Moodier, Murderier Mysteries

[James Arryn]

A few I’d mention not seen discussed here, might have missed:

*Jack Irish, Australian series starring Guy Pierce based on the books by Peter Temple. Kinda cozy noir, great cast, based on good books. My association is that this was the show I started watching to get through the screaming and pleading of the twins sleep training. 
 

*Whitstable Pearl, southern coast of England, thinking Kent?…about an ex-cop widow or divorcee (think widow) who runs a restaurant with her mother and son, but also runs a p.I. business on the side, not nearly as twee as it sounds, can get pretty dark, well written and acted. 
 

*Grace. Based on books of which I own the first but have not read yet. Stars John Simm, regular member of the British tv stable, as a Brighton cop whose wife disappeared years ago, presumed dead, and was semi-disgraced for being caught using a medium to try and get information on a case, something he still ~ believes in without being a particularly spiritualist person. The tone is greyish, though usually actually sunny, and the villains tend towards the very dark. 
 

On top of that I’d add my strong recommendation to those who suggested Dagliesh, very very well done. In a way like the film version of Tinker Tailor, in that they are taking a story line that filled hours and hours of older miniseries (also worth watching) and condensing it to an hour and a half, yet maintaining the central points and most importantly keeping it atmospheric and filled with lots of quiet moments that suits the lead actor’s choices. Really looking forward to S2/3 (both were commissioned together) Vera is well done, bit formulaic, based on the books by the same author upon whose other series Shetland is based on, which is imo superior, though Vera definitely has some memorable episodes. I personally preferred her first sidekick. 
 

Endeavour, Morse, Lewis, that’s my jam. Sad it’s almost (still putting off final series) over, sad that the rumoured Hathaway series has probably been tanked since Fox decided to appoint himself Anti-woke Avenger. Death in Paradise I’ll watch in the right mood, it’s pretty twee to me but can be ok. Can’t get into some of the others mentioned before like Agatha Raisen, Fran Fischer, etc. The latter I liked to begin with but she’s a bit Mary Sue, though I could give it another chance.

Midsomer Murders I agree is filled to the brim with nasty, petty, selfish people killing each other off for often ridiculous reasons and the plots are often pretty meh, the acting kinda mailed in, but somehow this battery acid in a chocolate box IS relaxing. Haven’t watched one in quite a while, barely watch any television since babies, but hopefully soon as they’re starting daycare. 

Edited January 24, 2023 by James Arryn

[Datepalm]

2 hours ago, James Arryn said:

*Whitstable Pearl, southern coast of England, thinking Kent?…about an ex-cop widow or divorcee (think widow) who runs a restaurant with her mother and son, but also runs a p.I. business on the side, not nearly as twee as it sounds, can get pretty dark, well written and acted.

Really enjoy Whitstable. Fits all the sense-of-place criteria, likeable characters, a bit of goofiness but not too much. I like the focus in a lot of these on middle aged women living reasonable, full middle aged lives with families and commitments and histories and totally normal amounts of murders. Annika goes into this sort of boat (pardon the pun) too, at the other end of the British Isles, though it's a little more dramatic.

Actually really enjoying the new Vera episodes - I feel like they're a bit more tightly plotted and paced than they used to be?

Happy Valley is back too - doesn't fit the relaxing whodunnit mold despite the plot, but mainly because it's too good.

Oh, I'm quite fond of McDonald and Dodds - it's definitely on the silly side, but I never find them kind of irritating the way Agatha Raisin is.

Edited January 24, 2023 by Datepalm

[Zorral]

I've watched all those @James Arryn mentioned, and liked them all, particularly Jack Irish, with the exception of Endeavour, that wet twit.  I dislike him even more than I disliked the 'mature'  Morse, so much so that I've never completed watching the seasons, as nothing about the young one or the old one progresses, and the story lines aren't interesting to me either, for whatever reasons.  The exception I do make is the character of Detective Thursday -- I really, really like him, and his wife too. Roger Allam is wonderful in anything.

