She must be so uninteresting I don't ever remember her. I don't like the American version, although at least there was an attempt to find someone worthy of playing the character. Still not as obsessive -- keep thinking the American character will actually cure himself. Ugh, what a thought. Sane men are so damned uninteresting, haven't you noticed that?

In these Armani Nineties, Americans are consistently portrayed as nearly perfect on TV. Their way is led by the advertisers, who constantly mock reality with commercials. This big toothed approach to television has insipidly become the standard, and even flawed characters like Andy on NYPD Blue eventually have to go on the wagon and become nice. Remember when Archie Bunker got a spin-off with the kid? Case in point. They stripped a fascinating character of his flaws and lost the point of his being. This happens constantly.

For some reason, the Brits are more apt to put out television characters who extemely screwed up and look kind of normal. I think Helen Mirren is an attractive woman, certainly, but let's face it, the US networks would cast Jennifer Aniston in some version of "Prime Suspect" and, as they say, bollocks the whole affair.

Jimmy, in a Narcissistic (Sp??) society it is difficult not to always be looking back to see if others are looking back to see. We worry far too much about the outer look and nothing about the interior. Thus when we find no integrity in our actions, we react with shock and dismay. We really are quite adolescent, you know.

Ah, we're back. P Marlowe, I didn't die. I just got really busy, and could not spend my time as I seem to want - thinking 'bout TV (what a loser).

Anyway, Yes, yes, yes. Adolescent! Exactly! America is an arrogant teen-ager (personified even by its overly hormonal leader), full of piss and vinegar, looking into a mirror and sucking in its baby fat. Yes, Marlowe, yes.

The metaphor works with Cracker. The British one was adult, the people looked like adults, they talked like adults, they argued like adults, etc. The American one, like all things Yank, is self-conscious and "cool."

By the way, I'm an American. I'm 33. I should go pop this zit.

Perhaps it is because we are only 200 years old - while England is what a 1000 or so. We are afterall still growing. And our leaders have alway behaved badly, we were just too busy acting like adults to bother noticing. The HJC looks like the day-care brigade picking up their toys and going home because they don't get their way. Another falacy - once you go through puberty, your ZITS go too. Lie, lie. ;-)

Jimmy Squidbait, where are you! Listen up - Cracker (English) vs. Cracker (American) are going head to head on A&E next week.

If anyone out there is interested there is now a mailing list for fans of Cracker (both the US and UK versions) to share their thoughts.

The list is called "CrackerFitz", and can be found at www.onelist.com.

If you are a Cracker fan please subscribe NOW!! We want to hear from you!!

I'm rather curious about something. One week I'm finding the British version of Cracker on A & E, great, fine, the world is normal (excluding waiting times between Inspector Morse?Morris? and A Touch of Frost). Then I see an entertaining version of Alice In Wonderland where Cracker (sorry, his real name escapes me) plays a fabulous Tweedledee, or Tweedledum, ... still everything is great, fine, the world is normal (by C.S. Lewis' standards anyway).

THEN I go BACK to A & E and there's this, ... this AMERICAN, with a NEW YORK, ACCENT no less, portraying CRACKER!?! Okay, granted, I like the American guy -- IN OTHER STUFF!!! -- and I know the millennium is coming but GEEZ-LOUISE wha' ha'pened????

A&E has a new 2-hr Cracker airing this coming Saturday. Previews look good.