‘Luther’: Series 2 Episode 1 review
‘It’s all very soul destroying, isn’t it – actual police work?’ remarks DCI John Luther to his protégé DS Justin Ripley at the beginning of Episode 1 of this new series.
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‘It’s all very soul destroying, isn’t it – actual police work?’ remarks DCI John Luther to his protégé DS Justin Ripley at the beginning of Episode 1 of this new series.
Over the course of its first four episodes, The Shadow Line has matured from an overwrought, rather confused melodrama plagued with florid verbosity into one of the BBC’s best thrillers in a very long time. In the fifth instalment, it gets even better.
After a promising but ultimately disappointing opening, the concluding episode of this two-part story was not only charged with rescuing the floundering tale of the doppelgangers in the acid-mining monastery, but also leading into the much-hyped mid-series finale.
Angry Boys stars Sydney-born comedian Chris Lilley (Summer Heights High) as Daniel and Nathan Sims, twin teenage brothers from small-town Australia who first appeared in the mockumentary We Can Be Heroes (transmitted as The Nominees in Britain by FX UK).
In the fifth instalment of BBC Two’s thriller series, Peter Glickman is finally tracked down by Gatehouse, but the runaway moneyman has a surprise in store for his ruthless pursuer.
Any drama serial being broadcast over five consecutive nights has to work very hard to hook the viewer immediately and maintain a decent level of either excitement, intrigue or both from the opening credits onwards.
BBC Two’s increasingly fascinating police drama reaches and passes its halfway stage in this episode, yet neither DI Jonah Gabriel (Chiwetel Ejiofor) nor Joseph Bede (Christopher Eccleston) appear much closer to accomplishing their respective goals than they were in the hours after the death of gangster Harvey Wratten.
In the fourth part of BBC Two’s thriller series, DI Jonah Gabriel finally establishes why murdered gangster Harvey Wratten received a Royal Pardon – but does the information help or hinder his investigation?
Like the drugs at the heart of the late Harvey Wratton’s empire, The Shadow Line has become addictive in a slow, almost sneaky manner. After an unhurried, take-it-or-leave it start, it has insidiously built up to the point where now, three episodes in, it has become impossible to break free of its grip.
ITV1’s new female-led detective series, starring Suranne Jones and Lesley Sharp as Rachel Bailey and Janet Scott, detective constables in the Manchester Metropolitan police, promises a great deal but – on the evidence of this opening hour, at least – delivers very little.