back to article There's NOTHING on TV in Europe – American video DOMINATES

A new report from the European Audiovisual Observatory shows what a sorry state European TV and film production is in when compared with the US market, and shows that US programming is increasing its stranglehold on European TV and video services. While the initial functions of the European Audiovisual Observatory were mostly …

  1. deadlockvictim

    Oh dear

    I gave up watching TV almost a decade ago.

    I just buy boxsets when I see something that interests me.

    It seems that I've missed something called Simon Cowell and Sheryl Cole and my children haven't yet realised that they are missing something called 'Peppa Pig'. A tragedy on a national scale.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Oh dear

      Euro TV might be in a sad state, but the UK sells nearly £500 a million of year in TV content to The Colonies. And that's not including Premier League Football - the world's widest watched sports league - an American premium channel carries every single game!

      Those that regularly fly across the pond will know that the BBC channels and home produced content are generally head and shoulders above anything that they have in the US. Particularly in the areas of Children's Programmes, Documentaries, Drama, News and Comedy. No adverts interrupting your viewing every ten minutes or so for a start!

      1. TheVogon

        Re: Oh dear

        Here is an classic example of British TV content that America has yet to get near to in terms of originality, talent and humour:

        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CZjb9ReW5c

        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCQa4iFmkW4&list=PLApR4y9irxGQobb7Ao9SvaiBhgRTYzGLn

        1. phil dude
          Joke

          Re: Oh dear

          Ahh the bygone age, when politics was ruled by personalities made of foam rubber...

          P.

      2. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

        Re: Oh dear

        "No adverts interrupting your viewing every ten minutes or so for a start!"

        That may be, but most BBC productions these days, especially documentaries, are made with sales to commercial channels in mind. There ared obvious "ad breaks" with "here's a re-cap of what you've just seen followed by a "coming next" segment at least once, if not twice during a show,

        And we are now getting ad breaks, especially on sat channels which are approaching US levels of intrusion, eg up to 7 minutes of ads and no station ident or other cue that an ad break is starting, just a cust from the show direct to the ads. This mainly on US owned channels, but is being copied by local UK channels too. It's most obvious at peak times. I tend to set my VM Tivo to record the repeat viewings late at night or early hours of the morning so the ad breaks are much shorter and so easier and quicker to skip over.

        I do wonder what has been cut from a show to fit in those longer peak time ad breaks though, We used to get three 4 minute adbreaks in a one hour show. Now we get three breaks of 6-8 minutes each, And I STILL DON'T watch them.

  2. Fihart

    Nothing on TV

    Report confirms the general experience.

    Best stuff on BBC is old Danish, Swedish, Italian series.

    Best US stuff -- Madmen only available via Sky and Breaking Bad via torrent. For most people not at all unless downloaded while on hols abroad -- thanks for that Virgin/BT.

    Commercial TV is doomed due to vast choice but little you'd choose and infested with ad breaks that are too frequent and too long.

    1. mark 63 Silver badge

      Re: Nothing on TV

      @fihart and other ad protesters: I don know if you've noticed but video recorders have come on leaps and bounds since the 80's. They eliminate adverts and help considerably in the "choice" department. We are living in fantastic times ladies and gentlemen - the TV companies have yet to adjust to the fact that a savvy viewer can tell his freeview box to record only the stuff he likes, which he can then watch conveniently sidestepping those ads that pay for it all! shhh! dont tell !

    2. tranzophobia

      Re: Nothing on TV

      And Netflix; Madmen and Breaking Bad are both on there.

  3. Khaptain Silver badge

    TV - the illness of the 21 century...

    When will people realise that giving up TV is like giving up cigarettes: - it releases you from the ensuing illness.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: TV - the illness of the 21 century...

      Actually, I think you'll find that even if you don't smoke in your recliner, you can still enjoy one during the commercial breaks...if only because they are now 5 minutes long...

      This is the only good thing about cable tv.

  4. Graham Marsden
    Thumb Down

    Quantity != Quality

    Remember we get the *best* of US Television over here. If you search through enough dross you may find a few nuggest of gold...