Jack Irish is surrounded by offbeat characters who are as interesting and charismatic as he is, in their separate ways.  It's also fun in a funny kind of way, maybe due to being in Australia and the dank and dismal wet England, but filled with bright colors under sunshine.

 

[James Arryn]

27 minutes ago, Datepalm said:

Really enjoy Whitstable. Fits all the sense-of-place criteria, likeable characters, a bit of goofiness but not too much. I like the focus in a lot of these on middle aged women living reasonable, full middle aged lives with families and commitments and histories and totally normal amounts of murders. Annika goes into this sort of boat (pardon the pun) too, at the other end of the British Isles, though it's a little more dramatic.

Actually really enjoying the new Vera episodes - I feel like they're a bit more tightly plotted and paced than they used to be?

Happy Valley is back too - doesn't fit the relaxing whodunnit mold despite the plot, but mainly because it's too good.

Oh, I'm quite fond of McDonald and Dodds - it's definitely on the silly side, but I never find them kind of irritating the way Agatha Raisin is.

Happy Valley is back? Great news, fantastic show, but yeah, anything but relaxing. Funny, I was just reading a book set in the area which had me reading about Happy Valley again a few days ago. One of the show’s co-writers is one of the leads/creators of Scott and Bailey which is a fantastic series whose only flaw is that they take the trope of the crimes being connected to the personal lives of the investigators and put it on steroids. The actress playing their boss is wonderful, all the cast really.
 

Back to Happy Valley, my reading revealed that the lead actress is amongst the better known in Britain, but I don’t recognize her at all, I think she’s done a lot more soapy stuff than I ever watch. But w/e her background, she can seriously act. The lead villain of the first season was very charismatic (I think he was the lead in the first few seasons of Granchester, which should probably get a mention though imo it felt contrived after the first guy left. But I really like Bronn’s best mate) and the actress playing her sister is great, from the stable, most known probably for Downton Abbey.

[Datepalm]

8 minutes ago, James Arryn said:

Happy Valley is back? Great news, fantastic show, but yeah, anything but relaxing. Funny, I was just reading a book set in the area which had me reading about Happy Valley again a few days ago. One of the show’s co-writers is one of the leads/creators of Scott and Bailey which is a fantastic series whose only flaw is that they take the trope of the crimes being connected to the personal lives of the investigators and put it on steroids. The actress playing their boss is wonderful, all the cast really.
 

Back to Happy Valley, my reading revealed that the lead actress is amongst the better known in Britain, but I don’t recognize her at all, I think she’s done a lot more soapy stuff than I ever watch. But w/e her background, she can seriously act. The lead villain of the first season was very charismatic (I think he was the lead in the first few seasons of Granchester, which should probably get a mention though imo it felt contrived after the first guy left. But I really like Bronn’s best mate) and the actress playing her sister is great, from the stable, most known probably for Downton Abbey.

Yeah, everyone in Happy Valley is phenomenal. First-Improbably-Hot-Priest-From-Grantchester (um, James Norton - that was quicker to google than write out) is terrifying in this season. He's got that kinda Jon Hamm skill where he can wear his own handsomeness and use it like it was another bit of costuming, to act as a complicated layer of characterization. He's riveting and repulsive at once as the villain. I'm very worried about Catherine. It is not relaxing.

Grantchester I do feel has gone down the hill a bit and become very tiresomely didactic and self-congratulating. Also like there are now too few murders.

 

[James Arryn]

6 minutes ago, Datepalm said:

Yeah, everyone in Happy Valley is phenomenal. First-Improbably-Hot-Priest-From-Grantchester (um, James Norton - that was quicker to google than write out) is terrifying in this season. He's got that kinda Jon Hamm skill where he can wear his own handsomeness and use it like it was another bit of costuming, to act as a complicated layer of characterization. He's riveting and repulsive at once as the villain. I'm very worried about Catherine. It is not relaxing.

