But there has been a bit of whingeing . . . mainly from women . . . about Detective Superintendent Tennison and her elegantly shod feet of clay. There is a nostalgia for the times . . . God knows how many series ago it is now . . . when Prime Suspect showed a magnificent female who could kick ass, smoke fags, shag junior officers and still catch the bad guy at the very end. The first Prime Suspect was broadcast in 1990.

What has happened to Jane Tennison in the intervening years is real progress.

So few career women on television, the distressed female viewers say, couldn't the writers of Prime Suspect hold back a little bit and make Tennison a happy copper? But a flawed and stumbling Tennison is much more engaging than some muesli-eating automaton, breathing easy on her yoga mat. Next thing you know is that they'll want Tennison to adopt a bloody Chinese baby. I mean how cute do you want the whole thing to get?

It's not that I want the real world in my living room on a Sunday night . . . good God, anything but that. But I do like a bit of human being with my crime. Even I cannot stomach Inspector Barnaby for ever. For one thing, the lovely Mrs Barnaby is driving me bonkers. I think it's her hair.

There is a problem here for minorities. The problem of being too good to be wholesome. It is usually members of the same minority who place such high demands on their television representatives. And, although it is ridiculous to call women a minority, we are so narrowly represented on screen that we are truly a minority in television and cinema terms. Except in terms of the television and cinema audience of course, but let's not go there. Let's stick with the women on the screen.

As Cynthia Heimel once famously observed, women in Hollywood films are usually confined to being either murder victims or the dutiful wife who sits up in bed in a perfectly pressed nightgown and sweetly says: "Having that dream again, huh?"

Unfortunately for us all, there has only been one Lady Macbeth. Female characters are dutiful daughters, evil tarts or loving mums. Just as black cops are always brave and decent (and dead before the film is two-thirds over). Just as gay men are usually witty and kind of crazy (and dead before the film is two-thirds over).

Just as lesbian women are either spooky or adorable (and dead before the film is two-thirds over. This even happened in Primary Colours, which was about an American presidential election, for chrissake. (Kathy Bates still bought it big time. ) Anyway, you can fill in the list yourselves. The point is that these models of perfection are pretty insulting, as a matter of fact; and totally forgettable.

Would Sherlock Holmes be so beloved today if he had lived happily with Mrs Holmes, existing on nothing stronger than cups of tea? Would Columbo have been such a good detective if he had been elegantly dressed, and driving a flash car?

Would the boys from The Sweeney have been such a success if they had abided by the rule book? Leave it out, Guv.

Now those Sweeney boys knew how to drink. Ah, the '70s. Sometimes, just sometimes, I miss them.

To have a lead character, a real hero, you must have faults and conflict. And loneliness. For goodness sake it's about our hero against the whole world, do I have to draw a map here?

If Jane Tennison is the first senior female police officer to be hitting the wine at lunchtime and the vodka at all hours, I would be very much surprised.

It only makes me love her more. My greatest fear is that they're going to kill Jane off tonight, now that Helen Mirren has returned to her posh career. To me, Jane Tennison is vulnerable, yet immortal; in other words, a true hero.