I don't even need a calendar any more to tell me when we hit the first full weekend of September. I look at the TV pages of any paper, look at what the main UK terrestrial channels are showing. Let's have a look :

  Saturday - ITV - Popstars - the rivals. BBC - Casualty (well, next week, but let's not get too picky_./. ITV - Who wants to be a millionaire. Sundays - BBC - Monarch of the Fucking Glen. ITV - London's Fucking Burning. (Heartbeat will be back next, you mark my words). BBC - something else shite. ITV - even more shite.

  Yes, folks, it's the New TV Season. In other words, yet more series of the same old shit. Time to renew the membership to Blockbuster, I reckon. There's stuff all on the box I want to see - in fact, it's more like the Resurrection Symphony than a New Season. You might as well just think back to every other autumn/winter in the last 10-15 years, and you'll know a good 90% of what's going to be on the TV this year.

  Actually, it's been getting weird over the last couple of years - now we import better TV programmes from the US than the UK makes. Sooner or later we're going to find Channel 5 getting better ratings on a Saturday than the main two channels. And what do they show? American Programmes. C.S.I followed by Law and Order. And they're both better than the home-grown stuff.

  Where did we go wrong? The UK used to be one of the world leaders in TV creation, and the US used to produce dross. Some semi-decent comedy, but it's drama production was for shit. And now the situation's reversed. We're stuck producing primarily the same series year after year - only the individual circumstances change. Now, you can see a new character join the programme, and you can set out a list of things they'll be doing, how things will happen to that character. And from that list, you'll probably get at least 75% of that list ticked off. If it's one of the longer-running series, you'll be up in the high 90s. The only thing you'll possibly get wrong is who they'll fall in love with, and possibly - just possibly - the way they exit the series. We've become the land of the derivative characterisation/ programme.

  So why have we ended up with such derivative garbage? Quite honestly, I have absolutely no idea. But it's weird, the way things have changed. I don't watch much TV at the best of times, but now the TV I watch tends to be American - it's as though all the decent scriptwriters have gone to American TV now, the films they make are getting worse and worse, less and less original - they're all going to the TV side of the business. Hell, C.S.I. is even produced by Jerry Bruckheimer's studio - part of the team behind such small fry as Top Gun, The Rock, Gone in 60 Seconds, Days of Thunder, and many many others.

  Anyway. It's the summer season, so it looks like (as usual) I'll either be writing more for d4d, rejoining Blockbuster, or watching American TV on Channel 5. I think I can live with all those options. Besides, it all gives me an excuse to get out more too...