When the BBC America panels began, we were pleasantly surprised to be blessed with a heretofore-unmentioned appearance by Ted Koppel, who has joined the BBC World News America team. Granted, Koppel’s appearance was via satellite, and it only lasted for a few minutes (he had to get back to other activities which were, we can reasonably presume, far more important than talking to a bunch of lousy TV critics), but let it be said that the man left an impression one simple exchange…

Reporter: How did all this come about for you? How did you get involved with these guys?
Ted Koppel: Well, I was off in a sleazy back alley, buying pornographic magazines…

And here I thought I couldn’t respect a newsman more than Brian Williams, who was heard to say during last year’s tour how such-and-such “really made my sphincter tighten.” But I think I’ve gotta give the title to Koppel now. (The reporter who asked the question thanked him for that quote, by the way…as well she should have.)

But, really, you have to like a guy like Koppel, anyway, if only because he’s not afraid to speak his mind, an opportunity he was given on a silver platter when he was asked why American viewers were being denied the kind of news coverage being provided by BBC America.

“Well, as you all very well know, that’s the subject of a very long discussion,” he admitted, “but the simple answer is economics. As there have been more and more outlets and the competition has become greater and the audiences have
become smaller and the amount of money that news divisions are making still has to remain high, there’s been a tendency to focus more on that demographic that brings in the largest amount of advertising dollars, and that’s the young demographic…and for reasons I never quite understood, the assumption is that young people don’t care about overseas news. And the other half of the answer is that the bean counters decided that one way to save money for the news divisions was to close down these very expensive foreign bureaus which are not necessarily on the air every day. And so, where in my heyday as a foreign correspondent, ABC, for example, may have had 30 or 35 correspondents, now they’ve got maybe five or six. And that’s the same with NBC and the same at CBS. There are just far fewer correspondents, far fewer bureaus, and that’s the one area in which the BBC remains preeminent.”

Preach it, Ted. Oh, and if you’re wondering, Koppel still considers the Discovery Channel to be his primary employer these days…but given how enthusiastic he sounds about working for BBC America, I’m left wondering how long that will prove to be the case.

Under the spotlight next was “Britz,” a two-part drama about a pair of second-generation British Muslim siblings who are drawn in radically different directions as a result of anti-terrorism legislation being used against Muslims in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Directed by Peter Kosminsky (”White Oleander”), “Britz” actually premiered in the UK last year and has since won the British Academy Television Award for Best Drama Serial, so it’s clearly something to look forward to.

“I think something really inspiring about a piece as challenging as this was the range of responses it drew, and from really unexpected courses,” said Riz Ahmed, who played Sohail, one of the siblings. “Newspapers known to be a little more kind of politically on the right were loving it for maybe reasons you wouldn’t expect, because I think it’s a very complex piece of work.”

Manjinder Virk, who plays the other sibling, Nasima, is particularly pleased that the program will finally be aired in the States. “I think it’s really important to have it shown here because I know it’s been shown in Europe and Canada. Also, it does address issues in America as well. I know our characters talk about your President and our Prime Minister, so I think it’s important for it to be shown here. Also, as a breakthrough, when you’ve got a four-hour drama where you’ve got Asian leads, I think that’s a huge milestone as well.”

On to less serious matters…or, at least, less realistic matters. Fans of “Doctor Who” and “Torchwood” will be beside themselves when they get a chance to take a gander at BBC America’s latest sci-fi action series, “Primeval.” As of this writing, even *I* haven’t had the opportunity to watch a full episode of the show - before I departed for L.A., all I’d received was a highlights disc, and although I’ve since gotten a DVD with the first few episodes, lord knows I haven’t had the time to put it in - but lemme tell ya something: that highlights disc was enough to sell me on the show in a big effing way.

“Primeval” follows a team of five scientists - led by Professor Nick Cutter (Douglas Henshall) - who investigate anomalies in time and deal with the prehistoric and future creatures that travel through. Cutter, an evolutionary zoologist, has a second agenda: to find his wife, who disappeared eight years ago while investigating one of these anomalies. The time-travel aspect is obviously very reminiscent of “Doctor Who,” but there’s no creative connection between this series and that one. “Primeval” is definitely its own series, the creation of Adrian Hodges and Tim Haines, but while Hodges may provide the majority of the sci-fi aspects of the writing, it’s Haines, creator of the BBC’s “Walking with…” documentary series, who’s responsible for the awesomeness of the prehistoric and future creatures.

Now, after spending all this time dealing with non-stop scientific accuracy, it’s Haines’ chance to have some fun.

“After years of discussing things like the angle of an abelisaur’s front arm, I think it’s great to just say, ‘Well, this
is sort of what they looked like,” said Haines. “We don’t worry about scientific accuracy because the whole premise is a science fiction one. At the same time, sometimes that information can really fire off ideas. If you know a
creature behaved in this way or you knew what it should be like, that can give you a great dramatic story. It gives Nick Cutter maybe something he can use to work out how to defeat it. So there’s lots and lots of stuff from previous work I can bring to this. But it’s great being able to give gorgonopsid two sets of saber teeth just to make him nastier, even though they didn’t have them in reality.”

