TV: Channel Four's going down the saucepan Part 1

PART ONE

A trailer for The F Word on Channel 4 just made me think: enough's enough! We all like food, we all like good food, but Gordon Ramsey's a big prick and no amount of acting hard is going to change that. And no amount of blue-mouthery either Gordon.

Gordon knows that being a chef isn't quite like playing for Rangers, but he's determined to toughen himself up by swearing as much as he can. Because we all know that that's the measure of hardness, true hardness: you ability to swear at underlings. Yes, here's a junior would-be chef. He likes mushrooms, making gravy and baking cakes. Quick Gordon, call him a fucking cunt! That'll sort him and that'll sort you too, you big hard-as-fuck chef you, you big 'look at me shouting at the £4- an-hours' ugly Easter Island-faced loon.

This isn't Gordon's fault though. He may be an ugly, sweary, brute of a bully-boy, but he didn't ask to be on telly: no, someone asked him! And who asked him, Channel 4.
Yes, pity the loss of Channel 4.

How highly we once held Channel 4, how highly I held it myself: yeah, this is radical stuff I thought, stuff my Mum and Dad might not get. Stuff that boiled the blood of Daily Mail readers. Lesbian sitcoms. Controversial disabled musicals. You name it, Channel 4 didn't have it: they had something more curious and other instead.

What have they got now? Jamie Oliver in a camper van, kiddy-loving little prick that he is. Jamie, I admire your drive to improve school food, but do you have to swear so much at 8 o'clock on a school night? If you make a mistake and swear while recording your programme, can't the editor earn his salt and cut it out, or can't the director ask you to do it again, without the f-bomb? Does everything have to be so fucking pressured?

I mean, I can see why he swears though. He's got to drive all the way to Sicily in that old VW for a start, you know, and he doesn't know if he can make it, or where he's staying the night, or if he can do it without Jools and the kids. I mean, this never happened to Keith Floyd. He got the production company to arrange things in advance so that the trip went smoothly and he could relax with a few drinks, know what I mean? You don't see old Rick Stein pulling his hair out because his fucking barge has sprung a leak. No, you don't, and you don't because they plan their trips carefully and they know that they're the talent and if they don't get treated right then there ain't gonna be a show and the TV company can stick that up their arse. You should take a leaf out of their book Jamie. Then you wouldn't have to swear so much because the fan belt's gone or something like that.

Hang on! I think Jamie's making a chump of me and I think he's making chumps of all of us. If his van breaks down surely the blokes with the cameras will give him a lift. Don't you think they do? Do you think? Well do ya, punk?

You see, Channel 4 likes swearing, almost as much as I do, but you can't swear before the watershed unless you're under a bit of pressure, you know, like you've got a lot of puds to make quick-sharp, or one of your milk pans has bubbled over again and you've just cleaned the fucking hob! So Channel 4 treats us all like numb-skulls, stupid ones, and says: Ooh, let's pretend Gordon's running a real restaurant! Ssshh, why don't we make like Jamie doesn't know when he's going to see Buttercup and Tinkerbell again, you know like he's in the fucking SAS or something, rather than actually being paid a fucking cash mountain to ponce over to Italy and fuck about with tomatoes, before coming home and counting his wallop with Lady Jools.

And so you see, it's not that great twat Gordon Ramsey who offends me (yeah Gordon, show how much better a chef you are than all that other lot on TV by going on and on and fucking well on about them like you've got nothing else to think about in the world, like the clearly small-cocked, insecure pseudo-Jock you are) or money-bonkers Oliver (although I do think he should stop pretending so much, as it only works if he's presuming we're all fucking nuts, and I don't like that, no siree) but Channel 4.

If it wasn't for Peep Show and Curb Your Enthusiasm, Channel 4 news, and well, alright, a few other programmes too (but not that many) I'd block your vile celebrity-loving, property-selling, working class-hating, Nazi documentary-making blue-tongued shit from ever entering my eyes.

And I haven't even mentioned Ghost Squad yet. Oh fucking hell, can't wait.

Part Two