I recently finished watching BBC3’s comedy/horror/drama series, Being Human. It was that rare beast in British TV drama – a science fiction show that’s genuinely scary/gory, laugh-out-loud funny, utterly riveting and original (hard to do in an era when vampires seem to be everywhere – Buffy, Angel, Twilight, True Blood, et al).
Of course, Doctor Who / Torchwood has been getting sci-fi right for a while now, but others have come and gone with little success – see the deadly boring Afterlife (ITV1) and the not-bad, but didn’t survive until a second series Demons (ITV1). Most of the sci-fi genre shows that have been attempted have aimed for the family audience, but Being Human revels in it’s post-watershed ability to show the realistic bloody violence that being set in the modern day world of vampires, werewolves and ghosts demands.
The premise is quite simple; George (a werewolf), Mitchell (vampire) and Annie (ghost) live together in Bristol, trying to get on with their lives and blend in among humanity. George struggles with the monster side of his life, as well as with a blossoming love affair with a nursing colleague. Mitchell is initially on the wagon and not drinking from humans, but his fellow vampires true to lure him back to his old, wicked ways (a bit like Angel). Annie has only recently died, and eventually learns that there was more to her death than she remembers.
There’s a great sense of humour running through the series, without being too ironic or post-modern, and drifting away from the ‘real-world’ setting. Russell Tovey’s George is particularly funny, and a lovable character, while Aidan Turner is a typically brooding, smouldering vampire, with a psychotic ex-girlfriend and a thirst for blood. Lenora Crichlow takes Annie from a slightly annoying being, obsessed with her (living) fiancé, and makes her into a fully-formed character – expressed through Annie’s later ability to be seen by people other than her housemates. 
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