    1. fishman

      Re: Quantity != Quality

      I lived in Britain one summer. I learned that the best of the UK television was sent to the US, and the rest was just as bad as in the US.

    2. Mark 85

      Re: Quantity != Quality

      The "best" of US Television? Isn't that an oxymoron? Or is the best the old shows from decades ago?

      Disclaimer: I live the States and I think TV sucks compared to 10 or 20 years ago.

      1. Tom 13

        Re: Quantity != Quality

        There's some good stuff out there. Just not on broadcast for the most part.

        Although I will confess the next season doesn't look promising. B5, Stargate, Eureka, Sanctuary, and Warehouse 13 are all gone now. All Gone. And I haven't noticed anything promising on the horizon.

  5. Frankee Llonnygog

    Ungrateful wretches

    Demanding entertainment! Viewers should be forced to watch commercials 24 hours a day with their eyelids clamped open and their thumbs resting on big red 'Buy!' buttons.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Ungrateful wretches

      Battlestar Galactica

      Fargo

      House of Cards

      The Wire

      True Detective

      Breaking Bad

      Community

      1. mark 63 Silver badge

        Re: Ungrateful wretches

        quite.

        All these whiny people on here "oh no theres big piles of dross , booo" "only 1 good thing in 20"

        well welcome to 21st century of media saturation.

        You all sound like a pensioner on the internet "oh theres too much stuff" . Just learn to pick what you want and have it delivered any way you want. Dont just sit on your couch getting force fed the kardashians for christs sake!

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    You jest!

    "The BBC in the UK is often held up as a shining example of what public service broadcasting can do to retain local flavour"

    OK, there's been a few gems in the clay, but if the BBC is the highlight of Europe then things must be grim. As TV technology gets better and better, so the content has become more and more sparse, and weak when it does come. It seems to take the BBC about eighteen months to conjur up three episodes of Sherlock (and the last three were pretty weak by the standards of their predecessors). There's a near total absence of the BBC's one time strength of costume drama (not my sort of thing, but great for buying me an hour on Sunday evening to play CS:GO or the like). And when they rolled out Jamaica Inn recently, they'd completely botched up the sound quality. Sci-fi is interpreted by the BBC to mean "more Doctor Who", just as kids TV is endless Tracey Beaker.

    Rather than interpreting this report as a success for the British telly tax, I think the correct conclusion is that even when you throw tax funding at broadcasters, they simply can't produce anything watcheable (unless government-friendly news and Antiques Roadshow are your pleasures). I suppose somebody will want to watch the monopolistation of BBC1 by the Commonwealth Games for the next two weeks, but looking at my increasingly corpulent countrymen I have to conclude that the games are on because the BBC think they should be on, rather than any public appeal of athletics.

    1. Christopher Rogers

      Re: You jest!

      Thats the point of a national broadcaster - show the stuff that wouldn't be commercially viable for private television broadcasters.

      European TV is GRIM. About 5 layers of suits need to be taken out of television management in the UK so channels like 2 and 4 can start producing more properly off the wall shows.

      America has the advantage because it can mass produce english language television and every now and then it gets it right.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: You jest!

        > America has the advantage because it can mass produce english language television and every now and then it gets it right.

        America has the advantage because it is ruthless in cancelling shows that dont appeal to the mass audience. They will not hesitate to cancel a show halfway through and toss any unaired episodes into the bin. This leads to a high churn rate for shows but also means that they occasionally get it right and produce something worth watching.

        Europe, on the other hand, will keep on producing a show that they think the audience should like despite poor viewer ratings showing that the audience doesn't.

        1. phil dude
          Coat

          Re: You jest!

          leading to that BBC gem, Episodes...

          P.

        2. graeme leggett Silver badge

          Re: You jest!

          BBC uses two values to determine what the population thinks of its output.

