Not with a Bang was a short-lived
BritishThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It is an island country, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of Ireland, and many small islands...
televisionTelevision is a widely used telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images, either monochromatic or color, usually accompanied by sound. "Television" may also refer specifically to a television set, television programming or television transmission...
sitcom produced by
London Weekend TelevisionLondon Weekend Television is the ITV network franchise holder for London and the South East at weekends, broadcasting from Fridays at 5:15pm. to Monday mornings at 5:59am....
in 1990. It ran for seven episodes, each 30 minutes long, before being cancelled due to poor ratings and a stagnant plot.
The show was a dark
science fictionScience fiction is a genre of fiction. It differs from fantasy in that, within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically-established or scientifically-postulated laws of nature...
comedyComedy as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse generally intended to amuse, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in Ancient Greece...
, focusing on the end of the
humanHumans are bipedal primates belonging to the species Homo sapiens in Hominidae, the great ape family. They are the only surviving member of the genus Homo. Humans have a highly developed brain, capable of abstract reasoning, language, introspection, and problem solving...
race on
EarthEarth is the third planet from the Sun. It is the fifth largest of the eight planets in the solar system, and the largest of the terrestrial planets in the Solar System in terms of diameter, mass and density...
. The key premise in this regard is based on the last line of the modernist poem
The Hollow MenThe Hollow Men is a major poem by TS Eliot, the Nobel-Prize-winning modernist poet. Its themes are, like many of Eliot's poems, overlapping a fragmentary, but it is recognised to be concerned most with post-War Europe under the Treaty of Versailles , the difficulty of hope and religious...
by
T. S. EliotThomas Stearns Eliot, OM , was a poet, playwright, and literary critic. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948. Among his most famous writings are The Love Song of J...
, that life will end
"not with a bang, but a whimper".
The pilot episode of
Not with a Bang begins with a spoof episode of the iconic
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation, usually referred to by its abbreviation as the "BBC", is the longest established and largest broadcaster in the world...
show
Tomorrow's WorldTomorrow's World was a long-running BBC television series, showcasing new developments in the world of science and technology. First aired on July 7, 1965 on BBC1, it ran for 38 years until it was cancelled at the beginning of 2003, ostensibly because of falling ratings...
, where
Judith HannJudith Hann at Littleover, Derby, Derbyshire, England, is a freelance broadcaster and writer specialising in science, food and the environment.-Early life:...
is presenting a story on how scientists have apparently isolated the hormone that causes aging in humans.
Not with a Bang was a short-lived
BritishThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It is an island country, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of Ireland, and many small islands...
televisionTelevision is a widely used telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images, either monochromatic or color, usually accompanied by sound. "Television" may also refer specifically to a television set, television programming or television transmission...
sitcom produced by
London Weekend TelevisionLondon Weekend Television is the ITV network franchise holder for London and the South East at weekends, broadcasting from Fridays at 5:15pm. to Monday mornings at 5:59am....
in 1990. It ran for seven episodes, each 30 minutes long, before being cancelled due to poor ratings and a stagnant plot.
The show was a dark
science fictionScience fiction is a genre of fiction. It differs from fantasy in that, within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically-established or scientifically-postulated laws of nature...
comedyComedy as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse generally intended to amuse, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in Ancient Greece...
, focusing on the end of the
humanHumans are bipedal primates belonging to the species Homo sapiens in Hominidae, the great ape family. They are the only surviving member of the genus Homo. Humans have a highly developed brain, capable of abstract reasoning, language, introspection, and problem solving...
race on
EarthEarth is the third planet from the Sun. It is the fifth largest of the eight planets in the solar system, and the largest of the terrestrial planets in the Solar System in terms of diameter, mass and density...
. The key premise in this regard is based on the last line of the modernist poem
The Hollow MenThe Hollow Men is a major poem by TS Eliot, the Nobel-Prize-winning modernist poet. Its themes are, like many of Eliot's poems, overlapping a fragmentary, but it is recognised to be concerned most with post-War Europe under the Treaty of Versailles , the difficulty of hope and religious...
by
T. S. EliotThomas Stearns Eliot, OM , was a poet, playwright, and literary critic. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948. Among his most famous writings are The Love Song of J...
, that life will end
"not with a bang, but a whimper".
Premise
The pilot episode of
Not with a Bang begins with a spoof episode of the iconic
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation, usually referred to by its abbreviation as the "BBC", is the longest established and largest broadcaster in the world...
show
Tomorrow's WorldTomorrow's World was a long-running BBC television series, showcasing new developments in the world of science and technology. First aired on July 7, 1965 on BBC1, it ran for 38 years until it was cancelled at the beginning of 2003, ostensibly because of falling ratings...
, where
Judith HannJudith Hann at Littleover, Derby, Derbyshire, England, is a freelance broadcaster and writer specialising in science, food and the environment.-Early life:...
is presenting a story on how scientists have apparently isolated the hormone that causes aging in humans. The chemical is then accidentally released from a vial and the effect spreads almost instantly, annihilating virtually all human life on Earth, turning people into little piles of an ash-like compound, before dissipating harmlessly.
The show then follows the plight of the four human survivors - three male, one female - who survive due to various far-fetched reasons - for example being sealed in a sound-proof booth during a pub quiz when the agent strikes the vicinity. The four characters are united by chance about one year after the event, and set up a base of operations in a country
cottageIn modern usage, a cottage is a modest dwelling, typically in a rural, or semi-rural location...
. They then spend the next six episodes looking for other survivors, adjusting to life after the end of the world, and deliberating over the repopulation of the human race.
The show relies heavily on a small cast of esoteric characters, which includes a
rugby leagueRugby league football is a full-contact form of football, played with a prolate spheroid ball by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular grass field. Rugby league is one of the two codes of rugby football, the other being rugby union...
fanatic (Colin); an average man (Brian) who comes closest to being the group's leader, and a bland couple who struggle over the idea of having children (Graham and Janet). Conversation between Graham and Janet frequently features Graham's reluctance and Janet's determination to have children, as well as Graham's extraordinarily low
spermA sperm, from the ancient Greek word σπέρμα and and more commonly known as a sperm cell, is the haploid cell that is the male gamete. It joins an ovum to form a zygote. A zygote is a single cell, with a complete set of chromosomes, that normally develops into an embryo.Sperm cells contribute...
count.
Cast
- Mike Grady as Graham Wilkins
- Josie Lawrence
Josie Lawrence is a British comedienne and actress best known for her work with the Comedy Store Players improvisational troupe, the television series Whose Line Is It Anyway? and more recently her role as Manda Best in EastEnders....
as Janet Wilkins
- Ronald Pickup
-Biography:Pickup was born in Chester, England, the son of Daisy and Eric Pickup, who was a lecturer. Pickup was educated at The King's School, Chester, trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, and became an Associate Member of RADA.His television work began with an episode during...
as Brian Appleyard
- Stephen Rea
Stephen Rea is an Irish actor, who was nominated for an Academy Award for his lead performance as Fergus in the 1992 film The Crying Game.-Early life:...
as Colin Garrity
- Judith Hann
Judith Hann at Littleover, Derby, Derbyshire, England, is a freelance broadcaster and writer specialising in science, food and the environment.-Early life:...
as herself
External links