By MICHELE HEWITSON
Being told you're going to love a new series because you happened to have enjoyed an old series has always seemed a dodgy way of selling a show.
It's a given, after all, that when anyone tells you you're just going to love Nigel because you've got such a
lot in common, you take an instant dislike to the hapless fellow.
Prime is insisting that we're going to love Grass Roots because we loved The Games. What do they have in common? Well, they're both Australian. And Grass Roots is supposed to be, like The Games, a satire.
Set in fictional Arcadia Waters, someplace in Australia where the pace of life is slow and the vowel sounds are even slower, there's a local body election underway.
Col the mayor - his slogan: Col Can Do - has a grand plan. His grand plan is to come up with a big idea two days before the election. He's thinking shops and houses. Shame that Col (Geoff Morrell) hasn't actually managed to get a prototype bus shelter built in time for the election. Some wit has graffitied the site: "Col, the bus stops here."
He's got a bit of trouble with the wife, too - in that he no longer has a wife. "Mayor's Wife Votes With Her Feet," is the headline in the local paper. Col has a big idea: he visits the editor with a bottle of whisky and a sob story.
The next day the mayor with the broken heart, and the hangover from hell, is front page news. That should wangle him a few sympathy votes.
But the big problem in Arcadia Waters council is corruption. It's Col's number one priority, he tells new councillor Karin Schumaker (Rhondda Findleton). That and the bus shelters.
Karin is an architect and she's not, Col predicts, going to be impressed "by a brick bus shelter that looks like a country dunny."
She might not be too impressed either if it gets out that Col took a holiday at a flash Queensland resort that just happens to be owned by a big property developer who has his sights set on a prime piece of Arcadia Waters.
Not that there was anything untoward in Col's little vacation. The guy "happens to own a few resorts. Am I supposed to stay away from them?"
No, he didn't actually pay full price for the Emperor's Suite, "they had a few cancellations or something."
And it turns out that "I was the millionth guest and got a lot of discounts."
No, you couldn't call Col corrupt. Not in the scheme of things.
Neither, in the scheme of things, is he really in control. The guy in control is devious Daryl, the building manager who runs the show from his fibro porta-office.
Daryl (David Field) gives all the council tenders to his brother-in-law, Terry. Nothing wrong with that, maintains Daryl. It's in line with the council's family-friendly employment policy.
He also happens to hold all the dirt on Col and the rest of the council team. Daryl, as he is fond of muttering darkly, never forgets.
So far so forgettable. Grass Roots has about as much in common with The Games as The Games did with Gliding On, from which Grass Roots is a cousin only once removed. It has similar bumbling stereotypes, it's set in the public sector, and it's about as satirical as a pair of walk shorts.
So there you go. If you liked Gliding On you're going to love Grass Roots. Honestly.
* Grass Roots, Prime, 8.35 pm
By MICHELE HEWITSON
Being told you're going to love a new series because you happened to have enjoyed an old series has always seemed a dodgy way of selling a show.
It's a given, after all, that when anyone tells you you're just going to love Nigel because you've got such a
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