Going retro (George Gently and Ashes to Ashes, sans spoilers)
George Gently was brilliant (Sunday night, BBC1). I can't tell you how much I appreciate having a detective (or 'murder mystery'[1]) drama that is gripping from start to finish, and doesn't rely on clues so obvious that an amoeba with special needs[2] could spot them. This series has also had a number of notable enhancements: firstly, the cinematography was even more excellent than in the previous episodes, beautifully shot and overlaid with heady, emotional music; secondly, we have a lovely title sequence! I hope that latter signifies that it there is much, much more to come. The only negatives I can remark on are that the press spoilered the plot over a week ago, and that the ending was pretty depressing. But next week's looks more upbeat, I think.
Ashes to Ashes is doing less well, I think. There's plenty about it that's good, and this week they didn't even overdo the 80s cheesiness too much, but Alex continues to fail to grab me and I still feel miffed at the lack of cracking scripts that made Life on Mars such a delight to watch. I love Gene enough to keep watching though, and this episode had some reasonable moments. The trailer for next week blew my mind though!
And before I forget, I'd like to ban TV shows from using that version of 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow' that's used to such wonderful effect in the final episode of Life on Mars - they played it in Primeval on Saturday, and I had flashes of {LoM spoilers} instead of noticing what was happening :)
[1] Is there much a difference? I can't decide whether there are two types of thing that merit different terminology, or not.
[2] Quote from Life on Mars - Sam says it to an NF heavy, in an unusual (but funny) breech of his usually terribly PC way of speaking.
Ashes to Ashes is doing less well, I think. There's plenty about it that's good, and this week they didn't even overdo the 80s cheesiness too much, but Alex continues to fail to grab me and I still feel miffed at the lack of cracking scripts that made Life on Mars such a delight to watch. I love Gene enough to keep watching though, and this episode had some reasonable moments. The trailer for next week blew my mind though!
And before I forget, I'd like to ban TV shows from using that version of 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow' that's used to such wonderful effect in the final episode of Life on Mars - they played it in Primeval on Saturday, and I had flashes of {LoM spoilers} instead of noticing what was happening :)
[1] Is there much a difference? I can't decide whether there are two types of thing that merit different terminology, or not.
[2] Quote from Life on Mars - Sam says it to an NF heavy, in an unusual (but funny) breech of his usually terribly PC way of speaking.