Bodies : The Complete BBC Collection Box Set [2004] [DVD]

Every now and then, something comes along which demonstrates that we can still produce excellent TV. It happens rarely these days but in 2004 came Bodies. Writer Jed Mercurio has been accused of constructing his screenplay for Bodies as some sort of personal tirade against the NHS which may or may not have been based on his own experiences as a junior doctor, so giving a predjudiced and overblown account of what goes on in our hospitals. That may be so, but this is drama. You wouldn't want to attend this particular Obstetrics and Gynacology Unit as the level of incompetance does seem overly high and this is exacerbated by the frequency of complications that arise with patients. But, as I said, this is drama.And what drama. The production is tight and tense. We're taken on a rollercoaster ride through hospital and sexual politics and the dynamics between the characters are both broad and deep. There is humour: dark, thick and cruel and with a good part of it being delivered by Keith Allen's cynical and sarcastic consultant. Allen has shaped himself into a competent actor and has come quite a way since his early days in comedy. He's supported here by an excellent cast, in particular Max Beesley and Patrick Baladi. There is management: a greasy and largely deeply unpleasant bunch who's priorities usually exclude the well-being of the patients. They are at the bottom of the pile. If you've had experience of devious management tactics then at least some of this will ring painfully true and probably more so now, ten years on. There is manipulation: a necessary tactic if you want to get on and keep your hospital up there at the top of the league tables. There are the operations themselves: little detail is spared and the suspense is often excruciating although it has to be said that sometimes the element of realism slips a little. And there are the consequences.Series Two steps up a gear and the tension is racked up. The first episode starts with a sequence which will have you squirming in your seat and from then on relaxation is not something that you are likely to enjoy for a good part of the remaining episodes. The directorial style, from different directors, is consistent enough to retain a strong sense of continuity.I didn't find the Finale so easy to involve with. It feels a little contrived, has a tacked on feel and lacks the hard edginess of the previous episodes. There's a slight shift in directorial style and some characters are missing. While this does leave a few holes new characters are introduced to fill them. There are a few occasions when we find ourselves outside the hospital which relieves the sense of claustrophobia which was prevalent in the first two series. It's easy to get over all this though, and the final episode leads us to some sort of resolution although the ending is left open, possibly for a further series, but I hope not. Knowing when to draw the line is important and many series (especially comedy ones), have failed to do this, leaving us with tired programmes which taint the earlier shows. Bodies isn't neatly packaged, which may frustrate some viewers.At over sixteen hours, Bodies may be considered too long especially if you watch them back to back. You may need a bit of staying power, but once this series gets its hooks into you you won't find it easy to pull yourself away. A bit of judicious editing wouldn't go amiss but even at this length the level of involvement leaves you longing for more and if you do still want more you can always watch it again, which doubtless you will do at some time or another.Medical dramas come and go, but Bodies will stay with you for a long while. Excellent, but don't watch if you're expecting.

Who knows why I never heard about this until a week or two ago when, at £11.97 for the whole two series and the finale, I thought it worth a punt?Perhaps because it was scheduled to run on BBC3, which I don't watch much. It's a crime of major proportions that the BBC seems to have successfully tucked away probably the best series it has ever produced - one that kicks old favourites like ER and the Sopranos into a cocked hat. An odd couple of series to choose, you think?IMHO, not so. The obvious parallel with ER is the hospital setting (though in a gyne rather than an emergency ward), and you get the same kind of tension (but on steroids) in Bodies, not only in the operating room, but pretty much everywhere else. There's also the parallel with the Sopranos in terms of its dark, gritty, claustrophobic feel (though not without humour and wit).I wonder if, like me, you saw "The Deer Hunter" on the big screen when it came out and can recall that mesmerising tension during the first Russian roulette scene in the bamboo hut? I was on the edge of my seat, completely drawn into the narrative, and not until Bodies came along did I experience the same thing again - but not for a few minutes or even half an hour. No - for practically the whole of the two series - that's around 20 hours' worth, which I watched back to back, unable to tear myself away. Only the 90-minute tacked-on finale lets the series down a bit, but what the heck, even that is a notch above the average.Bodies is as good as anything that HBO has produced, and probably better than most of that. Yes, I'm placing it above even Band of Brothers and John Adams if your measure of fine drama is how deeply involved in the story you become.For what I paid, it's legalised theft, so go out right now and steal it before someone realises that they've made a mistake on the price tag.

Some things are basically beyond criticism - and this series is one of them. It catches what I would imagine the environment of a hospital to be - the stress, the power games between medical staff, the politics between doctors and management, the cynicism, the catastrophic mistakes, the culture of secrecy, that many are doing their best in hard conditions, management targets influencing clinical decisions and the gallows humour.The writing is top drawer, the pace perfect, characters develop over the entire series and the acting is as good as anything you will see. I watched this first when it aired on UK TV and its easily stood the test of time five years on. If you want to watch something that makes you think for days & weeks afterwards about what you have seen, then buy this - it will be one of the most rewarding 17½ hours of TV you will see.As other reviewers have said, why the BBC canned it is unfathomable - Series 2 ends with plenty of open story lines and it doesn't look like Jed Mercurio had run out of ideas. Anyone involved in the making of this series - writers, actors, producers, directors - can at least rest easy knowing if they ever inadvertently are part of a disastrous production or project in the future it won't matter that much because they'll always have "Bodies" on their CV - and they should be very proud of that.