Doc Martin – That Hilarious British TV Series

You’ll note I said Mylow was Portwenn’s first only police constable. In the third season he’s replaced by Joe Penhale (John Marquez), now Portwenn’s second only police constable, who has a fear of open spaces (agoraphobia), falls asleep in mid-sentence (narcolepsy) and prattles on in law enforcement lingo. He goes by the letter of the law, but he softens just once, allowing Aunt Joan access to the florist, which had been cordoned off because of a robbery, so that Louisa could have flowers for her wedding. Wedding? To whom? To whom do you suppose? (Don’t anticipate anything until you see the episode.)

Once at the restaurant where I’m still sitting—the sun, now, is lower over the horizon—Bert had a problem. It’s true there was a plumbing incident—water appearing in the wrong place—but that’s not the situation I have in mind. This problem wasn’t even of Bert’s making.

Doc is not an expert at anything the viewer can discern (outside of medicine and tinkering with clocks), so when he fits the plumbing for his dishwasher— No, no, wait for it! Fact is, Portwenn suddenly experiences a diarrhea epidemic. While Pauline is away becoming a certified nurse (or partial nurse, maybe), a temporary replacement serves tea to waiting room patients, tea made from the office water. Seems the good doctor had inadvertently hooked his dishwasher to a sewer line. Even Bert, with all his ineptitude, had been outdone. It’s one of the best episodes of the series.

That episode reminds me of another one, equally absurd. A city couple (Karl Theobald and Amy Marston) invade Portwenn’s tranquility—did I say “tranquility”?—with their out-of-control teenage son. Their philosophy is to allow the child to run free, uninhibited, no restrictions on his “potential.” While mother roasts a dead badger on a funereal fire, son passes his time scratching cars, including Martin’s. Also, the boy sleeps with an old lady’s diseased cat, which explains why both the old lady and the boy—and several villagers—become sick. It is assumed this family moved out of Portwenn.

In “The Admirer,” Carrie Wilson (Louise Delamere) pursues Ellingham despite his usual disinterest and boorishness. She feigns more than one illness to get his attention, even going so far as to contrive an emergency house call. She has a little dog—Martin has a strong dislike of, and bad experiences with, these four-legged pests—and in the climax, on the way to a party to which Louisa has invited him, Doc accidentally runs over the dog. He brings it along, wrapped in newspaper. Ah, Doc must have been relieved: the lady’s annoying ardor is finally shattered, enough that she slaps him and marches off.

Each episode always has several subplots. In the main plot line of a more serious installment titled “Always On My Mind,” Aunt Joan and angry neighbor, Phil Pratt (Roger Lloyd-Pack, veteran of The Vicar of Dibley, a 1987 episode of Inspector Morse, etc.), feud over his use of crop pesticides. When his wife dies, he blames Martin. True, when the woman expires Doc is looking the other way, fiddling with his tools and complaining about having to race all over Cornwall when she could’ve made an office appointment. The husband’s accusation, would you say, is justified? Doc is later called back to the farm when Pratt is injured in an accident. Martin overcomes his hemophobia long enough to save the fellow.

One more episode? Okay. “The Family Way,” is a revealing one. Although one might have assumed otherwise, Martin does have parents, Christopher (John Woodvine) and Margaret (Claire Bloom), who come to visit. Margaret is stoically silent most of the time. Dad announces they’re getting a divorce, and in a horrid kitchen scene between mother and son, Margaret declares that her marriage was happy until Martin was born. Perhaps this goes far to explain Ellingham’s personality idiosyncrasies.

So, what’s the fascination with this GP, this Doc Martin you’re hearing so much about, not, hopefully, for the first time here? He has no bedside manner as a doctor, no communicative skills with people in the street, no social gifts at parties, which he avoids at all costs, and no sensitivity in the romance department, except to be succinctly medical. A tag line for the show boasts that he’s really compassionate at heart. Hum, there’s no demonstrative evidence of that. So—maybe it’s the reaction of others to his inanities or that the diverse antics of the Portwenn inhabitants redirect the viewers’ attention.

Just can’t get over the lovely view from this veranda. Wouldn’t mind moving to Portwenn myself, when my time comes to retire. Something to think about. I hope this brief look at Doc Martin, the man and the show, will prompt you to tune in. I hope, too, I haven’t revealed too many spoilers. . . .

Oh. Al has just brought me the garden salad I’d ordered, quite a while ago in fact, and I find— Wait a minute! What’s this? . . . yes, there’s a dead fly in my lettuce! Didn’t Doc Martin close down the Large Restaurant some episodes back because a silly girl had cut herself in the kitchen and shared her bloodletting with the customers?

You suppose I’m trapped here in Portwenn—in some kind of time warp? Huh, that wouldn’t be all that bad. Maybe Al can bring me another salad.

There are four sets out now on DVD (the last announced and available only for preorder). Recommended.