          One is the actual viewership - how many watch the programme. This is useful in seeing whether the programme ought to be on BBC 2 or BBC1. If it's on BBC2 and gets high numbers watching, then it will probably get pulled over to BBC1. Bit like your bigger brother taking your sweets off you. It's also useful for journalists to knock up page filler saying "Eastenders beaten by Coronation Street", "X-factor flop, has Cowell lost it?" etc

          The other is the audience appreciation index, which is a measure of how much those who did watch it thought of the programme. They might not plan on watching next week but if they thought the sets were nifty and they could hear what the actors were saying a little-watched programme could get a good AI. For the BBC, anything over 85 is excellent. A quick google search showed that Good Morning Britain has been around 55-60 in the past. The Doctor Who Christmas special got 83 but Call the Midwife and Mrs Brown's Boys also on at Christmas both got 87.

          Three things! there are three values to determine how a programme is doing - audience share. Which is how many of the actual viewers were watching your programme as opposed to something which was on the other channel(s) at the same time.

          I'm certain I had a point when I started typing this pose. Ah yes. A programme could have a low viewership but because it has a high AI it might be kept on. More so for the Beeb as it has to meet targets for quality programming in less "mainstream" areas. ITV has to get numbers and AI up to justify what they charge advertisers.

    2. Roger Varley

      Re: You jest!

      >> but if the BBC is the highlight of Europe then things must be grim.

      Oh, believe me, it is. The BBC is a shining beacon amidst the complete and utter dross that makes up the national TV service in most of the European countries I've had the misfortune to watch in.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        >> The BBC is a shining beacon

        all alone in the night

    3. Lionel Baden

      Re: You jest!

      I agree in regards to the comment about Sci-Fi

      I enjoy doctor who, But Imagine a BBC version of "Old Mans War"

      That would be awesome !

    4. graeme leggett Silver badge

      Re: You jest!

      Sherlock Holmes production may be slow but is that because Cumberbatch and Freeman are fitting it in between making movies and appearing on stage, while Moffatt is busy getting the big worldwide moneyspinner Doctor Who out the door?

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: You jest!

      looking at my increasingly corpulent countrymen I have to conclude that the games are on because the BBC think they should be on, rather than any public appeal of athletics.

      May be so, obviously; but just the other day I was thinking the fans of the big sporting events were overwhelmingly those who do no sport themselves whatsoever. Always having been a sporty person myself, most televised sport bores me and that which does interest me makes me want to get out and do it myself. Sure we'll tend to have favourite teams/favourite players and will watch them, but either you participate or you watch, which are two activities a world apart. In other words, I find televised sport for the most part boring as hell and would assume that so would couch potatoes, therefore the ones who immerse themselves in it genuinely do love to watch sport and it is probably something like fascination for something they're personally unable to do, even were they not living in a fast-food culture, and/or massive respect for those who can. It isn't like getting fat is a sign of such personal disregard that it precludes fascination with competition. Plenty of thin people are useless at sport, while almost everyone is getting fatter, and of course it is much harder not getting fat if you don't do sport. To put it in a nutshell, I think most people who watch sport are fat.

      1. mark 63 Silver badge

        Re: You jest!

        I watch snooker to see the incredibly high level of skill and wish i could do that, but im not prepared to throw my life away learning to do it that well! Other sports I can tell the players are good at what they do but its not that amazing to me. im thin btw. also everyone i know who plays football also watches it ad infinitum and are also not fat. In fact the fat people i know are nerds (in a good way) with no interest in sport, which is why i like them.

    6. James Micallef Silver badge

      Re: You jest!

      " if the BBC is the highlight of Europe then things must be grim."

      I can confirm that things are pretty grim. I get a couple of hundred channels in 4 languages from 6 different countries. It's mostly unmitigated rubbish interspersed with very rare good films or series (action, crime or comedy is my thing), and I think it's pretty much in line with what the survey is showing ie about half of what's watchable is US-produced, and most of teh rest is UK-produced (though I'm not sure if BBC or not)

      The highlight of having so many different channels is there's a lot bigger variety of sports to watch (which usually also can be enjoyably watched in an unknown language, unlike most other programmes)

    7. Christian Berger

      Re: You jest!

