I can’t say I’ve ever really been into medical dramas. They’ve always seemed like a strange concept to me. I see shows like Casualty, which has been running for over thirty years, and can’t help but think “Are there really that many ways someone can injure themselves?”. I ended up watching This is going to hurt, the BBC 1 adaptation of Adam Kay’s critically acclaimed autobiography, after my brother pitched it as “some comedy about doctors with Ben Wishaw”. Since Ben Wishaw (whose face you may recognise as Q from James Bond or, more importantly, whose voice you may recognise as Paddington Bear) is such a brilliant actor, I trusted him to pick good material and said I’d give it a go. In contrast, the part my parents picked out of that sentence was “comedy”. They ended up being less satisfied than me, to say the least.
I suppose what I’m trying to say here is that this show is not for everyone. My parents sat down essentially expecting an English version of ‘Scrubs’, or maybe some light escapism like ‘Holby City’. Now, it’s not that comedy is the wrong word, it’s just that the humour can be very dark at times. The show follows a fictionalised version of Adam Kay, (who also wrote the screenplay) played by Wishaw, working for the NHS in an Obstetrics and Gynaecology (mothers and babies) ward in 2006. As you’d expect, this is an incredibly stressful environment, and is mined thoroughly for comedic effect. It is genuinely impressive how many comically stressful events can be concocted exclusively to do with childbirth. Whilst all that is going on, the characters sneer withering British witticisms at each other in typical sitcom fashion, and I will say that sometimes it does get a bit much. I love a sarcastic remark as much as anyone, but when everything every character says sounds like David Mitchell, the show does start to lose me a little.
Another thing that does irk me a little is the overbearing cynicism. Being a very faithful and raw depiction of working in the NHS, cynical characters make sense, as the hospital around them is both literally and figuratively falling apart and there are never enough doctors to go around. This is great, and one of my favourite elements of the series, as it definitely feels like an authentic, warts-and-all portrayal, but occasionally this can slip into nastiness for the sake of it. For example, there is one fairly prominent supporting character who is relentlessly mocked for her perceived lack of intelligence, and it just becomes exhausting after a while.
However, this same meanness also allows for something I love about the show, which is that Adam is often shown to be quite a horrible person who does cruel things and then later sees the consequences of his actions. To be honest about the stress and pressure the NHS puts people through, Kay has to be honest about the way that manifested in himself, and this ability to be self-critical may be the script’s greatest strength.
It is worth noting though that due to this, you do have to stick with the show for a bit and trust that it knows what it’s doing, as, yes, his behaviour does get criticised later on. The characters do develop throughout and by the end I found myself emotionally attached to all of them. One I’d like to mention specifically here is a young junior doctor called Shruti, played by Ambika Mod. Starting off as a quiet, shy and nervous newcomer, it is through her character we see how this environment affects those unfamiliar with it, as all the other characters are older doctors who have already been shaped by their workplace, and we get to see this happen in real time with Shruti. This is helped by Mod’s outstanding performance which really brings the character to life.
This TV adaptation not only succeeds in showing the stress experienced by NHS workers by exposing a broken system, but also touches on many social issues and handles them delicately. I said this isn’t for everyone, and another reason for that is the inclusion of heavy issues such as racism, PTSD and domestic abuse. These are used to highlight other sides of the medical profession, such as the moral predicament involved in treating a bigoted patient. Homophobia is also touched on in the sections set away from the hospital following Adam’s personal life. These parts aren’t too frequent as the focus is absolutely on Adam’s work at the hospital, but contextual scenes do help emphasise the idea that he is so absolutely engulfed in stress in every part of his life, and this causes him to act like he does.
The title is not an empty threat; the show really doesn’t pull any punches. There are many gritty, tense sequences of doctors performing high pressure surgeries that could have severe consequences if they go wrong. The filmmaking is solid all round, but those parts are when the technical elements are most noteworthy; low droning music and long tracking shots of characters running down corridors, followed by close-up shots of surgery and the doctors doing them really engage the viewer and get their pulse racing.
After watching this series, I can’t help but reassess my previous doubts of medical dramas as a genre. It now seems so obvious that such a high-pressure environment is a perfect source of drama, but I still can’t understand how such a series such as Casualty can go on for so long. The most satisfying thing about ‘This Is Going To Hurt’ is that it appears to exhaust every possible situation that could come from its premise either for comedy or drama. It’s such a powerful and engaging piece of television, but I would just warn you to make sure you know what you’re in for first, lest you end up like my mother saying “this isn’t very funny” during a graphic scene of a caesarean section.