Anyone watching Broadchurch?
I just took a lunch break from writing to watch it, and I have just a few early thoughts, unorganized.
Generally, it's probably not the kind of thing I'd be going out of my way to watch, especially while I'm knee-deep in diss-draft-finishing, but I miss David Tennant on my screen, dammit, and I'm fond enough of Arthur Darvill that that didn't hurt either.
It's not the kind of thing that I'd watch largely because I don't bother with child-endangerment stories anymore. I have enough internalized lizard-brain fear for my children's safety without being manipulated into that kind of fear-based reaction by a TV show, thanks. But there are a few things that make this one different from the very beginning, I think.
We're never actually *shown* any violence against a child, at least in this first episode.
The child is a boy. And he's *not* been sexually abused. Generally, the cheap emotional manipulation of a show like Cold Case or SVU will have the opposite of one or both of those things.
The grief of this boy's family, especially his mother, is so raw, and so real, that it's *that* that made me sob, more than the situation itself. And it's internally thematic, as well. This is a story about grief and community, as Linda Holmes argues in her review, and watching the DS, who is the mother of the murdered boy's best friend, feel the same empathy toward his mother that I did just compounded the empathy I was feeling, and in a totally organic way.
Bechdel passed in the first episode, a couple of times by my count.
Tennant seems here, so far, to be a kind of crossover of the DI he played in "Blackpool," and Ten at his emoiest. It seems appropriate in context, though, and I can't say that sad, sad, Tennant isn't a beautiful sight to behold.
Plotwise, it seems like a typical murder-in-a-small-town, watch all the secrets of these normal people unfold kind of thing. But so far, it seems to be done well, so I'll be staying tuned.
Okay, there was only the barest of spoilers in there--nothing you wouldn't already know from reading any other review, I think. Short version: I'll be watching, and not only for Ten and Rory (oh, and Filch!)
Also posted at http://kouredios.dreamwidth.org/251614.html ; feel free to comment there if you so choose: add comment/
comments.
Generally, it's probably not the kind of thing I'd be going out of my way to watch, especially while I'm knee-deep in diss-draft-finishing, but I miss David Tennant on my screen, dammit, and I'm fond enough of Arthur Darvill that that didn't hurt either.
It's not the kind of thing that I'd watch largely because I don't bother with child-endangerment stories anymore. I have enough internalized lizard-brain fear for my children's safety without being manipulated into that kind of fear-based reaction by a TV show, thanks. But there are a few things that make this one different from the very beginning, I think.
We're never actually *shown* any violence against a child, at least in this first episode.
The child is a boy. And he's *not* been sexually abused. Generally, the cheap emotional manipulation of a show like Cold Case or SVU will have the opposite of one or both of those things.
The grief of this boy's family, especially his mother, is so raw, and so real, that it's *that* that made me sob, more than the situation itself. And it's internally thematic, as well. This is a story about grief and community, as Linda Holmes argues in her review, and watching the DS, who is the mother of the murdered boy's best friend, feel the same empathy toward his mother that I did just compounded the empathy I was feeling, and in a totally organic way.
Bechdel passed in the first episode, a couple of times by my count.
Tennant seems here, so far, to be a kind of crossover of the DI he played in "Blackpool," and Ten at his emoiest. It seems appropriate in context, though, and I can't say that sad, sad, Tennant isn't a beautiful sight to behold.
Plotwise, it seems like a typical murder-in-a-small-town, watch all the secrets of these normal people unfold kind of thing. But so far, it seems to be done well, so I'll be staying tuned.
Okay, there was only the barest of spoilers in there--nothing you wouldn't already know from reading any other review, I think. Short version: I'll be watching, and not only for Ten and Rory (oh, and Filch!)
Also posted at http://kouredios.dreamwidth.org/251614.html ; feel free to comment there if you so choose: add comment/
comments.