morrataxco I enjoyed the first two stories more in this four-story series. Unlike other reviewers, I didn't find the first story rushed. I thought the pacing was good. It was pretty obvious what had happened to Helen and Linda in the past, so it isn't exactly a big reveal. However, I didn't think that the flashbacks added much to the story - perhaps there were just too many of them and neither of the young actress resembled the older ones much. I liked that the resolution at the end included the historic case being reported, though.I'm not sure that there was much original in the first case - one police officer has to convince another that the wrong person has been charged etc - we've seen this many times before, but I liked the dynamic of having an established couple working together rather than a romantic tension cliche. I thought Ben Batt was really convincing as an excited prospective father, it was interesting that Helen Weeks isn't an entirely likeable character and I thought Matt King's character added quite a lot.You have to suspend belief a little in the second story - as if a woman about to give birth would rush around investigating a case. The character dynamic also completely changes. I must say, I really wasn't really that interested by the gang-member story and I didn't feel sorry enough for the new gang member's situation. Those parts felt like a distraction or padding.Some things didn't make sense - why does the criminal Frank take the action he does in light of the information he gives to Helen at the end? He may have made assumptions initially, but his henchman seems to get the full story but the course of action continues. Also, an item is stolen, we can eventually guess who by or, at least, who had arranged it, but why isn't it mentioned during the resolution? The ending was a little flat: you've kind of worked out some of it by then, I didn't buy the blackmail part and Helen's disgust didn't feel real enough. It was all over in five minutes with an off-camera confession.I felt a bit "cheated" by that!I thought Matt King was underused in the second story and the David Leon character was woefully underdeveloped. Still, I'd watch it were a second series made but it would be a different programme out of necessity.

Shiva Moon I loved this programme but, without giving anything away, I was expecting a few more episodes, as there are a lot of unanswered questions and unresolved plot-lines. It just kind of finished without warning, which is a shame because the rest of it was so beautifully written. Perhaps they're angling to see if it's picked up and want to turn it into a series; I hope so because, as it is, it was a big let-down, after a brilliant beginning. I started by giving the series 10 stars; I have now revised this to 6 because it just fizzled out and left me feeling cheated.

jc-osms I'm not familiar with the source book by Mark Billingham and so was initially confused by the format of this four-part crime drama consisting of two loosely connected stories run together one after the other.The first story was a traditional whodunnit in a familiar set-up where two young girls go missing, one turns up dead and there's a race to save the other one. Returning to her detested home town is pregnant police detective Helen Weeks played by Myanna Buring, ostensibly to comfort her childhood friend, whose husband is the prime suspect, but of course she can't resist some investigating of her own. Not only that, it turns out that her main reason for hating her upbringing was a childhood trauma she shared with her friend, which means some clichéd encounters with her phantom childhood self as she battles her demons, not to mention wider local prejudice, to crack the case. We've all seen these kind of stories spread out over 6-8 episodes so I suppose I should be grateful for the concision here but somehow it did feel a touch rushed although I'll confess I didn't guess the perpetrator.Did I mention that our girl was conflicted in her love life? Despite having an apparently happy relationship with "good bloke" fellow cop Paul, she has a fling with another cop, a Jamie Dornan lookalike, to the extent that she doesn't know who the father of her child is. This plays onto the third and fourth episodes where, now heavily pregnant, her life is turned upside down by an apparently tragic accident involving one of the men in her life which goes onto involve gang warfare in inner Manchester, with a mounting body-count which doesn't stop until the last scene. This story was much darker, more urban, more interesting I thought and contrasted with the more traditional story at the heart of episodes 1 and 2.I suppose the two differing stories show how different one case can be from the next but didn't exactly make for convincing continuity. Buring's lone-wolf activities, especially in the second half, take some swallowing as she puts herself and her almost-due child at great personal risk as she tangles with teenage gangs and criminal overlords in pursuit of the truth.Buring was okay in a sub-Anna Friel-type part but Ben Batt (a lookalike for pop singer Chris Martin) was better in the thankless task of the cuckolded boyfriend. There were some odd background characters you suspect there for PC reasons like Buring's gay dad and his boyfriend and her very camp forensics chum who isn't above following men into toilets. I did like the acting of the young black actor who played the new teenage father drawn into gangdom to provide for his girlfriend and child.For me though, on the whole, there were too many situations, too many characters and too many coincidences, plus I never really cared for Buring's character much from the start. But the detective parts were fine as was the depiction of inner city life and strife in Manchester making it a slightly above average crime drama of its type.

vicstevinson This is a well-written, thoughtfully directed crime drama... another one; BUT actor MyAnna Buring, who made a big splash in RIPPER STREET, proves she can shift gears and deliver a contemporary role with immediacy and honesty.Ben Batt portrays her partner Paul, and their banter sounds genuine and the rapport between them is easy and realistic.The plot progresses with few differences from other highly-rated investigative dramas. That's good news, but I wasn't sure if I could take another season of BROADCHURCH or THE KILLING. Luckily for Buring, I'm hooked and watching her acting choices.Glad to see she has escaped from the beating that was MY HOT PROPERTY, a film so driven by its premise, the characters don't have a chance.