Man this show is depressing. That said, I liked this episode better than the first, simply because it felt more like a straightforward whodunit instead of a family conspiracy that Quirke had to unravel. But as with last week, it’s very bleak in tone and sordid in content. Strangely enough, things like murder, drug-abuse, extramarital affairs and ( Read more... )

Another Porthos-centric episode! It’s hard to believe that some people were complaining he would be the requisite “politically-correct token” since at this point, he honestly feels like the most well-rounded of all four leads.


( Read more... )

So last night I watched the first episode of Quirke, which internet fandom generally refers to as the show that Colin Morgan will eventually guest-star in, but which actually stars Gabriel Byrne as the titular Doctor Quirke (and yeah, he still looks damn good). Based on the novels by Benjamin Black, the show is set in 1950s Dublin, where Quirke ( Read more... )

So as season finales go, I thought this was a pretty rewarding finish, with the requisite big twist and agonising cliff-hanger. When I first started watching this show, I was heavily reminded of Pan’s Labyrinth, one of my favourite movies, in regards to its atmosphere and dark fairytale trappings, and for the first time since the show’s inception, ( Read more... )

Late again, but this week has been rather hectic. Still, this episode maintains the high quality of plot/character interaction, and though I initially thought the story was going to veer into a political mystery, it soon became an espionage thriller with a twist I really didn’t see coming (though I should have).


( Read more... )

Three episodes in, and I still love this show. This particular episode heralded our first change in writers (from Adrian Hodge to Susie Conklin), so I was interested to see whether there would be any obvious change in tone/quality, but I think this has been the best one yet.


( Read more... )

The penultimate episode of any season (I’m calling this one penultimate since the final two were broadcast as a single episode) can either be one of two things: awesome setup for the finale, or a slightly low-key place-holder. This one... kinda managed to be both. Though Macey’s endangerment was fairly self-contained, there was plenty of continuity ( Read more... )

It’s my opinion that the second episode of any new show will either be amazingly good or pretty mediocre. A lot of effort always goes into the pilot episode, all the stops will be pulled out for the grand finale, and the intervening episodes will usually see a general improvement as the writers get their footing, but the second episode of any show ( Read more... )

This is late, and I still have another two episodes to catch up on, but here are some brief thoughts about The Musketeers 1x01. Basically, it was everything I wanted it to be - and not more. That is to say, it fulfilled my expectations, but didn’t exceed them. Which sounds as though I’m damning this with faint praise, though I’m not - I really, ( Read more... )

A week ago, having accumulated a number of anticipated programmes on my laptop, I decided to make a night of it and watched Endless Night, The Thirteenth Tale and Moonfleet in quick succession, topped off by Tríd An Stoirm and Metamorphosis, two short films (actually, I think the latter is part of an advertising campaign for the London Art Gallery ( Read more... )