Pity me: I’m behind on Game of Thrones, and I can’t even keep up with Line of Duty

In our latest arts column, Fiona Sturges says too much ‘unmissable’ culture is overwhelming

Jon Snow (Kit Harrington) and Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) in a scene from season eight of ‘Game of Thrones’ (AP)

I am, by nature, an idle person. Lying inert on the sofa watching TV or reading a book is my default position. Give me a sunny day and I’ll happily draw the curtains and burn my way through a boxset while marooned under a pile of snoozing pets.

By a stroke of fortune, I have managed to turn this activity (or lack thereof) into a job. While there are people out there valiantly saving lives or shaping young minds, I get to sit on my arse and pontificate on the sunburn levels on Love Island, or whether Game of Thrones’s Jon Snow will ever crack a smile. It’s absurd, and I can only apologise.

Lately, though, just keeping on top of it all has been getting stressful. My eyeballs are exhausted. As a result, “unmissable” television series remain increasingly unwatched; unread books glare in reproach from my bedside table; my podcast app groans with documentaries that I’ll likely never hear. And what of the plays, exhibitions and cinema releases all vying for my attention? Is three whole hours of Avengers: Endgame really the best use of my time when I could use it to blitz Glow Up: Britain’s Next Make-Up Star instead?

Matters haven’t been helped by the fact that last week my family persuaded me that sleeping in a field with no wifi or electricity would be good for the soul. Upon our return it was clear that something of life-altering importance had taken place. The police drama Line of Duty had, it turned out, bloodily dispatched one of its major characters and the viewers’ post-mortem of how, why and what would happen next was already in full swing. The nation had been united in shock, awe, and the misspelling of the word “definitely” – and I had no idea what everyone was on about.

It turns out that Fomo, that dreadful acronym that reduces us all to spoilt babies, is real, though at least in this case it springs from a genuine love of artistic endeavour – or that’s what I’m choosing to tell myself. How can I be expected to engage in normal conversation if I don’t have a theory about the identity of Line of Duty’s “H”? Maybe it’s time to lock the doors and unplug the router. Life as a hermit would certainly be simpler – so what if it leaves me out of a job?

We are living in cultural boom times. Never have we had so much choice in what we can watch, hear and read. Right now the perceived hotness of a fictional priest in a comedy drama can generate a national debate. Ridiculous? On the contrary: in these troubled times, it’s this kind of conversation that keeps us all sane. Besides, I can remember a time when talking about telly was seen as infra dig ­– that we now broadcast our enjoyment of it is, to my mind, progress and illustrative of the medium being taken seriously at all levels. It’s also revived what were once called “water-cooler moments” in which fans and haters gathered in offices to argue over the previous night’s viewing, only now the dissections are less likely to take place the morning after than the second the credits have rolled.

And yet the sheer amount of content, and the speed at which we are urged to consume it, is increasingly overwhelming. To engage with popular culture is to forever be in catch-up mode, both with the art itself and the ensuing dissection. That we can do all our reading, watching and listening on our phones simply adds to the pressure ­– there’s no excuse not to keep up. Even for a couch potato like me, the output of Netflix alone is boggling. Like clockwork each Friday, a fresh crop of “originals” are dropped, to be hoovered up on Saturday and Sunday and solemnly debated on social media at 9am on Monday. It’s no wonder that the network has been accused of killing millennial sex lives ­– why get busy making babies when there’s another series of Schitt’s Creek to inhale?

By contrast, it’s with precious little fanfare that the BBC has this month delivered wonderful comedy series such as Back to Life, about an ex-con who moves back with her parents, and Toby Jones’s Don’t Forget the Driver, an atmospheric depiction of small-town life. In the days of five channels, these would have been prime-time viewing. Now, with headline-generating, audience-gobbling marquee series such as Line of Duty and Bodyguard stamping on the competition, they pass by practically unnoticed. It was interesting to see the launch of Apple TV last month greeted with not so much zealous excitement as a collective sigh of exhaustion. Another subscription? Yet more unmissable TV? No thanks, I’m all full up.

Right now, I am – God help me – a full season behind with Game of Thrones, and I have spent the past few days trying and often failing to avoid mention of it, lest I stumble over spoilers. Thanks to social media, I have gleaned that Arya Stark has had sex (go Arya!), though I have yet to discover how this situation came to pass. Will I ever get up to speed? And if I do, what else will I be missing? And how will I catch up with my reading? So much to do, so little time. Woe is me. My struggle is real.