Buried

If you have enjoyed quality HBO drama then you recognise what makes a good series.

Like the British brother to the impeccable 'Oz', 'Buried' is sadly gonna end up exactly as its title suggests.

Tense, unpredictable, harsh, violent, and probably the best single piece of drama on British TV in the last 10 years. Ever piece of acting is flawless and from start to finish you care about the weak and revile those who exploit.

Poor viewing figures did for it but if ever it becomes available (or repeated even!) you will do no worse than attune yourself with the magnificent and sadly missed 'Buried'.

Apologies if the above summary is somewhat inaccurate but it`s the only real way that I can think of describing this sometimes bizarre series that seems to have been totally ignored at the time of broadcast and seems totally forgotten about a year after transmission

BURIED is set in a British prison and stars Lennie James as Lee Kingley a man who is doing several years in prison for protecting a family member from a violent thug . Kingley is probably the main character of the series but like the American prison drama OZ there`s no real overwhelming " main character " the show revolves around since both Lee and the other characters can be sidelined for much of an episode . This possibly is the main flaw with the show - It fails to focuss enough on a main character

Certainly BURIED doesn`t suffer from an over developed sensationalist nature that OZ sometimes suffers from and is certainly pretty realistic . However this does mean it`s sometimes uninteresting compared to the HBO prison drama , and by far the best plot line featured the old prison cliche of unwanted sexual attention , a teenage car thief arrives and one of the old lags takes a shine to him , invites him into his cell and forces the newbie to touch him . As I said it`s pure cliche with sexualt assault on prisoners by other prisoners being very uncommon in British prisons ( I`ve been in prison myself ) though from what I`ve read it`s distressingly common in the American penal system

A fairly realistic drama which has a shockingly downbeat conclusion . It`s certainly not the definative prison drama , or even the definative British prison drama ( That would be SCUM ) but it certainly didn`t deserve to be ignored by the critics

Channel 4 stuck this gem on late at night for students and the unemployed. Never has a greater gift been bestowed upon the wasters and insomniacs. This was a great series full of great scripts and above all a stand out performance from Lennie James in the lead role as a guy sent to prison for beating up a guy who had tried to rape his sister (if i remembered it correctly) I can understand why it was only one series because not a lot of people saw it. But there are still three letters i need to say to channel 4, more of a request than a quandary, DVD? This prison drama was probably the best drama of the year and its a wonder why Lennie James is not more famous. Someone give him a lead..please!

Criminaly ignored this was well written, superbly acted and not seen by as many people as it should have been. Hidden away on a Monday night at 22.30, it was hardly advertised by Ch4. If it had a 21.00 or even 21.30 slot, it could have really taken off.Set in a high security prison, it featured upon the trauma's of a variety of characters coping with incarceration. Lennie James, in the lead role was excellent and he was ably supported by many others. I really enjoyed this series, although it wasn't always easy to watch.It was very gritty and dark and often quite disturbing. Ch 4 could have easily had scope for making a second series but despite rave reviews from several leading critics, poor ratings put them off. This is damned annoying, I really believe the time it was shown put people off. Ch4 spend too much dough on reality rot and not enough time pushing drama's like this , which they are often very good at. Everyone who didn't see it , missed a treat. For those who didn't see it, it can't even be bought on DVD. You can buy a DVD of Big Brother highlights ( is there such a thing! ) but they never released Buried on DVD, citing a lack of interest from viewers. They and they only, are to blame for this.

Buried is one of the best British series that I have ever seen and I was desperately disappointed when they did not make a second series. The acting was brilliant, it had depth, it managed to be original whilst having very good story lines as well. I actually met Lennie James when he was filming a programme called Frances Tuesday and I congratulated him on Buried and he said that he would not have done the second series if there was one so maybe that was part of the reason why they did not do one. Even though this programme is now a few years old I still haven't seen anything near that quality since that time and even though when it was and they showed very late it was worth staying up for, even though I taped the whole series!