The military has got itself into a pickle in Iraq and been given a fright in Afghanistan. But there’s one thing the bods in uniform have done exceptionally well, and it’s the thing you’d imagine they’d be most hopeless at: media management. When was the last time you saw a mildly critical or even questioning story about the armed services? Now think back to the relentless press over Northern Ireland, the investigations into shoot-to-kill and military excess; and, if you’re old enough, remember the sceptical coverage of Aden, Malaya and Cyprus, not to mention the military idiocy and belligerence during the cold war. But something happened during the Balkans, and the camouflaged guys have managed to make-believe that they fight wars without any responsibility for them. The army has brilliantly cast itself only as victor or victim.

The arguments about the politics go on, despite the military. The reasons for this, of course, are access and danger: journalists have to be embedded, and for them to go to the front line in Afghanistan or Iraq without the protection of the military would be bonkers and, more important to most newspapers and television channels, far too expensive. Get too close to soldiers and you lose your even-handedness; you identify with them. So, military news on television is limited to shaky phone video taken by amateurs or junior reporters in flak jackets, paraphrasing military press releases from the roof of an international hotel, out of harm’s way. Then there are the reality shows that look at a regiment with an invariably adoring, sentimental eye; in truth, it’s difficult not to like soldiers when they’re on your side. Finally, there are the first-person diaries, such as Chris Terrill’s recent paean to the marines and Ross Kemp in Afghanistan (Monday, Sky One), about his trip there with his local East Anglian regiment, the Vikings, an unfortunate nickname.

Kemp has been one of the great surprises of popular documentaries. Who would have thought this soap actor would turn in the most watchable and exciting documentaries of the past year, winning a Bafta from a list of nominees that included David Attenborough? Dozens of actors try a bit of presenting, imagining it’s all eyes and teeth and hitting your mark. What makes Kemp so good on gangs, and soldiers, is the stuff the snobbish Soho Tristrams sneer at him for. He talks haltingly, his observations are broad-brush and not particularly cute, but he has masses of intense empathy and a dogged inquisitiveness that borders on bravery, and he says what most of us would say if we were there.

Aside from all the excitement of this well shot and edited film of Afghanistan, the bits that stood out were the conversations with ordinary soldiers and their families. They talk to Kemp in a way they don’t to professional reporters or documentary-makers because, I suppose, they know he’s like them, and they like him. There is nobody else doing what Kemp does. He’s not what executives look for when they want a bit of working-class rough diamond; he’s the wrong sort of stereotype, and all the better for it. We are still, though, desperately short on reporting from our nasty little wars, and the military is dead lucky that the other side are rubbish at media handling. Sawing the heads off journalists with bread knives isn’t the way to get a favourable feature in a magazine or an hour’s prewatershed reality show.

A colleague who reviews TV for a tabloid once told me I had no idea how lucky I was not to have to write about soaps. One of the nice things about watching television for a Sunday broadsheet is that I am free to assume you lot don’t want to know what I think about every screaming twist on every rolling drama. I understand they’re the most popular things on the box, and I can sort of see why. I can also understand that, as a genre, they are television’s great gift to narrative fiction, but they all fill me with bleak despair. It’s the thought of them going on and on and on without end, a Sisyphean commitment. They are not things you can dip in and out of. If you ever watch an episode of a strange soap, what you note is that there’s nothing perceptible happening, and that it’s not happening with an inexplicably uniform intensity.

So I waited for a couple of episodes of Echo Beach and its sister show, Moving Wallpaper (Friday, ITV1), before writing this review. The conceit, rather than the concept, of this double-header is that Moving Wallpaper is about the making of Echo Beach, so it’s a sitcom about making a soap opera, while Echo Beach is just a soap opera that has someone else making fun of it, starring Martine McCutcheon and Jason Donovan, both of whom were made famous by other soap operas. So, with your irony bucket overflowing, you can sit down and watch it either as a soap opera or as a postmodern “soap opera”.

Now, as a plot device, irony and deconstruction don’t move you very far. Moving Wallpaper is better because it’s written about something writers care about: writers. And Echo Beach is just about Corn-wall and kids – who gives a toss about them? It’s like a cross between Hollyoaks and Eldorado, on the set from Crossroads. My guess is that everyone will get fed up with the joke and bin it, or maybe they’ll bin Echo Beach and keep Moving Wallpaper as a sitcom about a soap that doesn’t exist. And maybe one day soon, when you turn on the television, there’ll just be a shot of you sitting on a sofa staring into a camera. Anyway, if Echo Beach does get binned, I promise I’ll keep reviewing it. Just because a programme’s not broadcast, it doesn’t mean it can’t be criticised. And, if it’s criticised, then who’s to say it doesn’t exist?

Messiah (Sunday, BBC1) is back. For those of you who haven’t seen it, it’s Midsomer Murders made for goths. It’s always biblical: “’Ere, sarge, we’ve got a woman complaining about Armageddon outside her back door. Do you wanna go? I’m all tied up with the Apocalypse.” In a previous incarnation, the detective in Messiah was played by Ken Stott, an Old Testament actor if ever there was one. They should name a plague after him. Now the part has been taken over by Marc Warren, who is more New Testament, more Pauline, though he brings precious little good news.

Oddly, nobody seems to care much about the corpses. I certainly didn’t. There was little wailing, gnashing or rending. They weren’t really people, more ciphers and puzzles. I’ve always thought the way to catch mass murderers who leave elaborate clues is to ignore them. As soon as you know it, the killer will be banging on your door, telling you how stupid you are. In this case, he could have snuffed the entire cast in the manner of the plagues of Egypt. None of it was as properly spooky and spine-chilling as watching Tom Cruise put us right with messianic hysteria about scientology. This week’s lesson, best beloved, was that religions are really crap at PR.

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