Line of Duty: The Most Important Police Drama in Years.

*not my photo

Admittedly, I haven’t been enthralled with a copper series since… well, since I can remember, except for that Scandi “Wallander” though that one is more protagonist-centered rather than procedural. The show I am referring to is BBC’s "Line of Duty” which began in 2012 and is now getting the much deserved traction because of the story arc's resiliency and its ability to hoodwink the most seasoned of cop show enthusiasts with every episode.

Format:
Line of Duty’s format is seminal in a great sense of the word because the mainstay actors (Martin Compston, Vicky McClure and Adrian Dunbar) in effect become supporting cast to the season’s main guest who generally are well-known actors. The current season’s person of interest is played by Thandie Newton (Beloved, Mission Impossible 2), 2nd season’s was played by Keeley Hawes (Upstairs, Downstairs) and the first, Lennie James (AMC’s Low and Winter Sun).


 The Gist:
AC 12 or Anti-Corruption Unit 12 is London Police’s internal affairs group that investigates possible corrupt police officers or “bent coppers", and they are relentless in their cause. What makes this show a cut above is the tangents from which the revelations arise. The initial issue to embark upon naturally, is to conjecture the guilt or innocence of the person under the light of the inquest, subsequently, the analytical reasoning by the viewers follows and whatever conclusion one comes up with as a spectator, many find themselves agape and wrangling with the “why?” “how” and the “what” during the finales.

Suspects:
Series One: The copper under scrutiny is Det. Tony Gates (Lennie James), a police officer lauded by his peers whose weaknesses include a beautiful Jackie Laverty (Nottinghill's Gina McKee) and high-end provisions for his children. Lennie James plays Gates with great conflict that one can’t help but be both sympathetic and aggrieved with his flaws altogether. Is he bent? if so, how knee-deep is he with the criminal element of London?

Series Two: One will truly commiserate with Det. Insp. Lindsey Denton, a lonely, single, scorned woman, who has to provide the best for her ailing mother, is it incompetence or corruption that causes the death of another police officer under her watch? Or does her dark side really seal her as an all out baddie? Keeley Hawes is almost unrecognizable as the frumpy detective who plays the character with a passivity of a doormat one moment and a powder keg of raw emotions the next.

Series Three: Daniel Mays (Tivik in Rogue One) is Sgt. Daniel Waldron, the rigid SWAT team leader with axes to grind with many people both great and small in London town. Malevolent persons in position by which he plays the vigilante, even coming from within the police force. Series Three explores child abuse perpetrated by high profile people in London (lending from the Jimmy Saville case) and bullying and dissent among a police team that has to struggle between loyalty and honesty.

Series Four: Det. Chief Insp. Roz Huntley played by Thandie Newton is tough and perhaps even heartless. She implicates an innocent mentally-challenged young man and an immigrant in heavy crimes without apparent remorse. Is she corrupt for her own gain? or is she putting herself on the line to protect someone else?

Jed Mercurio:
“Line of Duty’s” creator (the aforementioned), is the ace in hand of this show. His materials borrow much from his medical career as a physician and a military man; with a writing CV that includes well-received novels like “Bodies” (also made into a TV series)and a sci-fi “Ascent,” fans of "Line of Duty" enjoy a cognizant and honest to goodness, edge-of-your-seat guessing game from the beginning to the end of each season. The arcs of the story lines have the staying power to keep audiences through and back again.

As series four concludes this Sunday, I see this one soar to the stratosphere even more and would venture to say that it’s only a matter of time before we hear one the the US’s alphabet networks adapt it there. The cat’s out of the bag, here’s a TV show that’s original and is a blueprint in the making. Give this one a tumble, I’d say, it’s quite intelligent, yes, a plot hole or two exists but the storytelling is genuine and it hits the spot.  

The Night Manager, Espionage Du Jour

photo from BBC

Allow me please to take a moment to write about “The Night Manager.” That John Le Carré espionage novel turned into a BBC TV series starring Tom Hiddleston (Loki in Thor) and Hugh Laurie (House). It is a stunner. I have not read the book yet but I like it already because of the show. My most memorable of the Le Carrés are The Spy Who Came Out From the Cold, The George Smiley Series, The Tailor from Panama and the Russia House I remember for being tedious. Though Le Carré's books are not suspenseful in a bloody, action sense, I always insist on finishing them because I imagine his views on covert operations are closer to reality, it has more leg work, interrogation and drawn out cloak and dagger exchanges versus high octane chases and commotion. 