      Seriously the BBC is great when compared to the rest of Europe. Even ITV is.

      For example the BBC dares to bring shows like "Stargazing Live" at prime time. A show which is not aimed at the lowest common denominator. The BBC even experiments with things like "Hairdresser of the Year".

      And ITV even has people with character, just think of Harry Hill. You may not like him, but at least he's not bland down like German show hosts are today.

  7. Pete 2 Silver badge

    We have all the TV we need

    Let's see what's on the box.

    The major UK terrestrial channels (BBC1 & 2, ITV and juuuuust about Channel 4) show repeats about half the time. And if you count the "+1" channels, 247 and everything that is shown once on the "prime" channels and then shunted off to Dave, Gold, ITVx, More 4 and all the other filler channels - the vast majority of terrestrial TV (and an even greater proportion of satellite channels) is repeats. For the "majors", these are mostly during "daytime" when few are watching. Otherwise it's a mixture of game shows, reality stuff, sports, things we laughingly call "documentaries" (which generally consist of someone vaguely famous on a "journey" and constantly repeating, everything they've told us in the past 5 minutes), some period drama, quizzes, celeb chat, cooking and soaps.

    Would it matter if none of these were contemporary programmes, but just repeats from 10 or 20 or 30 (or 40) years ago?

    OK. For the sports and news programmes, it might. But for all the rest: does it matter if the petty criminals we watch arguing with each other, in the weekday early evening slot, are yelling about something we haven't heard before, or are fighting over some minor inconvenience from 1991?

    The same could be asked about quiz shows. The answers will still be the same. We'll still be rooting for contestant X, Y or Z merely on the basis that they look like aunt Betty, or are wearing a nice shirt.

    We know that most new programmes are crap. Why else would the BBC constantly repeat programmes like Dad's Army? the latest episode to be shown (BBC2 8:30pm last saturday) was from 1970. Forty four years old, and the Beeb still can't find anything for a saturday evening that draws a bigger audience.

    So, apart from the small amount of stuff who's value is down to its newness: news, weather and sport, why don't the major channels just quit making new programmes and simply resort to transmitting all their old stuff (sans those hosted by convicts, or other disgraced individuals). They should just admit defeat in the realisation that they can't make decent telly any more and start a 25 year long loop of old broadcasts, In fact, given that anyone under the age of 30-ish would find it new and novel anyway, it would probably be more successful that the current crop of programmes.

    1. phil dude
      IT Angle

      Re: We have all the TV we need

      I laughed reading this post!!

      It did not happen overnight, but it is now happening much faster.

      We are witnessing in the news today, the fight for media conglomeration in progress. It happens to be Murdoch, but it just makes good business sense. If you sell media, CPU's , software or soap it helps to be the only one selling, so you can set the price.

      In the USA this is the war between Netflix, Amazon, Google and cable companies, and it has become intermingled with the net-neutrality arguments. If you cannot compete making media, stop others selling theirs.

      We have an ever-increasing surplus of media, where artificial scarcity is used to prop up prices, could it be this is saturation?

      P.

    2. Oninoshiko

      Re: We have all the TV we need

      well, for the BBC they would actually need to still have it around.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiping#BBC

  8. Uberseehandel

    For years it has been axiomatic that Gresham's Law applies to television as well as the coinage.

    There is a great deal of garbage and talent-free content created in both the US and Europe (including the UK). There is also some excellent content still being created, but not as much as formerly.

    Over recent years some of the widely broadcast 'Scandinavian Noire' series have been thought provoking and well made.. But this level of programming is, I agree, increasingly rare.

    Television is not alone amongst the media in being inundated with egregious content. It has become ever harder to find a quality English language daily newspaper in Britain. In a world where hoi poloi confuse infamy with achievement and self promotion with endeavour, is it surprising that the media in all its facets is overrun with talent free programming.

    Good programs are still being made, you just have to look for them. It has been three years since any of my television sets have been attached to external antennae; connecting them to the internet ensures a much wider choice a quality programming.

