Happy Valley is fantastic TV — but very hard to watch. It’s simply too intense.
Devastating.
Catherine Cawood is a divorced police sergeant with two children.
She is still trying to recover from the suicide of her daughter, which happened eight years ago.
Catherine is raising her grandson, Ryan, who was born due to her daughter being raped by Tommy Lee Royce.
Just when it seems like Catherine is gaining control over her life, she discovers that Tommy, whom she holds responsible for her daughter’s suicide, has been released from prison after serving time for other offences.
89% Rotten Tomatoes. That’s about right. I’d change a few things, if I could.
Intense. But skillfully done.
Unlike typical Agatha Christie, the dialogue is believable.
Emma Corrin is excellent as Darby Hart, a 24-year-old “Gen Z Sherlock Holmes” hacker who has written a true-crime book about her past as an amateur sleuth.
She’s Rami Malek‘s paramour right now IRL.
Harris Dickinson as Bill Farrah is quite good, as well. They make a charmingly socially awkward duo.
Darby and eight other guests are invited by a reclusive billionaire to participate in a retreat at a remote and dazzling location. When one of the other guests is found dead, Darby must use all of her skills to prove it was murder against a tide of competing interests and before the killer takes another life. …
LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman once told the New Yorker he estimates more than half of Silicon Valley billionaires have invested in some type of “apocalypse insurance,” like an underground bunker.
… follows the adventures of fearless private investigator Alexa Crowe, who solves the most baffling crimes as well as coping with the frustrations of everyday life.
Lucy Lawless as PI Alexa Crowe, former detective of the Victoria Police Crinimal Investigation Branch (CIB) . As a side hustle, she bakes bread in her kitchen for Baristas Café. …
Not bad. Standard police procedural.
But what makes it worth watching for me is the humour. And the Melbourne scenery.
There are some personal mysteries you ponder.
WHY is Alexa working cold cases for the police? She doesn’t seem to get paid.
WHY does Madison — who actually does work for the police — drop everything instantly anytime Alexa needs a hacker / analyst?
I’d best continue on to season 2. For one thing, the show moves to New Zealand, my former homeland.
Over the years, I’ve finally watched all 79 episodes 2004 and 2022. A joy.
Sitcoms are pretty much the same formula for each and every episode. But for me seasons 1 and 9 were best.
I MIGHT have to start over again with episode 1.
I finally learned that — in real life — Martin Clunes is exactly opposite the character he plays in this comedy.
For one thing, he LOVES dogs! 😀
And he’s a charming people person, unlike the ramrod stiff and unpardonable Doc Martin.
Sigourney Weaver appeared in season 9 as a stubborn American tourist because she’s a good friend of Selina Cadell, who plays Mrs Tishell, the pharmacist.
International adaptations were made in Czech Republic and Slovakia, France, Germany, Greece, Netherlands, and Spain.
It’s an excellent anti-hero drama, that happens to be set in the Star Wars universe. Technology and special effects are incidental to the story.
It’s gritty. The characters flawed and conflicted.
A BIG complaint about Star Wars is that it’s cliche. Andor takes pains to be surprising.
Of all the made-for-streaming Star Wars and Marvel spin-offs to shuffle off the Disney+ production line, few have arrived with less anticipation and lower stakes than Andor.
A prequel to a prequel, the series explores the origins of Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), a Rebel Alliance captain introduced in the 2016 wartime heist film Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. Rogue One was set immediately before George Lucas’s original Star Wars films and ended quite decisively …
With no Jedi or Skywalkers to be seen, this politically charged, slow-burn thriller adds human stakes and a real sense of the fascism behind Star Wars’s endless civil war.
The Body in the Library (1942) concerns the murders of two girls of outwardly similar appearance.
One of them was an 18-year-old dancer, and the other was a 16-year-old Girl Guide with aspirations to an acting career.
The identities of the two victims were deliberately left ambiguous by the killers.
Jane Marple eventually discovers that the dancer was the intended adoptive daughter and heiress to a wealthy man. She starts suspecting the other potential heirs to the old man’s fortune. …
Somewhat too complicated for me. I didn’t find myself assuming that everyone was the killer as I typically do in Christie stories.
Many of these old TV shows are available as full episodes on YouTube.
English actress Emilia Fox is Signora Volpe. 😀 Sylvia Fox in this excellent TV show.
Well, the first 2 episodes are great. I could have lived without episode 3.
Disillusioned with her work at MI6, spy Sylvia Fox travels to Italy for the wedding of her niece.
Although her relationship with her sister, Isabel, is troubled, Sylvia is welcomed warmly by her family.
But when the groom goes missing, leaving a dead woman behind, Sylvia feels compelled to investigate. The trail leads her from an empty pizza box and stolen children’s book to a deadly showdown.
The badass decides to move to Italy at the end of the first episode.
It’s Italy. Beautiful.
There’s romance. Charming.
An English language TV show set in Italy well done, with many Italian actors and Italian dialogue.
They did not make the same mistakes as Murder in Provence. 😀
Liverpool-based veteran cop DI Colette Cunningham uproots to Dublin when she learns that her estranged daughter, Stacey, has taken her own life.
Once there, Colette meets her two teenage grandchildren for the first time.
Despite having never known of their existence she’s their named guardian. Determined to do right by her daughter in her death, Colette joins the local Dublin Police and cares for the kids.
However, not everything about Stacey’s life is what it seems. Colette sets out to uncover the truth.
The first series sees the sudden arrival of DC Leila Hussain (Amara Karan) in the fictional Northern Irish town of Port Devine.
The local residents question the reason behind her arrival; only Inspector Finn O’Hare knows why Leila has been transferred, but is keeping it to himself. …
Rick McCharles 