I like ER. Not as much as I used to, sitting transfixed watching George Clooney, but more in a surfing-the-web-glancing-up-when-Dr Kovac-is-on-the-screen sort of way.
But the episode I'm watching tonight has grabbed my attention for more than the talented male totty. It has to have the worst English accents since Dick Van Dyke for a start and blatant stereo-typing not seen since the sitcom 'Allo 'Allo had French characters dressed in berets and strings of onions around their necks.
For a start the story line involves an English man who has sprained his ankle in a cheese rolling competition - an obscure and ancient sport played out occasionally in a handful of villages in the West Country. Naturally they've not gone for the West Country accent because I imagine that most American viewers wouldn't have a clue they where they were from English. So of course they've chosen Cockney and 'e's all cor blimey guv-nar'. The characters are required to name as many English sounding produce as possible such as biscuits and the script only just stops short of using rhyming slang.
The story concludes with a group of fellow 'Brits' arriving at the hospital to dispute who won the cheese rolling competition and one of the American doctors shouting out "David Beckham is rubbish" in order to distract the rowdy crowd from the fight they are about the have.
What shred of credibility the programme had left has been shattered. Please, the writers have been taking the piss.