    If all this sounds a bit elitist, it is. Sadly, programmes about dancers who can't dance, singers who can't sing, and fornicating tattooed and bejazzled sociopaths is what we get in a culture driven by entitlement.

  9. regadpellagru

    French TV those days

    Like the article pinpointed correctly, France as well is invaded by US series/movies.

    Nowadays, a full week of french free to air TV is:

    - loads of US series (all of them, multiple times). Some you can't follow because they're broadcasted out of order by complete retards (Hello, NRJ12 ?).

    - loads of US movies

    - loads of reality TV (entire channels of it, like D8, NRJ12 M6, and others, about 1/3 of the full specter)

    - the obligatory "plus belle la vie" french serie which really sucks

    - some rare good french and interesting program (Arte)

    - some never seen stuff in new channels (RMC disco)

    That's it. I even watch UK FTA channels when I'm bored.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: French TV those days

      It could be worse you could be forced to watch Swiss TV... it takes a lot of courage unless you like Lederhosen musique with static scenes of the Swiss Alps, which is what they show late at night when there are no more programmes.....

      1. Adrian Harvey

        Re: French TV those days

        What was awesome about Swiss TV, or at least the cable service I had whilst living there, was that it mostly consisted of direct feeds of all the other language groups' broadcast channels - so, BBC 1,2,3,4 ITV1,2... etc, etc as well as the French and Italian channels. So no cut-down BBC "prime" channel like seemed to be on offer in Germany for example. Had to remember that show times were skewed (+1H for UK channels). They didn't even swap out the ads on the commercial stations, it was mildly amusing to have commercials for products that we couldn't possibly buy.

        Of course it wasn't really Swiss per-se, so your point stands, but it was a good service that I wish I could get elsewhere in the world!

  10. Kevin Johnston

    My 2p

    I have to wonder if the people who 'could' be good TV drama/comedy writers are being blocked by comparison with the programs on endless loop from the 70's and such. There have been some good series more recently but in some cases there is a clear understanding that these series have a natural lifespan before they drag down the good start point while in others they are a little 'edgy' which makes suits uncomfortable especially if something happens in real life which could be taken as a parallel. Examples of 'live' stuff I am watching which stand up well are Bluestone 42 (totally not PC so may struggle to keep going) and Death in Paradise (already on a new lead actor in series 3).

    There are good nuggets out there but the sheer volume of competition keeps them niche.

    1. Mike Smith
      Pint

      Re: My 2p

      "have to wonder if the people who 'could' be good TV drama/comedy writers are being blocked by comparison with the programs on endless loop from the 70's and such."

      You sir, are absolutely one hundred per cent bang on the money. Have a pint and an upvote.

      I've been trying to break into the TV writers world for a few years now. Not having much luck in spite of some very good reviews from a few folks whose track records mean they know what they're talking about. That's pretty much par for the course for new writers though, so I'm not griping too much, but one thing that stands out right across the board is this - though all the production companies say they're crying out for 'new voices with stories to tell' or somesuch, what they're really looking for is people who can regurgitate the same tired old formats over and over again.

      In fairness to the production companies, they have to get things commissioned, and those decisions fall to the suits at the big broadcasters. Which means that unless you're touting politically-correct comedy, medical dramas, legal dramas, historical documentaries aimed at retarded chimpanzees, singing contests or vacuous voyeurism you might as well forget it. The last time we saw any real innovation was on Channel 4 in the mid 1980s, before that idiot Grade ruined it.

      And yes, I admit that I'm pretty pissed off about it and I'm trying to find a way round it. But that's where we are - it's an industry dominated by risk-averse beancounters with next to no vision or imagination.

      1. Mystic Megabyte
        Megaphone

        Re: My 2p @Mike Smith The answer to your problem?

        Watch this, it's long but well worth seeing. Joe Wilson gets very animated when he starts ranting about the Hollywood beancounters. NSFW but contains some gems.