Grantchester I do feel has gone down the hill a bit and become very tiresomely didactic and self-congratulating. Also like there are now too few murders.

 

Re: Grantchster, the newer priest’s voice is quite a bit like mine, and for that reason I can tell when he’s trying to lean into it, and that’s happening A LOT. Gets on my nerves a bit, but I doubt it bothers others. And it’s no one’s fault, but two priests in a row who happen to be sleuths and the cops kinda translating the first guy’s credit to the second…it all heightens my sense of artifice. Also, having boxed for years, if this guy ever boxed before, it doesn’t show. Even working the heavy bag, he has no real idea what he’s trying to do. Really being nit-picky and like I said, no one’s fault, but it’s not a show that can readily survive the lead changing, because you are already accepting some serious improbabilities in the first place. 

Also they are really hitting the class thing hard, and I know for Brits this rings really true, but as a Canadian I’m a bit meh about it all, like it in limited doses but otherwise it doesn’t have the effect on me it’s supposed to have, I’m not impressed or surprised or intimidated by someone of the ____ class doing _____ the way the show assumes I ought to be. But other British shows do this too, and if the show was working for me overall it’d probably not register as much. 

From HV, Norton’s (thank you!) combination of charm and sociopathic villainy reminded me a bit of Ralph Fiennes in Schindler’s List, though obviously pitched much younger. If we are moving away from relaxing, I’d again recommend Prime Suspect and Cracker, two shows from thw 80’s (maybe early 90’s?) that are imo two of the best shows ever, and Mirren and Coltrane delivering absolute master classes in tv acting. 

[Zorral]

27 minutes ago, James Arryn said:

I don’t recognize her at al

You never watched, say, Last Tango in Halifax?  Sarah Lancaster is an HV's director/writer, Sally Wainwright,  stalwart (Wainwright is also responsible for the brilliant Gentleman Jack, among other very good titles.)

Lost interest in Grantchester even before Norton left it.  So, is his character returned for HV third season?  The horror of the victims and their suffering had me dropping out of season 1, dropping out of season 2, too.  There is so much of this in the real world I cannot bear to watch it on screen.  It is not entertaining.  Or enlightening.

As for Whitestable Pearl, the drawback that began in season 2 and got really large in season 3 is the character of Mike McGuire; Howard Charles, who plays him, was so much more engaging as Porthos in Musketeers.  He's become the actual lump his character is, seemingly pouting that Whitstable is less than he deserves -- his backstory isn't generating a sympathy that should mitigate that sense of his attitude.  Not that I am correct in saying either the characer or the actor possess this attitude -- I actually doubt that, in fact.  It's just how it's coming across to me.  But I still really like the show, and Pearl and Dolly and Pearl's kid.  And the location.

[James Arryn]

1 hour ago, Zorral said:

You never watched, say, Last Tango in Halifax?  Sarah Lancaster is an HV's director/writer, Sally Wainwright,  stalwart (Wainwright is also responsible for the brilliant Gentleman Jack, among other very good titles.)

Lost interest in Grantchester even before Norton left it.  So, is his character returned for HV third season?  The horror of the victims and their suffering had me dropping out of season 1, dropping out of season 2, too.  There is so much of this in the real world I cannot bear to watch it on screen.  It is not entertaining.  Or enlightening.

As for Whitestable Pearl, the drawback that began in season 2 and got really large in season 3 is the character of Mike McGuire; Howard Charles, who plays him, was so much more engaging as Porthos in Musketeers.  He's become the actual lump his character is, seemingly pouting that Whitstable is less than he deserves -- his backstory isn't generating a sympathy that should mitigate that sense of his attitude.  Not that I am correct in saying either the characer or the actor possess this attitude -- I actually doubt that, in fact.  It's just how it's coming across to me.  But I still really like the show, and Pearl and Dolly and Pearl's kid.  And the location.

