First transmitted on BBC1 in 1995, BUGS was the first mainstream telefantasy drama to have been broadcast in an adult slot for a number of years.

The show revolved around the exploits of Ros, Ed and Beckett, who investigated various high-tech crimes while working for Ros' company — Gizmo's — and in a move that was to foreshadow the casting policy that became prevalent in UK drama over the next few years, the three leads were all departees from high profile soap operas or dramas. Jaye Griffiths had recently left The Bill, Craig McLachlan had starred in both Neighbours and Home & Away, whilst Jesse Birdsall had starred in the appalling BBC soap Eldorado as Marcus Tandy.

After some heavy promotion the first episode was watched by an astonishing 12.5m viewers — something which sufficiently impressed the BBC for them to commit to a further two seasons of ten episodes. Virgin Publishing, ever on the lookout for a tie-in or two, pounced on the publishing rights and commissioned five novelisations which were released during 1996.

However, Season Two saw a noticeable dip in ratings as the winning formula was tinkered with by bringing back Jean Daniel from the previous season's Pulse as a recurring villain and upping the sci-fi content of the programme — something which obviously wasn't to the taste of the viewing audience. The programme also had a minor scheduling problem when A Cage for Satan — the season finale — was pulled at short notice when the IRA blew up Manchester city centre...

Season Three saw further changes with our three heroes joining up with the secret Bureau 2, a government organisation that dealt with the same sort of crimes as before, but which enabled the producers to introduce two new characters. Ex-Howard's Way actress Jan Harvey played the mysterious Jan who was in charge of the Bureau and Paula Hunt was introduced as Alex Jordan.

Rather surprisingly, the season was to end on a cliffhanger with Ros missing and her apartment smashed up. Even more surprising was the news that BUGS was to be recommisioned for a fourth season — again of ten episodes. Season Three's scheduling calamity occurred at the start of September when Buried Treasure was pulled to make way for extensive coverage of the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales.

The major change in Season Four was the departure of Craig McLachlan, although the part was re-cast with the role of Ed going to Steven Houghton — fresh out of the ITV firefighting drama London's Burning.

Yet again events conspired against the series. Firstly, the series was moved to an earlier timeslot, thus losing the advantage of a lead-in from the National Lottery draw. More annoying for telefantasy-starved viewers in the UK was the fact that ITV decided to schedule The Vanishing Man, their updating of The Invisible Man starring Neil Morrissey, in opposition to the series for three of the episodes. The next blow for the show was when Pandora's Box was hurriedly removed from the schedules when the Real IRA struck so tragically in Omagh. The final indignity for fans was when the series was cut short after just seven episodes had been shown. It was to be a further twelve months before the final three were transmitted, but even the inclusion of yet another cliffhanger failed to save the series from the chop on this occasion.

Despite it's many shortcomings, the series was never as bad as its more vociferous critics liked to claim and for a few short years showed that, if nothing else, British TV could still make an action show when it put its mind to it.

BUGS has been released on DVD, and a box set of all forty episodes (along with a bonus DVD featuring an interview with Stephen Gallagher) was released in 2005.