        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRdRzlVuzn0

      2. Dazed and Confused

        Re: My 2p

        > Not having much luck in spite of some very good reviews from a few folks whose track records mean they know what they're talking about.

        This reminds me of an interview with John Lloyd where he's talking to the BBC management about the original HHGTTG series and having shown them some of the early material the senior BBC man says "Is this funny? Can anyone tell me whether this is funny?"

      3. Denarius
        Unhappy

        Re: My 2p

        @Mike: >> But that's where we are - it's an industry dominated by risk-averse beancounters with next to no vision or imagination.

        Aren't they all ? maybe not the space ship guys.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Between "reality" shows, talent contests, brazilian and brazilian-style soaps, the 10 mins comercial breaks and the news that some footbaler has a new g/f, what's left? Not to mention that the money that governmens provide 99% of the time ends in the same old producers...

  12. big_D Silver badge

    Mostly local

    we watch mostly locally produced stuff (around 85%). Germany does a lot of its own production and having a German family, we tend to watch a lot of German produced content, especially TV films and soaps - well, the girls watch the soaps and I don't get to use the remote when the soaps are on... :-S

    Watched a great French film last night as well l'immortel.

    That said, there is very little on television that I would go out of my way to watch - and, apart from NCIS, I can't think of a single US series where I have actually watched more than a couple of episodes in the last decade.

  13. Gordon 10
    Thumb Up

    Holey Moley

    If the Beeb is responsible for 20% of the European TV budget - that kinda suggests what a dire state the rest of Europe is in.

    I find it ironic that the 2 tax payer subsidised organisations (Beeb and C4) produce better quality output imo than the other UK ones (looking at you ITV and Sky).

    Its not mentioned but is it possible that Beeb/Beeb Worldwide is also the biggest TV exporter in Europe? Or do someone like the Spanish channels get a look in? Or possibly the Scandinavians' with the current Scando-Noir trends.

  14. Rikkeh

    On handguns

    Actually, a lot of EU countries have much less restrictive handgun laws than the UK (France, for example).

    Like the author, we tend to forget this, as there don't seem to be any Europeans who are fanatically devoted to a perceived "right" to bear arms as an insurance policy against oppressive government or invasion (despite having far more historical justification for having such devotion).

    1. Dan 55 Silver badge

      Re: On handguns

      Switzerland?

      1. Rikkeh

        Re: On handguns

        Not in the EU :P

        1. Dan 55 Silver badge

          Re: On handguns

          Doesn't matter, even Russia and Turkey are members of the EAO.

    2. Dazed and Confused

      Re: On handguns or American morals

      Americans have guns, but are legally forbidden from having nipples. Americans have guns in case they ever discover anyone who posesses a pair of nipples (therefore must be a witch)

      If we import American moral standards we'll all need to surrender our nipples in return for being allowed to carry guns, but all right thinking people know that it is better to show people shooting other people than to show any evidence that people are mamals and that therefore Dawin might have had a point.

  15. James 51

    Where does stuff like The Tunnel which is made by Sky/Canal+ which is a remake of The Bridge Scan Noire (I like that new genre term) fit in?

    Some of the best TV I've sceen recently is Spirals and The Returned but you find them on BBC 4.

  16. MrJonno

    People want different things from TV, I can guarantee there is absolutely nothing the BBC or ITV can show in a Saturday evening that will get viewing figures and keep the average Register viewer happy.

    No one is going to show anything like Game of Thrones on prime time family tv. It has to be something that 10 year old Bobby and his Grand dad will want to watch.

    Guess what I don't like 10 year old Bobby and Grand dad family TV but the sort of people who stay in at the weekend do

    1. phil dude
      Joke

      no time like the present...

      what is this "weekend viewing" you speak of?

      P.

  17. DJO Silver badge
    Holmes

    Another breakthrough from the centre for establishing the obvious.

    So a single country with a population of over 300 million produces more programming than 20 or so countries with an average population of around 30 million and having to cater to half a dozen different languages.

    In other news: Fire is hot.

