Flinthart’s review: Bleh.

It’s fun, poking around the dusty attic-rooms of TV and cinema history. Every now and again you unearth something nifty. More often, you come across stuff that’s turned into weird comedy gold because the culture that spawned it has moved on, leaving the work stranded, flopping like a fish out of water.

But sometimes it’s just dull.

This British TV show sounded like it ought to be good. Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) has a simple premise. Actor Mike Pratt is Jeff Randall, a moderately successful (if slightly dodgy and seedy) private investigator. His partner Marty Hopkirk (played by Kenneth Cope) is the uptight worrier of the two, concerned with getting the bills paid – but far less skillful than Randall. And sure enough, Hopkirk goes nipples-up in a hit-and-run in the first episode, leaving him as a ghost visible only to Randall. Boom! There’s the series in a nutshell: private detective with a ghost for a partner.

The trouble is that it’s all so tedious. It’s played for a mix of light comedy and action/detective drama. Dead Hopkirk is still the uptight, worrying one while live Randall is still the laid back, slightly dodgy one: a classic “odd couple” pairing which should have delivered nicely on the comedy, especially with Hopkirk being dead.

Unfortunately, there’s about as much chemistry onscreen as there is in the process of paint drying… and it’s almost as much fun to watch. The jokes and sight-gags are tired, shabby, threadbare things recycled from an ocean of old BBC sitcoms, while the detective-action stuff is sabotaged by having to play second fiddle to stupid comedy set-ups meant to exploit Hopkirk’s deceased status. And don’t get me started on the effects. Budget? What budget is that?

Honestly, I’m not even going to bother grinding through various plots and episodes for you. I guess if you’re a tragic fan of British TV comedy from the late sixties and early seventies, you might find some joy in the petty bickering between the two leads and the clueless, goofy plotlines wearily shaken free of dust and tacked into place… but no.

Sometimes, the job of a reviewer is simple. Sometimes the important thing is to say: this is not good television. It was not good when it came out (one series only — it played in the US as ‘My Partner The Ghost’). It is far more not good now. Most crucially of all, it isn’t even bad enough to be interesting or amusing. It was mediocre fare sixty years ago, and it’s definitely not worth the effort now.

Give it a big swerve.