All Along the Watchtower

Scotish humor sometimes translates well to North American (Well... U.S.) tastes and sometimes not. This series of only 6 programes is quite wonderful and amusing and makes that tranlation very well. The premise - a lone military listening post high on a cliff overlooking a small coastal village in far North Scotland manned by an out-of-touch commander, a simple-minded enlisted man and a junior officer with more brains than luck - might seem limited. But the writers managed to come up with a combination of story lines that were individual while still growing on each previous one.

Like many programs from the British TV system, it probably could have used an initial run of 10-12 shows in order to get its foot in the door. Six is just not enough for many shows (and sometimes about 5.9 shows too many for others). And the pity is that these 1-series wonders rarely get saved to video and made for sale.