As if to prove that television’s appeal depends mainly on what it gives you to see, the BBC’s new headline serial SS-GB spends many millions giving you something you can’t hear. Some expert analysts say the show is quite audible, but other even more expert analysts point out that this is true only if you have a Woofendorf M-23 multiple takedown receptor within 10ft of your set and another within 10ft of your feet. It goes without saying that this elementary boosting equipment needs to be further enhanced with a Paxman P-36 growl-filter in your loft, to translate the German of anyone above the rank of feldwebel into double Dutch.
After the first episode, I was wiping the blood from my ears with Kleenex, but here’s the gag: I wouldn’t have heard it anyway, because I’ve been going deaf for years and would not hear German invaders if they landed one at a time in my chimney and assembled in my living room to sing Wir fahren gegen Engeland.
But let’s start with SS-GB’s unarguable attractions. Len Deighton’s novel still holds up well, mainly because the Germans attempt to dominate Britain every few decades anyway. Indeed, their latest round of dominating Britain came to an end only a few months ago, when the triple agent Teresa von May was parachuted into Downing Street.
In the current show, the triple agent is played by the best-looking young male actor since Johnny Weissmuller got the part of Tarzan. But DSI Douglas Archer (Sam Riley) has made a big mistake penetrating the British police force, because no one in Britain who is not an actor can understand a word he is saying. Luckily, the beautiful blond woman who catches his eye is an American, the weirdly named Barbara Barga, played by Kate Bosworth. My favourite character, though, is an SS officer, Dr Oskar Huth, played by Lars Eidinger with the appropriately pitiless bad manners. Rude enough to dominate Britain all by himself, he will be able, when the occupation is over, to open a dominance parlour in Chelsea and charge huge prices for beating people up. Do Archer’s tastes lie in that direction? From what he says, we will never know.
Deighton’s original had everything except young Princess Elizabeth driving vehicles for the resistance. One of the reasons Britain is still Top Monarchy is that no one doubts she’d have done this if the opportunity offered. She ought to be in the show, busting through an SS roadblock at the wheel of her Humber Super Snipe and shouting imprecations at the Jerries, even if thousands of people would write in to say they couldn’t understand her.
