APPROACHING four hours into the new Clarkson’s Farm and not one animal had kicked or butted Jeremy in the nuts.
A glaring sin of omission as far as most viewers were probably concerned.
Because, in terms of livestock, I think a bull was the only creature who hadn’t poleaxed Clarkson during the previous three series.
But then, 16 minutes into the fourth episode, bingo. Our prayers were answered.
Clarkson beckoned Sansa the hyperactive dog towards him and . . .
“Nyuuuuurgh. Baaah. That was right in . . . ”
His nuts.
And all was well again on Clarkson’s Farm, which remains the best thing on TV and one of those incredibly rare shows that can make you smile just through the simple act of pressing “play”.
Pedantically speaking, though, by the end of this latest Amazon Prime run, the title was a bit of a misnomer.
It had become Clarkson’s Pub, a place he clearly hated running almost as much as he loved Diddly Squat.
Pork scratchings
There was a change in the mood and personnel as well, with the on-tour Kaleb Cooper being temporarily replaced by Harriet Cowan, who’s an unannoying version of Helen Skelton, if you can imagine such a thing, and so dangerously competent she could kill the entire project if she was allowed more than a future cameo slot.
Of more immediate concern, however, was the fact that throughout the run, Gerald, the show’s MVP, seemed to become almost intelligible.
Not across an entire conversation, obviously. It’s not that serious, but there were tantalising fragments of sentences where I could now understand what the f*** he was saying, without rewinding.
“. . . Royt down a foot deep . . . ” “. . . Woan actually pull it round . . . ” “. . . Well, no chance in the world, izzer . . . ?”
No, there isn’t, Gerald, but this situation clearly has to be addressed before the best joke on TV is unscrambled completely. In these changing agricultural times, it’s a mercy and blessing that the essential ingredients of Clarkson’s Farm remain unchanged.
Uniquely, on TV at the moment, it’s still a drama, documentary and comedy all rolled into one.
With the most important element being the last one, because it’s the only farming show in history that’s ever kept the camera rolling on the stuff we really want to know and see. Jeremy’s “convalescing plums” play a huge part in that equation, clearly.
But so do the long, lingering shots of livestock sex and the fact that as well as knowing the picnic area at Jeremy’s new pub used to be a dogging site nicknamed “The A40 Bum Club”, I’m also now aware “pigs have a clitoris” and rub them.
Indeed, it’s given me an idea for a new variety of pork scratchings to be sold behind the bar of the Farmer’s Dog.
The really remarkable thing about this show, though, is that Clarkon’s approach hasn’t just got the easy laughs — it’s made the potentially boring stuff about farming funny and riveting as well.
Details like: Pre-planning applications to West Oxfordshire District Council, Defra’s GS4/SAM 3 regulations for herbal lay, barley yields per acre, the cost of UK black pepper per kilo (£100, seeing as you ask) and the Habsburg rule for assessing durum wheat quality, which broke a couple of readers who emailed to admit they’d actually cried when Jeremy’s rain-blighted crop fell catastrophically short of the 250 minimum rating.
A bit of an over-reaction, if you ask me, but these are the things that turn Clarkson’s Farm into a work of unparalleled genius. The rest of television knows it as well.
That’s why the BBC and Channel 4 have tried to copy it with shows like Fletchers’ Family Farm and Our Dream Farm with Matt Baker, neither of which has come close to recreating Clarkson’s magic.
Indeed, to watch them is to witness the slow death of terrestrial TV, where they’re so straitjacketed by the cult of woke they’d hand themselves into the local plod before laughing at Gerald’s accent or broadcasting Clarkson’s episode seven pub pep-talk to a bunch of startled millennials, which was still making me howl a week after it landed. “One thing I cannot stand is gormlessness.
And I don’t want slovenly oiks leaning on things. This is designed to back British farming. If anyone wants a Coca-Cola, they can f* * * off.”
And so say all of us.
BIG SLIP
VERBAL slip of the month. Soccer Saturday, Michael Dawson: “I always remember Tim Cahill scoring goals and punching the slag . . . flag.”
SWING ON THE SLIDE
BRITISH people should no more take up swinging than Costa Ricans should launch themselves into a ski-jumping career.
