garywbrown38 British Detective series - 2 leads have great chemistry and very good acting - Recommended

Bill Polhemus I started watching the first season of this police procedural, and enjoyed it a great deal until it got to a point at which I lost interest. More on that later. I should say that this appears to be another British police drama with female lead that offshoots from Prime Suspect, much like "Scott & Bailey" (which featured a supporting character played by Nicola Walker). And in fact I appreciate this one seems to avoid the extended depictions of office politics and attendant drama of those earlier series, and sticks with the crime being investigated.But here's where I lost interest. I'm not British and have never even visited the UK, but I'm aware of the intense struggle there (as here in the USA) with "political correctness" and the attempts to cast whites as guilty ex-colonizers, avoiding any intimation that non-whites are ever at fault for anything - their foibles are induced by the horrible suffering at the hands of whites. (The current ongoing drama of Tommy Robinson, currently under arrest for what in the USA would be his constitutionally-protected right of free speech is a case in point).And it seems the writers of this show are zealous adherents of that school of thinking. Thus you have one character cursed and reviled for the crime of "racism" committed forty years in the past when she was a confused teen. And then, the sudden introduction out of the blue of the "crime" of "homophobia" at which point I simply lost interest. I watch TV for entertainment, not political indoctrination. Bringing up contemporary politically-correct notions of right and wrong might resonate with a certain type of person for whom "hating Whitey" has become a religion, but to me it's tedious and distracting.I'm sorry to have been so disappointed with this series.

westsideschl I was initially going for seven stars because like most crime series of this type we are again presented w/around four to six possible baddies/perpetuators to the crime however they did add a twist that began to show itself about two thirds of the way through and was thoughtfully presented and concluded. Acting and background forensics all intelligently & realistically thought out. Another possible negative was an over reliance on making everyone a flawed character (or within a flawed environment).

paulromney03-568-287877 This review applies to season 1 only.The mystery is well set up, and the characters are sufficiently well-written to give scope to a stellar cast. However, triteness creeps in with the working out of the relationships, and to my mind the "solution" is a rabbit pulled out of a hat. It can't bear the weight of expectation established at the start. As I move on to season 2, I'm hoping that stronger writing will prevent the concept from degenerating into soap opera.