Re: Halifax, no, but it kept coming up in my recent reading, so I’ll probably give it a go. Cast sounds incredible. Jacobi, right? I think whenever I’d heard it mentioned before I stupidly assumed it was a Canadian show.

Totally feel you on HV, it strikes very depressingly real, and usually I avoid that. Don’t like true crime stuff that takes place at any time or place I can relate to, actually pretty much avoid true crime stuff period (Jack the Ripper is the exception for that reason and because I always ~ associated it with Sherlock Holmes as a kid). But I generally avoid mobster movies set in modern times, true crime stuff, any of those things that feel like they could happen to someone I know, and yeah Happy Valley crosses that line often, I have to be in the right frame of mind to watch it. But it’s just so good.

Whitstable, I’m only up to the first or second episode of S2, so the McGuire character hasn’t felt that way yet. I was kinda relieved they dropped their romance (though I suspect it will keep popping it’s head up) despite their actually having good chemistry because it’s such a small show it would be hard to keep their relationship from becoming the show, to the detriment of the mysteries, if you get me. Love the mom, but at the same time I could see them going overboard with how much of a character she is if they’re not careful. 

Edited January 24, 2023 by James Arryn

[Iskaral Pust]

We’ve just recently started Jack Irish and like it a lot so far.  Great humor.

I want to like Whitstable Pearl but the barely coherent mumbling by the main actor — trying too hard to sound tough, I think — puts me off.  Enunciate!, FFS.

[Zorral]

HE is NOT the main character. Pearl is.  The show has HER name in the title, not McGuire's.

[Iskaral Pust]

3 hours ago, Zorral said:

HE is NOT the main character. Pearl is.  The show has HER name in the title, not McGuire's.

I just couldn’t remember the character’s name.  

[Zorral]

16 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

just couldn’t remember the character’s name.

Man, what is it? Now you say the main character, whose name you can't remember despite being in the title,  mumbles. Pearl, is the main character; her character does not mumble.  But McGuire mumbles.   Is he the character you meant?  But, again HE isn't the main character. SHE, Pearl, is the main character, Pearl, She Who Does Not Mumble.  

Edited January 25, 2023 by Zorral

[Mindwalker]

After 1 episode, Whitstable Pearl didn't really do it for me. Maybe I'll watch one or two more to give it another chance.

Poker Face, otoh, is quite promising after one ep. Natasha Lyonne on the run, solving mysteries in Vegas. .

Edited February 2, 2023 by Mindwalker

[AncalagonTheBlack]

Inspector Ricciardi: From Friday 10th March, All4/Walter Presents

Inspector Ricciardi, an Italian period crime drama, will hit our screens next month.

Naples, 1932. Inspector Ricciardi is no ordinary detective. The police commissioner is haunted by the ghosts of people who were violently killed, and can hear their final thoughts. It is a gift he inherited from his mother, and he doesn’t hesitate to use his chilling connection to the echoes of the dead to solve Naples’ most vicious murder cases. Thus, this extraordinary gift is both a blessing and a curse.

 

BBC Four confirms transmission date for Paris Police 1905

Two years ago we were bowled over by Paris Police1900, a handsome, turn-of-the-20th-century crime drama set in Paris (the clue’s in the name, we guess). It examined politics, riots, race, addiction and class in a sumptuous, sprawling story.

And it’s coming back for a second series.

Now set in 1905 (again, the clue is in the name) Paris Police 1905 follows Paris police’s vice squad – on the orders of Police Chief Lépine – as it begins to clean prostitutes off the city’s streets. However, a man’s body is found in the Bois de Boulogne and Inspector Antoine Jouin is entrusted with the investigation.

Here’s a French-language trailer:

The six-episode series will once again be told in weekly double-bills.