The suspense in Le Carré’s novels I believe are in human flaws, mishaps in timing and the deep malevolence of the villain and if one becomes gripped at the start, the entire package of the book from the characters, the plot, subplots and other nuances will be embedded in your memory.

The Night Manager:

Jonathan Pine (Tom Hiddleston) is a night manager at a reputable hotel in Cairo, Egypt during the height of the Arab Spring uprising that ousted Mubarak. He is charming and people are drawn to him, especially women. A mysterious woman named Sophia who is the mistress of a known Egyptian baddie approaches him at the front desk and gives him a copy of a transaction of an arms deal with instructions that should anything happen to her, this information must be given to a friend of Jonathan Pine's at the British Embassy. Pine reads the document and realizes that the man supplying the arms is a famous British philanthropist/businessman named Richard Roper (Hugh Laurie). Pine shows this information to his friend at the embassy who then submits it to MI6 but instead of an investigation or arrest, Roper is warned of the leak from the inside. This results in the brutal murder of Sophia as the paper trail leads to her and Pine is affected by this. Sophia’s death makes a painful impression on Pine that he seeks solace at the Swiss alps in an exclusive hotel lodge and stays there to hide.

Four years has past and who should enter the Swiss lodge but none other than the evil man himself in the flesh, Richard Roper with his entourage. Pine’s righteous indignation for the man is rekindled and he gets re-acquainted with the head of an obscure MI6 division, Angela Burr, who attempted to help the Cairo situation back then. Angela Burr (played by Olivia Coleman), has a vendetta with Roper. Burr recruits Pine to help her take down “the worst man on Earth,” and allows him to infiltrate Roper's inner circle. Pine builds another identity, that of a lowlife criminal on the run, one who is close in character as possible to Roper and the gambit pays off when he is then taken in by the villain himself. While inside the core group, Pine wins the affections of Roper’s kid, girlfriend and even the henchmen. And since he has to leak information to his handlers in London and not to mention he does not keep his hands to himself as regards Roper’s gorgeous girlfriend, it is here where most of the sweating of one's palms begin.

The TV show is very sophisticated, it has posh elements and locations like Mallorca, London, Istanbul; it has high fashion wardrobe, champagne, luxury and everything else that blood money has to offer coming from the arms trade. The actors are superb and they include, Tom Hiddleston who is able to carry it through mainly because of his perfect visage, hey, it really works. Hugh Laurie who plays Roper is urbane and pragmatic as someone who doesn’t think twice about mixing Sarin gas and children, perhaps the pathology lies in not having a line and Laurie's performance makes the mark. Olivia Coleman is a watchable dramatic actor always and so is Tom Hollander as Corky, the cynical assistant who is threatened by Pine's existence.  But the Easter Egg here in my view is the actress that plays Roper’s girlfriend, Elizabeth Debiki; a newbie from Australia who I know will go high towards the stratosphere in movies, not because she is 6 feet and 2-inches bare feet, but for of the soul she bares as a performer; with her the adage in acting that goes, “There are no small parts…” is fulfilled. Move over, way over there Charlize Theron.  

The spy drama has 6 episodes in the first series and the suspense lies in whether Pine's cover will be blown and that indeed captures you. The initial series has now concluded at the BBC, already people are thirsting for the second installment and who can blame them?

Delightful Dickensian

*photo - BBC

Dickensian, a delightful TV mash up of most of Dickens' characters which centers around the investigation of the death of Mr. "Ghost of Christmas Past" himself, Jacob Marley ( a character from "A Christmas Carol").  It is enjoyable for one to watch and recall which character comes from what book of Dickens' and go, “Ah, so that’s what may have happened as to why Miss Havisham of 'Great Expectations' lost her mind,” for example.

In this spin off, Fagin (the ringleader in "Oliver Twist"), Jaggers (the furtive lawyer from "Great Expectations") and Scrooge and Marley (both from "A Christmas Carol") interlocks in their business affairs, and the inquest of the latter's murder is the common denominator. The investigation is being conducted by one Inspector Buckett, the capable copper from "Bleak House". One sinister but commanding presence here in Dickensian is that of Meriwether Compeyson, the black-hearted extortioner of the Havishams. Though in "Great Expectations," his character was mostly annotated, he is pivotal to the whole story because were it not for his malevolence, the main characters' complexities in that book would not revolve as such. As it is in the book, Compeyson is significant but this time he is conspicuous here in the BBC drama; like all soaps though, the culmination of his ignominy is long in coming.

