Hugh Laurie's 'grumpy diagnostician', Doctor Gregory House. Photograph: Channel Five
Hello, and welcome again, to the non-list of the list world, the list that claims not to be anything so authoritarian as a top ten, merely an attempt to highlight a certain strand or profession through the medium of a numbered passage. Yes, there happen to be ten, but those are not The ten, merely A ten. If there are others, which there are, hundreds, you can then simply add YOUR favourites in the comments.
Now, I thought the topic of top telly dogs was contentious. I have, I feel sure, seen nothing yet. There are a lot of doctors on television. It is just one of those careers that we all seem to want to know more about or imagine to be desperately interesting, as if they were semi-gods, masters over our very life and death. Which, sometimes, they are. So that's quite reasonable, I suppose.
Please bear in mind, this is not psychiatists, nurses, vets or other health professionals - there is time enough for those another week; another list. In fact, now I think of it I should have kept all pathologists for another list as well, but needs must.
1. House: And the reason for this week's list, the return of Hugh Laurie's formulaic but marvellously grumpy diagnostician. If someone had told me ten years ago that a mass desire to copulate with the other half of Fry & Laurie could overwhelm a television audience, I would have found it hard to believe them. Now I do not.
2. Doogie Howser MD: He was a child! A child who was a doctor! In all seriousness, although the series may not have been mighty and important, the character is bigger as a pop culture reference now than he ever was as a doctor. But then, he wasn't a very big doctor.
3. Doctor Doug Ross: Quite apart from the cliched female drooling response to the lovely George Clooney's paediatrician it was... No, no, that was mainly it. A manly man getting all passionate about children - in a good way - and being just on the right side of bad boy.
4. Dr Finlay and his casebook.
5. Sam Ryan from Silent Witness. Amanda Burton left the series several seasons ago saying that she no longer wanted to be associated with it, but it clearly hasn't worked as, trying to think of a female doctor, she was the first that sprang to mind. And I couldn't think of much else she'd been in. Well, Brookside; but come on, Amanda, which would you rather? Still, I'm shaky about including her in the knowledge that I may later want a list of pathologists, but positive discrimination wins the day.
6: Dr Kildare: Surely an innovator in the televisual field of doctor-as-demigod.
7: Doctor Zoidberg: This was a toss-up between cartoon doctors. Although Zoidberg is a king in his own right, we only chose him because we couldn't decide between Simpsons doctors Dr Nick and Dr Julius Hibbert (eh heh heh heh heh heh!).
8: Karl Kennedy: You know, from Neighbours. Because he may have been a general GP, but he had a surprising amount of specialist knowledge. And also you could always tell he secretly wanted to be a rock star.
9: Sheila Sabatini, from early nineties show Surgical Spirit: Because I remember her as witty and strong and a great leading woman in a British sitcom, with a pocket full of brilliantly sharp dialogue. Although looking back AT that dialogue, I'm not entirely sure why I remember that.
10. Doctor Who: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because what other list is the poor man going to fit into? The Ten Top Timelords list? Anyway, he's there, and he'd better be grateful, because he nicked Dick Van Dyke's spot.
Now if they could remake Diagnosis Murder and tie it in somehow with the Doctor Who franchise, that would be great. Although since the whole joy of Diagnosis Murder was based on it being a simple "whodunnit", I suppose the puzzle element of the show would be over rather quickly. Because Who done it. Get it? Oh I give up.
More doctors, please. Yes of course there are hundreds more - Casualty, ER, soaps, sitcoms; my head is bursting with doctoral loveliness, and screaming in decision-driven pain at having to be clipped shut after only ten. So help by adding the rest, if you please: who are YOUR favourite television doctors?
