BANISHED (drama series about Australia 1788)

Britain banished some criminals to what became Australia. Life is brutal!

Seriously, it is intriguing, but what a vicious concept. It's presumably like the TV 'reality' series survival, which I've never watched, but realistically brutal.

I don't know much about Australian history, but the series may suggest its ignominious.

As to exporting criminals so they could be treated so vilely, wouldn't it have been cheaper to just execute them back in Britain?

 

Sure, but if Kirk had executed Khan rather than banish him to Ceti Alpha V we never would have gotten "The Wrath Of Khan".

 

They generally weren't convicted of a crime that called for the death sentence but stuff like stealing a loaf of bread or cutting down a tree. The prisoners probably thought it was better then being stuck in an overcrowded prison or floating jail. It was also a way to get rid of excess population.

Chad

 

The program is being carried on our CBC and is brutally cut-up by extensive commercials

 

So is this a scripted drama, or done as if a reality TV crew were able to follow settlers around the continent? A drama about settlers in a new land could be pretty interesting.

 

Yes mate! Most of Australia was settled as a penal colony, made up of British convicts and their masters. However South Australia was settled as a free state. This is where people came to of their own free will. Many Germans settled in South Australia in the 1830's, leaving their homeland to escape persecution.

 

It's a drama, and pretty interesting and intense, but I wondered if it was cut much, with all the GD commercials in the hour.

 

The moral dilemmas in this series are excruciating - to save his own life, one of the main characters has agreed to be the hangman for the prison colony

Looked, but seems it is not on DVD for north America yet, as I am afraid the CBC may be shortchanging the viewer - some of the cuts into scenes for commercials seem to be awfully abrupt

 

And in the next episode he seems to have forgotten why he was spared the noose himself. The story is fascinating but infuriatingly difficult to follow, and I'm blaming the CBC assuming they have hacked it up.