On a brighter note, we are treated to a sound-minded Amelia Havisham and a non-bleak Honoria Barbary, (soon to be Lady Honoria Dedlock of "Bleak House"); both are depicted as bosom friends here and what a sight for sore eyes to see such youthful buoyancy in these two. Capt. James Hawdon of the British Navy who is also an annotation in "Bleak House" is cheerful and full of romantic dreams for Honoria but alas in the future, he becomes "Nemo." *Spoiler.

Most everyone from the Dickens realm meets and passes through this Main Street in Victorian London and both benign and malignant characters hang and/or schemes at the default public called "The Three Cripples" (featured in "Oliver Twist"). At the pub, Mr. and Mrs. Bumble, Bill Sikes and Nancy (all from "Oliver Twist"); Mrs. Gamp, the gin-loving nurse from "Martin Chuzzlewit,” Bob Crachit, the honest clerk from "A Christmas Carol" and of course Fagin et. al. chill and conglomerate. The pub is owned by wooden leg Silas Wegg from “Our Mutual Friend,” and his diseased non-amputated leg  is being nursed by Mrs. Gamp. In “Our Mutual Friend" taxidermist Mr. Venus was featured as Silas Wegg’s would be cohort but in this universe of Charles Dickens, he becomes a confidant and forensic man of sorts to Inspector Buckett. Also found in the streets of Victorian London is “The Old Curiosity Shop,” and pretty, little Nell (still not quite fourteen) is being wooed by one of the Crachit kids.

The story lines here predates that of the main protagonists of the famous Charles Dickens books as it in fact lays a foundation for them. Example, Estella and Pip ("Great Expectations"), Esther Summerson ("Bleak House") do not exist yet, but I've read that Oliver Twist himself will materialize in the second season. The "street urchins" as Dickens fondly referred to them like Artful Dodger and others are used as couriers by baddies and goodies alike. Characters which I’d like to see but are absent from the show (so far, as I’m only in episode 7) are characters from Nickolas Nickleby, Barnaby Rudge and Little Dorrit, unless I missed them. I will not pretend to have read all of Dickens’ books but as it stands, this is a very clever and exciting amalgamation and innovation of the classic characters already.

Actors in the show include, Stephen Rea (Crying Game, Interview w/ a Vampire), Anton Lesser (GOT, POTC - On Stranger Tides), Tuppence Middleton (Countess Bezukhova in War and Peace, the recent one), Sophie Rundle (the sweet one in Bletchley Circle), Pauline Collins (Queen Victoria in Doctor Who), Tom Weston-Jones of BBC America's "Copper," who plays Compeyson and many more. Give this a tumble won't you? Because even if one doesn’t know their Dickens intimately, the plot twists and turns stand on their own, not to mention, the period design and costume and skillful acting of veteran and young actors are worthy.

Clark Kent and the Blue Police Box

In Reddit, there is a writing prompt for any one who is willing to take a gander at making up stories. I responded to one where the scenario begins with the Earth being attacked by aliens and Clark Kent who needs to change to Superman finds a blue box in the middle of the street. Most Sci-Fi dabblers know what the blue box is and who it's inhabitant is and certainly, everybody knows who Superman is, the rest however goes like this:

Clark Kent entered the Blue Police Box and met a man dressed as a magician with very particular eyebrows. He noticed a round panel with a column at the center and though it was bigger on the inside, he was not confounded by it as he figured, what ever he entered into was not terrestrial. The old man was friendly and didn’t seem surprised when he saw Clark. His eyes fixed on the “S” at the center of Clark’s chest and said.

“Peace.” The old man said with a notable Scottish accent. “You come in peace! so do I, I’m the Doctor.”

Clark looked at him quizzically and while he wondered how the “Doctor” was able to figure out the meaning of the S in his own planet Krypton, he also sensed that the old man was not hostile.

“Quickly, I need to change.” Clark said.

“Upstairs to the right and 2 lefts.” The Doctor said.

As Clark ascended with acceleration, he noticed he was somewhat slower than his usual speed of light, but given the urgency, he brushed it aside and changed to his super hero outfit with only one thing in mind. When he got out of the box he would battle the aliens fast before it was all too late. He did notice however a slight hesitation within himself and felt as though someone was watching, as he turned around, he saw a stone statue of an angel looking serene. He blinked once and noticed this thing came closer though he wasn’t sure. As he blinked one more time it was indeed right at this face and showed it’s fangs ready to attack but with quick reflexes he obliterates the creature with the lasers in his eyes. As the smoke settled around the rubble of a Weeping Angel ,The Doctor entered the room yelling, “Don’t bli!! Oh," he said, "so much for that heap of stone."

“What is this place, what was that and who are you?” Asked Clark.

