Doc Martin, a franchise history.

      WARNING:This article may contain spoilers.

 Martin Clunes (playing Dr. Martin Ellingham) and Caroline Katz (playing Louisa Glasson)  with baby James

Doc Martin ran over 9 series on Britain's ITV between 2004-2019. Here we look back on what made it special. 

Doc Martin was a spinoff from the movie Saving Grace, a 2000 British drug comedy starring  Brenda Blethyn and Craig Ferguson.  In the movie, Brenda´s character finds herself having to pay off the debts of her late husband so that she can  keep her home in Cornish seaside town of Port Issac.  She ends  up growing marijuana to solve the problem.  The movie  portrays the foibles of the small town residents. How does Doctor Martin figure in this? Well, in this film, British comedy actor, Martin Clunes, plays a young, happy go lucky, town doctor named Martin Bamford.  The role is small, and there was little  of this characters' less then serious  personality that was  retained by the later TV show.  

 Saving Grace in French!

Next up , in 2001, and 2003 were two TV pilot  movies, that Martin Clunes´ production company made as spin offs of the movie.  Once again, the  the village of  Port Issac is the real star of the production. These two movies were called  Doc Martin and Doc Martin and the Legend of the Cloutie,   These movies reboot Dr. Bamford into a  London obstetrician  who finds himself in Port Issac after learning that his wife has been cheating on him. The rest of the movie cast is jettisoned, and replaced with new townies.  This Dr. Bamford is less giggly then the Saving Grace version, but he remains somewhat personable , but over the course of two movies, he begins to become grumpier.  The biggest contrast with the later Doc Martin  TV show is that Dr. Bamford has an excellent bedside manner. The TV movie also establishes that Dr.Martin spent summers  in Port Issac as a child.  These movies feature Scottish actress Neve McIntosh as a possible love interest for Doc Martin but their relationship  is never developed .  Overall, the TV movies don't quite work as well the later series. 

The Doc Martin character was rebooted a third time for the actual TV series, that was produced for ITV in   2004.  Once again  a mostly new cast of actors was brought in to play the role of unwashed Cornish yokels. Now, Dr.Martin Bamford, was renamed Dr. Martin Ellingham. Dr. Martin is now   a socially challenged, but brilliant London surgeon who returns to the place  he summered as a boy to become a surgeon.  We soon discover that Doc Martin also has a special genius for diagnosis. The reason why this Martin has moved to the country  is because he  has developed a phobia for blood,which makes work as a surgeon all but impossible, but proves to be almost manageable as a General Practitioner. 

In  September  2004 , the Doc Martin TV show was first aired it   introduces his new love interest, in the very first scene. The lady was  a teacher named  Louisa Glasson, who seems to be the only sane person in town. The port town is now renamed Portwenn for the remaining duration of the show. And it remains the star of the show.   But Dr. Martin´s character is transformed from the minimally interesting Dr. Bamford into one of the greatest portrayal´s of social awkwardness ever presented on the small screen,  Martin now never smiles, does not engage in small talk, talks briskly and to the point. Over time we learn that Martin is emotionally scarred by unloving parents.  

We also learn that his backstory includes a time where did actually break his emotional barrier once with another doctor, Dr. Edith Montgomery played by  Lia Williams. They reunite during one of Martin´s separations from Louisa .  Dr. Montgomery is whip smart and abrasive like Martin, you see how he enjoyed being with her, yet there was also a  discomfort. The telling moment is we learn that Martin  had written her love poetry during their original time together, and that she apparently valued it so much that she couldn't remember where she put it.   Ouch. 

 In the first season, the Doc Martin character is such a fish out of water, that he attempts to adjust his attitude ever so slightly so that he does not get thrown out of town.  He makes a friend of a male music teacher (who sadly does not remain in the show). However, by the second season, Doc Martin is making no efforts to be friendly to be anybody except his Aunt Joan, who is the only adult who ever loved him as a child  and who is the only  person  he ever lets his  guard down for. For the next few seasons, the main plot line is the  futile attempts to get Doc Martin and Louisa to get together and stay together. We soon realize that both of them are sabotaging their relationship.  And while that happens we get a endless parade of hapless town villagers inflicting themselves on poor Dr. Martin. 

   Three of  the townie supporting players remain throughout the series run.    Bert Large, his son, Al  Large and Mrs. Tishell, the town pharmacist.  The remaining regulars are three characters that are replaced a few times in the show.  There are two silly policeman, two aunts and three of Doc Martin´s receptionists.  Aunt Joan (Stephanie Cole) dies of a heart attack, and is replaced by  Martin's Aunt Ruth (Dame Eileen Aitkins) who somehow makes intelligence , old age and wrinkles seem sexy.   The two trademarks of  all three receptionists is  that they wear funny clothes, and date Al Large. Elaine, the first receptionist is the least likable character to grace the show, a gum chewing, selfish mess played by  Lucy Punch. Her replacements first  Pauline, (Katherine Parkinson), and then Morwenna (Jessica Ransom), spend much of their time trying to teach Dr. Martin basic manners. 

Dame Eileen Atkins

The show  was not perfect, it repeated some situations too times.  Crazy farm dwellers would accost the doctor and in the chaos  somebody would come to harm, the ambulance would never come in time, forcing Dr. Martin to do emergency surgery out in the middle of nowhere.  Some student would have some horrible medical issue at the school, some town idiot would take meds they were not supposed to, Bert Large would  always be up to some crazy new  scheme.  Sometimes ,the repeated situations get tiresome, and the some of the story lines for the secondary characters are tedious.   It also doesn't seem realistic that Dr. Martin is the only medical professional in his surgery, let alone the whole town.

Very few characters on the show-come off smelling like roses, the writers were not afraid to make characters seem selfish and vain.  But at the same time, the characters are generally likable. Ian McNeice's Bert Large character is often  given considerable depth-you see over time how much he really loves his son, and how much    respect he has  for Louisa Glasson.   Mrs. Tishell, the character who has a unrequited obsession with Doc Martin is allowed to show that she loved her absent husband.  The put upon silly policeman are at least on a few occasions allowed to  exhibit some minimal competence.  

Most importantly, and most interestingly, Doc Martin is allowed to grow ever so slightly.  Doc Martin always hated the stray dogs that would not let him be, to the point where he was going to have one of them , a dog named Buddy put down. But instead he ends up taking the dog in for the good of his son and wife, and though he still dislikes the dog, later in the series he finds himself helping to  save the dog , when the vet who is caring for him cannot see. At the end of the episode, Martin complements the dog on his bravery in surgery, a unprecedented act of humanity for Doc Martin. 

The on again, off again romance between Martin and Louisa, becomes the featured story line in most of the shows various season finales, all of which are good.  The fifth season climax has Mrs. Tishell stealing Martin and Louisa´s baby. Mrs.  Tishell sums up all that happened between Louisa and Martin in the first five seasons.

One moment you're together,
then you're not,

then you're getting married,
then you're not, then she's gone,

then you're going, but you don't,
and then you have a baby

and you're living together
and then you're not, and

then you're going away and
I can't stand it anymore!

Eventually, after a few more seasons of this, Martin and Louisa both accept that they must do what is necessary to stay together. Each finally moderate  their personalities around each other enough so that they can be happy together.  And so in the final season, we are rewarded with them having a normal family, however,  Martin's blood phobia and poor bedside manner finally catches up with him in the final episode.  

The actual star of the show was scenery of Port Issac in Cornwall on the West Coast of Britain.