    1. Al Jones

      Re: Another breakthrough from the centre for establishing the obvious.

      A country with a population of 300 million that absolutely refuses to broadcast any "foreign muck" on the mainstream channels*. They'll buy in a series and re-make it, but they won't broadcast the original. You can understand their reluctance with something like Taggart, for instance, that even some BBC viewers might have needed subtitles for, but when it comes to "police procedurals", for example, there are plenty of BBC and ITV series that would more than hold their own against their US equivalents, but they will never be seen on US TV, except on PBS stations. Even "niche"channels like the Food Channel won't show the likes of the Great British Bake Off, even though there's nothing in it that would be a turn-off for that channels typical audience.

      It's a level of chauvinism that even the French can't aspire to!

  18. Jamie Jones Silver badge
    Trollface

    Bang bang!

    " Europeans have no guns, but our children go around pointing their finger and saying “bang, bang” all the time."

    We did that back in my day too. Cowboy films are hardly a new phenomena

    1. John Hughes

      Re: Bang bang!

      "Europeans have no guns" is only true if "Europeans" are English, Welsh or Scottish.

      Guns/capita:

      USA: 97

      Switzerland: 45

      Sweden 31

      Norway 31

      France 31

      Germany 30

      ...

      Nirland 21

      ...

      England & Wales 6

      Scotland 5.5

      1. Ossi

        Re: Bang bang!

        America has 97 guns per person?! It's worse than I thought.

        1. Blain Hamon
          Joke

          Re: Bang bang!

          "Europeans have no guns"

          Wait, what has James Bond been waving about all this time?

      2. Jamie Jones Silver badge

        Re: Bang bang!

        " "Europeans have no guns" is only true if "Europeans" are English, Welsh or Scottish."

        Not even then.

        Plenty of British civilians legally own firearms

      3. graeme leggett Silver badge

        Re: Bang bang!

        That is guns per 100 population, surely?

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The Problem is Culture

    In the UK you really need to be part of the old boys network of established lovies in order to get anything commissioned. The entire backbone of TV production culture here is infested with middle/upper class twonks and power-crazed femzillas. It is very difficult for anything creative, organic, or non mainstream to find its way into production, and hence the variety of offerings is very limited.

    This culture extends from bigger network type companies (BBC,C4), through the funding bodies (National Lottery, etc), and most of the private investors here. In US it is a lot easier to get the money needed to make a film because the funders/investors are,

    - a lot more willing to take a chance on this type of investment (presumably it yields a return otherwise they would stop),

    - more interested in the idea and less interested in whether or not the producer went to Oxbridge or is the wrong 'sort of chap'.

    Dont get me wrong, there are definitely cool UK shows like Sherlock that get made within this closed style system, but it's rare. The UK will always be miles behind until the underlying culture changes.

  20. John 156
    Big Brother

    a drift to US moral codes and values?

    Possibly, de facto, but what it means in practice is Hollywood's moral codes and values or more accurately, the moral codes and values and historical perspectives which Hollywood, with its atypical demographic, wishes to foist on the rest of the world. Should we be concerned? Yes. "he who controls the past controls the future, and he who controls the present controls the past". - George Orwell. Personally, I prefer foreign language programmes and films because they usually do not attempt to emulate Hollywood clutural norms or be made with an eye to the US market.

    1. Fihart

      Re: a drift to US moral codes and values?

      @ John 156 for the most thoughtful comment here.

      US TV shows and movies (and many UK films made with an eye on the US market) are too American for my tastes. Ignoring the obvious pointless explosions and shouting and the one-dimensional villains, the stories largely lack the ambiguity of real life.

      Thankfully a few shows roll along like Madmen and The Sopranos but by and large I'm happier watching something like the French 'Spiral' or Italian 'Montalbano' and the Scandi cop shows.

      I also watch foreign-language films on the basis that if they have made it over here without the hype put behind Hollywood rubbish, they must have something going for them. Surprising how good films from Argentina, Iran or Korea have turned out to be.

