NEITHER Michael Elphick nor a £7m budget could save BBC series Harry from the TV trash-can.

The mid-nineties prime-time BBC show - set in Darlington and featuring Elphick as a hard-bitten news agency reporter - failed to set audiences alight and was axed after just two series.

The Saturday night show was expected to attract millions of viewers when it first hit our TV screens in autumn 1993.

But it quickly became clear that TV audiences weren't keen. Week after week, the show's ratings slumped, with repeats of Dad's Army regularly pulling in more viewers.

The 12-part drama series had its lighter moments, but the first episode, centred on the horrifying murder of an innocent anti-nuclear campaigner, was panned by critics and viewers alike.

Nearly half the 14 million people watching either turned off or turned over.

The programme brought fame for Darlington as the town where Harry - a former Fleet Street reporter - set up a news agency.

But for Elphick it was a career move he could have done without.

Viewers who had loved him as soft-centred private eye Boon, found the character of Harry far too abrasive and unlikable. Elphick admitted that Harry was difficult to warm to - and partly blamed himself for the character's failings.

"In the first series I felt I went wrong," he admitted, shortly before the second series aired in 1995.

"I was too relentlessly bullying. I didn't put enough light and shade into the character. There wasn't a lot of charm there."

He also complained about people comparing him to the alcoholic Harry.

"I got fed up with people drawing parallels with my own life," he told the Northern Echo.

"I don't whack it back like I used to," he added, referring to his own drink problem.

By the second series, production company Union Pictures had learnt its lesson and gave Harry a far softer edge.

"He has mellowed a little bit, not too much I hope, because that wasn't the idea," said Elphick.

The change paid off initially with the second series, switched to a mid-week slot and featuring eight episodes, faring slightly better in the ratings.

The first episode in the series was watched by seven million viewers, but the numbers soon began to fall away and TV bosses decided not to commission a third series. For Darlington, the series delivered less than it promised.

Town leaders hoped the show would give Darlington a tourism boost, but the deluge of fans who were expected to visit failed to show.

Traders also hit out after the town's market place car park was closed off to allow filming for the first series.