A rare example of memorable TV … Colin from Accounts. Photograph: BBC/ rare example of memorable TV … Colin from Accounts. Photograph: BBC/
That piping hot new TV show I just watched? I can’t recall a thing about it
I’m never fully concentrating, always simultaneously thinking a huge thought about the future or scrolling through Vinted
Some friends and I were talking, at the weekend, about the TV shows War (about a couple getting divorced) and The Diplomat (about an entirely different couple, not getting divorced). I hadn’t seen either because I was busy with Colin from Accounts. One friend had seen one show but not the other, and couldn’t remember which; a second friend had seen both and couldn’t remember anything that happened in either.
It emphatically wasn’t because they weren’t good. The second friend seemed medium-sure, in fact, that they were both great. His thesis is that he just watches so much TV that none of it can find any purchase in his memory.
I can’t remember plots because I’m never fully concentrating, always simultaneously thinking a huge thought about the future or scrolling through Vinted, and I don’t even notice I’m only half in it until I try to watch something with subtitles. Then it dawns on me that, having no trace of conversational Korean, I must literally look at the screen if I want to know what’s going on.
Relatedly, I can’t remember which series of anything I’m up to, either. I can cheerfully get halfway through episode 3 of series 2 of, say, Slow Horses, before I realise that not only do I know what’s about to happen, I also know that one of those characters is no longer alive.
The most elegant rationale came from friend number two, who put it down to the Netflixification of the televisual arts. In its play for world dominance, the streaming company makes all countries look the same, and everyone dress the same, and eat the same sort of food from the same slightly-too-large plates in their implausibly hotel-like kitchens. So what possible choice does your hippocampus have but to merge all the stories into one?
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A third friend blamed herself, for watching Game of Thrones too often – twice, all the way through, then some jaw-dropper episodes many more times. It has occupied all her mental RAM, now and for ever. Ask her how any intractable situation resolved – with, say, an organised crime ring or a hostage situation – and she’ll just assume a dragon arrived.
Blessedly, it’s impossible to get lost in Colin from Accounts, because only two things happen: they are off, then they are on again. If you can’t remember why they’re off, no problem – it was probably a misunderstanding and soon they will be back on. Sorry. I should have given a spoiler alert.
Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist
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