Paris Police 1905: Saturday 4th March, 9pm, BBC Four

[Iskaral Pust]

Sherwood was ok but then the ending was really unsatisfying and the long epilogue for everyone to talk about their feelings was just an indictment of terrible storytelling: show, don’t tell.

[Mindwalker]

I've started to rewatch Vera, all of it right from the start, as I couldn't figure out which seasons I'd already seen. And it's been so long that I don't remember most of the cases anyway.  I'm at season 6 now, I think. I find the changes in co-workers a bit jarring, particularly of her sergeant. The first one was more interesting.

Also, Three Pines got cancelled.

Edited April 7, 2023 by Mindwalker

[AncalagonTheBlack]

1 hour ago, Mindwalker said:

I've started to rewatch Vera, all of it right from the start, as I couldn't figure out which seasons I'd already seen. And it's been so long that I don't remember most of the cases anyway.  I'm at season 6 now, I think. I find the changes in co-workers a bit jarring, particularly of her sergeant. The first one was more interesting.

You will be happy to know that David Leon is back as Joe in season 13.

https://thekillingtimestv.wordpress.com/2023/03/31/vera-season-13-itv-confirms-return-of-brenda-blethyn-and-david-leon/

[James Arryn]

On 4/7/2023 at 12:05 AM, AncalagonTheBlack said:

You will be happy to know that David Leon is back as Joe in season 13.

https://thekillingtimestv.wordpress.com/2023/03/31/vera-season-13-itv-confirms-return-of-brenda-blethyn-and-david-leon/

That’s great. Been a while since I watched, but to me the show sagged when he left. Not in a big way, not that the replacement guy wasn’t good, it’s just that Joe served as her only alternative to ~ living like a recluse outside of work, they’d established a believable rapport that allowed him to express concern about her isolation and choices without it having to be a show-stopping scene, and she had established her only real personal interest in the outside world re: his family, even if she avoids the ramifications of that pretty often. Her desire to connect, often choice to pull the plug and his sincere hurt and concern when she bails or pretends to/forget the kid’s name or w/e was believable and felt like RL relationships can often feel. 
 

With the new guy, trying to do that…and they often avoided it from what I remember early on…would necessarily seem artificial because the odds that she develops another exact same vulnerability after obviously being hurt he left are pretty low and come off canned. But avoiding that still leaves her living in a bubble, connecting to the world only through murder investigations which would be bleaker than the show wanted to be, imo. I don’t feel the mysteries suffered when he left, just that the stuff surrounding it was lesser, through no fault of anything but narrative plausibility given Leon’s leaving.

Edited April 9, 2023 by James Arryn

[Mindwalker]

On 4/7/2023 at 6:05 AM, AncalagonTheBlack said:

You will be happy to know that David Leon is back as Joe in season 13.

https://thekillingtimestv.wordpress.com/2023/03/31/vera-season-13-itv-confirms-return-of-brenda-blethyn-and-david-leon/

That'll be interesting!

I've no complaints they switched out the first pathologist, Mr Supercreep, though. Actually quite like the current one (in season 9 or so), the sarcastic one.*

The cases vary in quality and yes, are quite formulaic; the series really hinges on its protagonist and her relationships - or non-relationships - with people.

*ETA: Well, I obviously jinxed it! Mr Sarcasm has announced his departure.

Edited April 12, 2023 by Mindwalker

[Zorral]

I hate to admit this, but the last two Vera seasons -- I felt they should stop making them.  I can predict every line every character speaks now, before it is pronounced, can predict the entrance or movements of every character within the station, etc.  The policing moves as policing have become silly -- the writers can barely be bothered to put them in at all, they are so formulaic, so they are barely even sketched invisibly in air. 

Quite like putting on gloves in cop shop shows now is merely an indicator the characters are observing forensic protocols to not contaminate scene and evidence -- while with bare hands they rifle through things and pick them up.  Vera is very close to this too, at this point.

I'm sad about this as I've loved the series, both in print and on screen.  But like the books are getting less interesting too . . . .