The series has been a cross-generational hit in the UK (it’s gone through two series thus far, with a third on the way), to the point that when they held a recent contest to design a creature for the show, the entrants ranged in age from 8- and 9-year-olds up to people in their 50s.

Henshall smirked when the topic of younger fans came up. “I always kind of ask them which creature they like the best or which character they like the best,” he said, “and they kind of nod and smile and maybe say the gorgonopsid and the future predator, and then they blush, and they go away. So there isn’t a great deal of feedback in that way.”

“Clearly, we are very aware that we have a lot of kids who love the show, who love the creatures, and all of the rest of it,” acknowledges Hodges, “but, quite clearly, at the same time, the research shows and the figures show that their parents and older people who love this more serial side of it as well and the adult relationships. So we really are trying very hard to try to put something in there for everybody.”

Based on what I’ve seen thus far, they succeed. Granted, there’s a certain amount of disbelief suspension involved when it comes to these mysterious anomalies, but I’ll say this: in the clips that I saw, there’s a battle between a dinosaur and a future predator that is arguably the most amazing FX-derived fight scene I’ve seen in years, either on the small or big screen. If you dig time-travel stories, dinosaurs, action, and even a bit of a romantic element, you need to check out “Primeval” as soon as it premieres.

Last on the BBC America agenda was their new sitcom, “Gavin and Stacey.” Now this show I did score an advance screener of an episode…two episodes, in fact…and when my wife and I first started watching it, some of the dialogue was, shall we say, verging on impenetrable. And I wouldn’t want to call out anyone incorrectly, but I’m pretty sure the problem parties were the Welshmen. See, the premise of the show involves a young Welsh lass named Stacey (Christine Gernon) who works for the same company as a young London lad named Gavin (Mathew Horne), and they’ve spoken so often on the phone that they’ve fallen for each other, even though they’ve never actually met. When the first episode opens, however, that initial meeting is on the verge of occurring…and by the time the episode ends, you can’t help but love these two kids. They’re just so…sweet.

You can’t necessarily say the same thing about their friends, though. Stacey’s friend, Nessa (Ruth Jones), is heavily tattooed and…okay, fair enough, she’s just plain heavy. I wouldn’t call her out like that, but it’s actually an integral part of the character, much as it is for Gavin’s mate, Smithy (James Corden), who’s a rude bastard who refers to Nessa as “it” when he first spies her and can barely stand to make eye contact with her. It’s hardly a spoiler to let you know that there’s some mad shagging between Nessa and Smithy before the closing credits roll - you can pretty much guess it’s going to happen the second they appear on the screen together - but more surprising, perhaps, is the fact that Jones and Corden are actually the co-creators of “Gavin and Stacey”!

There’s no question that Corden is the de facto spokesman for the show, if only because - God love him - he’s one of those fellas who doesn’t like to let more than a moment or two of silence pass before he takes the opportunity to fill it. Still, with lines like these, his performance on the panel won’t soon be forgotten…

* “This is so weird, sitting up here on a white leather sofa, talking to loads of people while they all check their emails. It is so amazing. There are people going, ‘Yeah. Oh, yeah.” But there are a couple of people shopping, he’s on YouTube, some woman was on their Facebook…you don’t know. Someone just checked theirFacebook while ‘Britz’ was happening. She’s not even listening. She’s just been poked by a friend of hers in Dallas. Amazing.”

* When someone asked about the scene in the first episode where Smithy is spotted wearing Nessa’s red satin thong, Corden winked and said, “I’m in (Room) 665 if you want to see it again.” He then added, “What we did with me
wearing the thong was really thinking about what the people of Britain and BBC America viewers wanted, and we
gave it to them right there. The people made it clear they wanted me in a thong. The BBC made it clear they’d green-light it if we promised me in a thong. And, hence, now we are here. And once this is all wrapped up, there will be some kind of show in my room later.”

* On the matter of “Gavin and Stacey” being optioned by NBC for an Americanized version: “It kind of exists and yet feels like it doesn’t. It would be lovely to know a bit more about it. If someone knows Ben Silverman, someone
can call us and just say ‘You know this show that we bought the format to? This is what we are doing to it.’ We’d
love to know a bit more about it, because then we could tell you…and think about the money.”

* On a related note, when asked if a large sum of dough-re-mi would change his mind about doing more episodes of “Gavin and Stacey” in the UK (they’ve already done two series of the show), Corden replied, “I’m almost certain…that it could.” From there, he backpedaled slightly, saying, “Maybe. I don’t know. What’s really important is that…well, oh, my God, you live in America. You’re used to people fucking up your shows after six series, right? You know, like, God, ‘Lost,’ anyone?”

Brilliant fella, that Corden. Brilliant show, too. Check it out.