The only possible conclusion to be drawn from series three of Channel 4’s Open House: The Great Sex Experiment, where they might as well have a “no petting” sign next to the swimming pool.
For everything here works against the show’s stated aim of “shedding inhibitions” and “challenging conventions”, starting with the weather, which has got the mansion’s resident sexpots togged up like the Lochaber Mountain Rescue team in fleeces, blankets and overcoats.
You could plonk most of the visiting couples down in the Caribbean, though, and they’d still be as “sick and petrified” as Tom from Exeter, who sounded like he needed a defibrillator more than group sex.
“I’ve got sudden death syndrome and I could drop down dead at any moment,” he announced, before heading upstairs for a fivesome with partner Lauren.
Words that hardly screamed “all aboard” to anyone present.
But I guarantee you equally unsuitable couples will be back for another go next year, because morally bankrupt Channel 4 is terminally addicted to the cheap, tawdry voyeurism offered by shows like Open House and Virgin Island.
So all I can do is suggest they amend the billing of a coercive old Euro bat called Effy Blue who’s currently operating above the caption: “Non-monogamy coach.”
She is the Trollop Tutor. Nothing more, nothing less.
GREAT TV lies and delusions of the month.
The Soap Awards, Angellica Bell: “It’s so good to be here with some of TV’s most gifted, brilliant and talented people.” (Hiding where?)
Love Island, Alima: “I’m a ten out of ten, of course.”
And Love Island, Blu: “Girls fall in love with me quite quickly.”
Arshol.
EASTENDERS line of the month.
Alfie Moon: “Kat Slater, will you be my beautiful, beautiful wife for the third time?”
A proposal which, on second thoughts, I’m filing under “a big ask”.
RANDOM TV IRRITATIONS
THE tragic sight of Ian Hislop desperately trying to appeal to HIGNFY’s studio mob of anti-Israel bigots.
Oddbod Junior and his wife putting me off pizzas for life sitting in their Domino’s advert bath.
Clare Balding still posing as a champion of women’s sport, on The One Show, despite bottling the subject of Imane Khelif beating up female boxers at last year’s Olympics.
And environmental propagandist Chris Packham slyly upping “climate change” to “climate breakdown”, on this week’s Springwatch.
With the next stages of Chris’s scaremongering being: Climate wacky shack, climate prolapse and climate catastrophuck.
UNEXPECTED MORONS IN BAGGING AREA
TIPPING Point, Ben Shephard: “Mount Everest is located in which continent?”
Ruvimbo: “Europe.”
Ben Shephard: “The AIG Women’s Open is a tourn- ament in which club and ball sport?”
Rob: “Football.”
And Ben Shephard: “Located in the Mediterranean Sea, Majorca is part of which European country?”
Maureen: “America.”
LOOKALIKE OF THE WEEK
THIS week’s winner is Kelly Osbourne and professional bloke-in-a-skirt Danny Beard.
Emailed in by Karen Michele.
TV GOLD
BBC2’s shocking documentary Surviving Syria’s Prisons.
Diane Morgan simultaneously ridiculing everything about Who Do You Think You Are? while starring on the show: “The slow head turn at the start makes me cringe.”
Race Across the World winner Tom realising that love and respect for his mum, Caroline, was infinitely more important than crossing the line first.
A sublime Nations League final between Spain and Portugal, on ITV, making me think Scotland might not have it all their own way at next year’s World Cup.
And episode eight of Clarkson’s Farm using a flash frame of Rachel Reeves, as Jeremy said: “You couldn’t possibly believe next year will be worse.”
’Cos it’s the care and attention to detail that make this one of the century’s best TV shows.
GOOD Morning Britain competition, Andi Peters: “Me, you, cocktails by the pool, what’s not to love?”
You.
GREAT SPORTING INSIGHTS
FABIAN HURZELER: “I’ve been trying to improve my sleep but it doesn’t happen overnight.”
Lee Hendrie: “Orient have two number tens with all three of them behind the striker.”
And Michael Dawson: “With two minutes left it’s a huge five minutes.”
(Compiled by Graham Wray)
TV QUIZ
TELLY quiz. Complete the EastEnders line. Nigel to Phil: “You and Sharon are like one of those great love stories, like…”
A) “Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor.”
B) “Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford.”
C) “Piers Morgan and Piers Morgan.”
