You have to keep telling yourself that ‘it’s only a television show’. Sure it’s fiction based on fact but it’s only a television program.

I’m obviously talking about Underbelly, Channel Nine’s much-touted series on the Melbourne gang war that killed about thirty men and put other killers behind bars.

It’s is more than a TV show now because today Justice Betty King banned the program from going to air in Melbourne as advertised tomorrow night.

And it will stay off air in this state until a murder trial is completed over the death of one of the gangsters whose violent end was a major part of a later episode in the Underbelly series.

Part of Judge King’s reasons for banning the screening of the program was that it would go into virtually every living room in the state and could influence potential jurors.

In my opinion there is a weakness in that argument. This is fiction. It is a dramatisation. Nothing portrayed in Underbelly could remotely be used in court.

 I also believe it insults the intelligence of possible jurors. They are told when they enter the jury box they must come to a verdict based on the evidence before them and exclude anything else.

And Underbelly is hardly a trailblazer when it comes to stories about the gangland war that mesmerised and repulsed Melburnians for years. On that basis recent newspaper articles would be in contempt. Books like the one the series is based on would have been banned. Along with Adam Shands’ Big Shots.

And what about the alleged killer whose name has been suppressed? Heaps of people know who he is. I mentioned his name and The Age printed it before a suppression order came in. Several other men have already faced trial over that same murder.

Another point is that the banning of Underbelly in Melbourne won’t stop it being seen. It will still legally go to air in the rest of Australia tomorrow. Within minutes the Internet will be smothered with it.Video copies will be sent to Melbourne -- The way I saw Blue Murder , the crooked cop series, when it was banned in Sydney.

And one final comment:  Serial killer Carl Williams who launched the vendetta that saw Mark Moran and Jason Moran and their father Lewis Moran all killed says he is not upset that he has been portrayed as ‘a brain dead goose’ because, according to Adam Shand, ‘he won the war. Look at the scoreboard.’

What a bonehead. The same could be said for actor Gyton Grantley who plays Williams in the show. He told the Sunday program he hoped Williams liked his portrayal. Grantley said he liked the baby-faced killer.

‘He treated all of his people well. He paid them well, he was fun to be around, he was quite a loveable guy, always joking and smiling. He never seemed too threatening. He dressed normally. He was an average kind of guy. Williams almost gives Australia a bit of pride in their own gangster.’

Speak for yourself, sunshine. Williams was a drug-dealing murderous scumbag who dealt in human misery. And despite all his bravado, when the cops finally threw the big tough gangland ‘winner’ to the ground and arrested him – he pooed his pants.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008