“I’m The Doctor and you are in my home/space craft/ hobby room/concert stage/time machine, that was a Weeping Angel, etc. etc. Why are you in a funny outfit?” The Doctor asked.

“I’m Superman. Did you bring the aliens here? Is this why Earth is under attack?”

“Firstly, the TARDIS may be a space ship with infinite dimensions inside and yes, the artifacts chamber or museum may harbor monsters and such but I assure you, they are dead and stuffed, a taxidermist from Newcastle had a hand in that. Secondly, no, I did not bring the aliens here. Thirdly, Earth is always under attack anyway, if not by aliens from other planets, just amongst themselves, and fourthly, how super?”

Superman found himself sitting on the stairs of the TARDIS and felt a slight drain of energy and began to have doubts about The Doctor.

“Then why did the statue try to attack me?” He asked.

“That is a mystery to me too,” the Doctor approached the center and pushed some buttons on the console. “According to my calculations, a disturbance is arising from the 3rd level chamber below with a type of an unidentified radiation. Wait a minute, it’s the Artifact Chamber,” it’s seems..”

Both The Doctor and Superman look to the left and four silver metallic robots walking in military cadence mechanically vocalizing “Delete! Delete!” repeatedly, came charging towards them.

“Cybermen!” shouted The Doctor. As the Cybermen take aim at both of them, Superman lets out a massive breath and forms a dense layer of ice which buffers the laser fire. While the lasers missed them narrowly, fireworks and explosions erupt inside the TARDIS, beams topple over and crashing all around. At the sight of the second wave of lasers from the organic robots, Superman turned to a solar flare of energy and zoomed into the Cybermen like a meteor. A loud sound and boom fills the TARDIS and the Cybermen fall on the floor mangled in a heap of metal mess.

Under the pile of metal, Superman emerges looking weak and discomfited. Though the Cybermen were destroyed, it appears Superman felt depleted.

“Somehow, the creatures from the Artifact Chamber are coming to life in your presence.” The Doctor spoke as he read the calculations on the console. “Where are you from? because clearly, you aren’t human. Are you alright? it’s as if..”

The Doctor catches Superman as he falls from his attempt to stand. Superman was very weak, out of breath and even his garment was torn. He has spent a great amount of energy with the solar flare and though he has healed because of this many times before, it would take a long amount of time and he continued to feel drained

“Yes, but I also feel as though I am losing my powers.” Superman mutters with a feeble voice. “What is in this ship? where are you from?” As he remembered his beloved humans being attacked by formidable alien beings, a pang of sadness comes over because for the first time he felt he might not be able to do anything to help them.

“Well, let me see, I had a distress signal around the southern constellation of Corvus, about 26.7 light years from Earth to a planet that orbits around a red dwarf star, ah..ah.. the LHS 2520, yes, that’s right. It was a band of Daleks which assimilated to the element of the planet, the planet Krypton, I believe it was.” The Doctor’s eyes grew larger and fearful as he looked at Superman. "Of course, you, you are a Kryptonian; that’s why everything that’s lifeless in this ship is reacting to you, somehow the TARDIS and elements on board must have accumulated a minute form of energy from Krypton and with your presence, they are regenerating, in a sense! but you, the energy is being taken away from you because you are a.. so, you are dying...”

Just as the Doctor finished speaking, a sinister presence emerged from the corner south end of the TARDIS and entered the upper dome with a familiar mortiferous electronic voice, “Exterminate!, Exterminate!” it was a Dalek, with the exoskeleton made of Krypton, glowing in bright green! The Dalek fires lasers indiscriminately destroying what’s left of the TARDIS. Superman feels the radiation coming from the Kryptonite Dalek and lays down with increased shallow respiration, his arms reaching across as if to make a stand but to no use, as the lasers continue to fire, more damage is incurred in the ship, a beam descends toward the Doctor and hits him mightily. As he falls down he reaches for the time rotor on the control bridge, and pulls the lever down, hoping that the TARDIS will understand what he is trying to do just as it did a few times before. And then blackness…

Moments later or ago, the sound of the TARDIS appearing is heard. Inside the blue box The Doctor stands straight facing the door unscathed and whole with the TARDIS intact. As it swings open, he sees a bespectacled tall man with the letter “S” on his chest about to enter.

“Stop!” he yells in that thick Scottish accent. "What ever you do, don’t come in here. Go somewhere else to change and deal with the the aliens yourself, you can handle it obviously, with your laser eyes and your solar body, it’s just the Sontarons, knock them at the back of their head or, appeal to them on their “military" side and they’ll love you. But just please, don’t come in here, go and find another box in which to change.”