  21. Dr_N

    France

    "This shows how European policy is in abject retreat despite a huge political stand by France in particular. France, with its substantial subsidies for locally produced content, is still completely failing to halt the shift to US content"

    French TV is (for the most part) garbage.

    About the only thing they do well is travel documentaries.

    The fact it is (or isn't) subsidized doesn't change this.

    At least the Beeb can still pull rabbits out of it's hat some of the time.

  22. Catullus

    Europeans have no guns?

    Britain != Europe.

    4 of the top 10 and 10 of the top 20 countries by per capita gun ownership are European.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_guns_per_capita_by_country

    1. Pete 2 Silver badge

      Re: Europeans have no guns?

      > 4 of the top 10 and 10 of the top 20 countries

      it's not whether they have guns, it's whether they are so gung-ho about shooting their fellow citizens, either on the smallest pretext or simply by accident "I thought he was an intruder". That only happens because they are so pathologically scared of every little thing in everyday life that they simply must strap one on just to go for breakfast.

      Though it's not the guns that are the problem.

      1. John Hughes

        Re: Europeans have no guns?

        Yup. There are two countries that are insane about guns:

        The USA

        and the UK.

    2. Vinyl-Junkie
      Pirate

      Re: Europeans have no guns?

      Neither Americans nor Europeans have swords either (generally speaking) but you still see kids having swordfights! I don't think you can blame kids going "bang bang" on the influx of US TV (and generally speaking I'm not a great fan of Merkin culture).

      Pirate icon because it has swords...

  23. HereWeGoAgain

    I stopped watching TV ages ago

    It was becoming full of American crap. Not like the good old days when we had the Sweeney, Edge of Darkness, Smiley's People, etc.

    As for gun culture, America is a deeply sick place. Just about all American film posters have pictures of grimacing arseholes waving guns. As though guns solve all known problems. America doesn't have a moral code. It divides the world into America and everywhere else. And everywhere else is a scary place for Americans. A place without enough doughnut shops or enough guns.

    Just don't watch it. Let the TV channels go bust if they think pumping out imported American crap is what passes for 'programming'.

  24. earl grey
    Trollface

    Europeans have no guns

    Well, I don't know about that. All the US films i see that have been filmed in EU, everyone and their mother has a gun.

  25. JimWin

    And yet....

    Line of Duty, Edge of Darkness (currently being re-run), Broadchurch, Doc Martin and more. (Some) american videos are good, but British Isles are not a quality-free zone and a good number of British shows head westwards over the pond and elsewhere. If 'Europe' excludes the Brits, then that might be a different matter.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: And yet....

      None of those shows will show up on any of the "mainstream" channels in the US. Some PBS stations and BBC America are really the only places in the US that you can catch TV that was made in the UK.

  26. Chris Beach

    US Remakes

    Language is an obvious issue, there's a lot of different languages, with far more limited markets. US shows are far easier to market worldwide, so people know about them, and demand their local broadcasters show them...

    That doesn't mean Europe isn't producing decent quality shows/stories, and one thing that the US producers have gotten better at is remakes, the Killing and the Bridge are both excellent, but based on Scandinavian shows. Maybe its because in both cases they had the original creators onboard.

  27. This post has been deleted by its author

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Dear Europe, the world doesn't revolve around you...

    Onslaught? Stranglehold?

    Hollywood doesn't make this stuff for your benefit. If you don't like it, make your own g***amn TV shows instead of paying to copy ours and then whining because you're watching American TV. Do you expect us to do it for you?

    Maybe I should claim Shakespeare is an act of British Imperialism...

  29. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Meanwhile, on the other side of the pond...

    ...33% of us may be clinically obese, but we do produce a lot of good TV (as others have pointed out).

    BTW, in fairness it should be mentioned that a decent number of good "American" shows are actually produced in Canada, e.g., the remake of Battlestar Galactica (made in a Canada with a blend of American, Canadian, and British cast and crew).

  30. ecofeco Silver badge

    American TV?

    You are so fucked.

    Leave. Leave while you can.

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