the peerless Olivia Colman if she read out the script of the latest series of Birds of a Feather. In French.

I have struggled with the show since the first series took the nation by storm in 2013. I am not sure whether it was the Wurzel-style West Country accents, or yet another gaggle of pantomime villain journalists, which I must declare is my pet televisual hate.

Having said that, the second series started of promisingly, but appeared to depart with all sense of reality during the latest episode (ITV, Mondays).

Yet another pet hate of mine is unrealistic courtroom scenes, and Broadchurch took the biscuit. From the moment the ‘murderer’ from the last series pleaded not guilty, it seems the scriptwriters have been hell bent on completing a television trial in record-breaking time. Of course, there is artistic licence in drama, but once you get into preposterous territory, then I am afraid you have lost me.

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There were perhaps more implausible characters on Channel 4’s Angry, White and Proud (Wednesday, 10pm) which was billed as an exposé into a far-right splinter groups.

This was a programme to watch in tandem with that barometer of pop culture, Twitter. The Keyboard Warriors were in fine voice, with some arguing the programme should never have seen the light of day.

At a time when freedom of speech is the hot topic, it is ridiculous to suggest that a vocal minority should not be able to speak their minds, regardless of the fact that most of us find their views abhorrent. This documentary was useful, as it reminded the viewer of how impotent the far right appears to be today.

The documentary managed to humanise these normally snarling yobs, and we learnt at least two of them had parents who were not born on these shores, which provoked a chuckle.

The programme was followed by a repeat of Stef And Dom from Gogglebox’s interview with UKIP leader Nigel Farage. I see what you did there Channel 4.

Blaise Tapp