We are watching this BBC drama now and have two more episodes to go. It is excellent! Max Beesley is superb and the series itself is compelling if a bit on the "oh my God, I can't believe they are showing that on TV" side. It is a very realistic portrayal of an intern or new resident in a private British hospital. The attitudes of the management and some of the staff are inexplicable and I hope they are an exaggeration of fact. The sex scenes are more explicit then anything I've ever seen on regular cable in the U.S. and it is better than ER at making the surgeries realistic - definitely not for the squeamish. Although very disturbing, it is worth watching. Every minute is filled with intensity.

I liked the first three episodes, even though I thought that some of the criticisms of the book on the Amazon.uk site were valid--that Mercurio is overly bitter about his experiences, that the book works best for non-medics who don't have a clue what life in a hospital is really like and that Mercurio's descriptions of how and why senior doctors make the decisions that they do are less than realistic because he never went further than being a junior doctor. And then there's the sex, which seemed especially unlikely considering how much energy you *don't* have in that kind of job. I suspect that reflected more something that Mercurio wished he had done back in his own career than what he actually did. I also felt that, while Mercurio was trying to show a different view of doctors, he in fact reinforced the idea that doctors are somehow separate beings making awful, terrible decisions so that everyone else doesn't have to--including, apparently, nurses, medical technicians, paramedics or any other medical professionals. In reality, the latter groups have far more actual contact with patients than doctors ever do. The show reminded me of a medical version of F. Scott Fitzgerald's famous exchange with Ernest Hemingway about rich people: "Doctors aren't like us, you know." "Yes, they have more money."But what really made the show jump the shark for me was when they sectioned the female anaesthesiologist on a psych ward for blowing the whistle on a surgeon. I suppose it was inevitable that a strain of misogyny would show up in this series, considering that it's written by a man about a Maternity ward. Until very recently, male obstetricians and gynaecologists have had such an appalling record for woman- hating that women usually prefer another woman for a GYN, even if she treats them as badly as the female junior doctor does in "Bodies". However, the sectioning was a bit much. You can't just do that, not even for the usual 30 days. If you could, the NHS would not be wrestling with the bad publicity of having seen several dangerously mentally ill people engage in random murders over the past few years--at least one of them after walking off a closed ward with no resistance from medical staff. Staff are not even allowed to use mechanical restraints on out-of-control psych patients in the UK. So, the author's assumption that you could just lock up a respected MD for reporting a colleague is, at best, obsolete and at worst, laughable.

There is another series coming of Bodies later this year I believe. i too wondered why it was on BBC2 and not BBC1 and apparently it's too graphic for BBC1. It is scary but it was indeed written by a real doctor, I read an interview and he said everything on there is true. I think the writing is brilliant and the acting is too. Especially Max Beesley. I haven't heard or read one criticism about this drama, its by far the best medical drama on TV because it is shot as though it's a documentary. And being written by someone actually in the profession makes it spot on. I would recommend this to anyone, except the squeamish - the prosthetics are superb.

I have been following this fantastic drama over the last few weeks. It was gripping. I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. Every week I kept thinking of a very small swear word to describe Dr Hurley.I read the book and as Jed Mercurio rightly points out his book taken straight from page to screen would not have worked. I am pleased with the way in which he has handled the transition and made it real in a way that only television and the screen can do. I felt that by making Donna Rix and Rob Lake older than their characters in the book (21 and 24 if i remember rightly) their lives held a better realm of realism. Max Beesley was far more believable as a doctor rather than trying to find a younger actor to play the part. When he makes mistakes you feel as though as an experienced doctor he should have known better.All in all bodies was a fantastic piece of drama and my only point of criticism is that the ending of the series was a little abrupt, especially if this is to be a one off drama. I hope not as the doors have been widely left open. I hope to see a DVD release and a new series.