It’s a subject that is timeless.  No matter who, what, where, or when, there’s an endless amount of interest in how we end up at what Stephen Jenkins aptly names ‘our ending of days’.

It’s therefore comes as no surprise that one of Australia’s best known media figures, Ray Martin, at the invitation of the BBC has turned his mind to consider the ins and outs of laying the dead to rest, to put it politely, or getting rid of a human carcass, to be frank and blunt.

In: Ray Martin dives into the world of death and funerals in ‘The Last Goodbye’, Michael Di Iorio (SBS, July 2024), reports that:  Australia’s beloved journalist explores one of the nation’s last taboos – death – as he plans his own funeral in this new three-part series.

Ray discovers the trends, rituals, practicalities, and emerging tech around the way we lay ourselves to eternal rest. Meeting with morticians, medical students, undertakers and death deniers, Ray seeks to understand Australia’s relationship with death. What choices must be made along each stage of the dying act? Why do we choose certain ceremonies, songs and resting places? How do religions and cultures negotiate death differently? What options will open up to us in the future? And how much is it all going to cost us?

Like Ray, Australia’s largest age demographic, the ‘baby boomers’ are approaching the end-of-life cycle. They will reach the average age of death – 83 – before the end of this decade, a period academics are terming ‘peak death’. With our retirement-aged population expected to grow by 50% over the next 20 years, the conversations around our death processes, rituals and rights have never been more relevant or time critical.

Quickly discovering that most Australians don’t plan or even talk about funeral arrangements and only half have a will, Ray sets off on a quest to understand how we all approach death in our nation of differing cultures, religions and views and why it’s still one of our last taboos.

Ray Martin: The Last Goodbye is a poignant, revealing and, at times, humorous quest that will send Ray down the rabbit hole of dirges and vigils, cryonics and body composting, ancient rituals and inventive celebrations.

Ray Martin: The Last Goodbye premieres on Wednesday 14 August at 8.30pm on SBS and SBS On Demand. The three-part series continues weekly on Wednesdays at 8.30pm.

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Writing in Deadly Serious, Tim Elliott (SMH, Good Weekend, July 27 2024) reports on the SBS television three part series, Ray Martin: The Last Goodbye.

The way we say goodbye to the Boomers is not the way they said goodbye to their parents and grandparents. When Martin’s grandmother died, for instance, her body was prepared by the family at home: the kids were invited to look at her in the parlour and touch her.  But these days, most people die in hospitals or nursing homes, and body viewings are increasingly rare. As a result we’ve become fairly distanced from death. Indeed, the whole funeral industry is predicated on our determination to avoid it; too squeamish or bereaved, we retreat to genteelism, outsourcing our final journey to places like While Lady and Living Hope