Do people believe that Australian Dramas (ie, Neighbours, Home and Away, Blue Heelers, All Saints, Headland, The Surgeon, Mcleod's Daughters...) are worth watching?
In my opinion they totally suck and I would much rather watch an American Drama, something like The OC, Grey's Anatomy and so on.
Anyways, what does everyone think about this?

I think the OC and Grey's Anatomy are both trash.  In fact, I fell asleep in both and only saw one (or part) episode.

I don't like the OC either.  I like Grays Anatomy so far.

On the topic though, you can't really compare Aussie dramas to those shows.  You need to compare Neighbours, Home and Away, Blue Heelers, All Saints, Mcleod's Daughters to something like The Bold and the Beautiful and I hate all of those but I think given the choice, the Aussie ones would be less painful to watch Clockwork Orange style.

I haven't seen Headland or The Surgeon.

I would have to say NOT!! The problem I think with Australian dramas is production thinks they have to make them Australian ie alot of maaate, fella, cobba, etc. If it is set in Sydney they always, always do a shot of the opera house, the bridge, centrepoint. Yeah we get it's australian just play the characters and settings normally  

Greys anatomy is another cookie cutter US medical show and utter rubbish. Had you used house as an example that's something else.

I agree you need to compare shows like neighbours to the bold and the beautiful.

In that case neighbours by miles. US soaps are god awful..

If we're talking one hour dramas such as CSI,Law & Order et al vs our dramas they have us beat.

Quoted from aquamonkey

I would have to say NOT!! The problem I think with Australian dramas is production thinks they have to make them Australian ie alot of maaate, fella, cobba, etc. If it is set in Sydney they always, always do a shot of the opera house, the bridge, centrepoint. Yeah we get it's australian just play the characters and settings normally  

Well if they did that, I would certainly enjoy the shows. But i can't stand them the way they are now. I can't believe people actually watch them to be honest.

Totally agree; i dont think there was an episode of Water Rats that didnt have the bridge in the background, or an episode of Secret Life of us that doesnt have a shot of a ridiculously obvious St Kilda landmark in it.

Oz does a way better soap, but a far more average prime-time type show, although celebrity circus was pretty good...

I dont think aussie dramas are not all bad... i do enjoy watching shows like home & away and neighbours, which some of their plots match up to the "quality" of dramas over in the U.S.  

I don't really like the daily soaps ...so Neighbours etc are not my thing..but then again neither is Bold & Beautiful or Days of our Lives or Coronation street

I would agree that Australia doesn't make the same quality of "formula" shows as the US - cop shows in particular (although Murder Call was one of my favourites a few years back and I liked Water Rats too).  But that's OK with me as these are not my favourite kind of shows.

But Australia does make great drama...of the "quirky" variety I guess, stuff with real character development...something a little "different" - such as SeaChange, MDA, Secret Life of Us (almost a soap I guess), The Damnation of Harvey McHugh, GP - to me these are on a level with good character driven drama such as Six Feet Under and West Wing which are also among my favourite shows.

And as for Aussie shows always showing the Opera House...shows set in New York always show the Empire State Building & the Statue of Liberty, shows set in London always show Big Ben, shows set in Paris always show the Eifel Tower....it's what TV producers do...easy way to let audiences know where they are.  I was in Paris not too long ago and there was a campaign along the lines of "there's more to us than this bloody tower" - so they get sick of it too.

I definately think Australia makes better soapies than America, and although I watch Neighbours as often as I can; the acting and the characters still make me cringe at times.

Of course Aussie Drama's good, but not comparable to the American drama.

Neighbours is good, The Surgeon was excellent, but H&A and headLand make me cringe.

Aussie drama tends not to have the budget to live up to hollywood drama's. But I think Neighbours really shows the charm of Australian culture.

To whoever said things like "g'day" and "mate" are unnecessary. Couldn't disagree more. That's part of our culture. It's no worse than the americans saying  "Y'all" or "yo" or even start sticking an american flag in the background of every single show they create.

I can agree with the shots of Opera House and Sydney Harbour bridge. People around the world will never recognise our cities if we only ever show them one part of it.

I disagree. I hate when Aussies say "Gday" or "mate" the same way I hate Yankees saying "Yo" or "Dawg" in their own shows. Sure, I wouldn't mind if people included the word mate whilst speaking, but using stereotypical Australian characters in dramas really pi** me off (Namely Joe's character on Neighbours. I'm SO glad he's gone).

Seven  has  new  dramas in  developed  for to 2007
one is a cop show

There is no doubt in my that Neighbours is the best Aussie drama by HUGE Distance. It is well written and acted by the cast.

Home and Away and Headland are the two worst Aussie dramas, the are not well written and the acting in both shows is terrible