Weekend TV Review

Weekend TV

By Jeremy Clay

In the end, the biggest surprise in Timewatch (8.05pm, Saturday, BBC2) had nothing to do with Stonehenge at all. 

It came halfway through the show, when King Kong of the spider world suddenly tumbled out from underneath my sofa and performed a swift but incident-packed lap of honour round the front room, nimbly dodging each and every one of my lively but woefully inaccurate slipper-blows.

Timewatch, then, was always going to struggle to match that for drama. But it might have fared a little better if the programme hadn’t cheerfully given away its secrets so freely before it had even aired.

Like an over-enthusiastic auntie who can’t stop herself telling you what she’s got you for Christmas, the archaeologists on Timewatch had already spilled the beans on their findings. So by the time the opening credits rolled, we knew the good stuff.

Stonehenge wasn’t a celtic temple, they reckon, nor a giant astrological observatory or a cemetery. Neither was it a large-print calculator, a landing site for UFOs or an enormous abandoned game of Jenga.

Nope, it was a healing centre: the Lourdes of the prehistoric world, or “A&E for southern England,” as one digger put it.

Which must have been a comfort for the chap whose body was unearthed nearby, his ribs dotted with arrowhead holes. “Well, if you’re going to get hit by a murderous volley,” he must have reasoned, before losing consciousness, “what better place for it to happen ...”

The archeologists hit on this new notion after finding a liberal sprinkling of bluestone fragments lying around in the dirt. Bluestone, apparently, was cherished for its magical properties.

These bits, they surmise, were pick-me-up keepsakes for the infirm.

And it seems word got out that Stonehenge was dispensing ancient Aspirin: some of the (also injured) skeletons found nearby had come  from as far away as the Alps.

So Stonehenge Hospital it is.  All they need to find now is the WRVS  shop where you could buy a cuppa and a card reading So Sorry To Hear You Were Casually Maimed With An Axe.

But what Timewatch lacked in fancy-that revelations it more than made up for in eye-candy camerawork.

It looked beautiful. I quite fancy going. Maybe even tonight, before the next alarming bout of arachnid time-trials across my floor.