Line of Duty - series 1, anyone?

[HouseOnTheLake]

I'm pretty late to the party with this one but, after watching and thoroughly enjoying Bodyguard, I've just started watching the first few episodes of Line of Duty based on its rave reviews.

Anyone else watching/watched it recently? I'm not finding it nearly as riveting as Bodyguard but I can't deny it's good. Although I'm enjoying most characters, I have a few gripes:

1. Is it just me that thinks that Martin Compston was miscast as DS Steve Arnott? He's clearly a great actor but I find him entirely unbelievable as a DS going up against CI Gates. He just seems too softly spoken and "wet", more like a character from The Office than a law-enforcer to be feared.

1. I'm finding Gates' two sidekicks really annoying, in a Tweedledum and Tweedledee way. They just seem like the station idiots and not who I would expect to be behind the great officer of the year that is Gates.

This is just based on 2.5 eps so maybe the characters will develop in ways I wouldn't imagine!

He does write brilliant female characters, though.
Agreed. Strong, yet feminine, and more than capable of holding their own.

unashamedly marking my place for when OP comes back after binge watching 4 series!
I promise I'll be back, maybe sooner than expected as all these rave reviews have compelled me to plough on through more quickly than planned!

God; I fucking loved Line of Duty. Might watch it all again.

Line of duty is one of the best things I’ve ever watched. I found series 2 was the best. I like how the series link to each other

That trailer indicates a moderately amazing recovery for, um, one character (trying to avoid spoilers here).

spoiler alert for anyone who hasn't finished series 1!

I've just finished the first series and loved the shocking ending. I'm hoping someone can enlighten me: why the hell wasn't Morton (Gates' sidekick) prosecuted for whacking Fleming round the head and then spitting in her hair?? There were witnesses both times. Or will all be explained later on?

Presumably she didn’t pursue it with anyone because there were bigger fish to fry.

And no, not explained later.

YY LostIn - I was trying to formulate a reply saying similar but gave up because I couldn’t guarantee not revealing a spoiler!

I’m such a LoD pusher. If anyone says they’re bored I suggest they start watching.

Thanks! Going to start series 2 now

Ooooh, I started watching this on Netflix a couple of weeks ago and I was hooked by the end of episode 1. I do love Lennie James though so would pretty much watching anything he was in!

I just finished season 3 last night and OMG, it just gets better and better. I'd like to think I might hang on before watching season 4 to make it last a bit but I'm kidding myself.

I loved LOD but am struggling to get into the Bodyguard. Really enjoying Killing Eve, but that took a while to get in to. Love the assassin, she plays a great part.

Stick with LOD, it's great.

I felt exactly the same Bodyguard was ok, but LOD is absolutely brilliant.

I've just binged watched season 4 over the weekend. It's bloody brilliant. I agree with a previous poster, the ending of season 3 was just great, I think I cried.

Definitely stick with it. As others have said, even though each season is stand alone, their are story lines and characters that weave throughout all of them. The baddies aren't always necessarily bad and the goodies, they all have their own stories too. All the characters are flawed in some way, none of them are perfect, which is real life.

I have a love hate relationship with Steve. I'm always waiting for him to do something to piss me off . And I love the way him and Kate call each other "mate" all the time. I always feel it has a serious underlying passive aggressive tone

Oh I'm so jealous of anyone discovering LoD for the first time and getting to watch them all with fresh eyes! Absolutely amazing TV.

I am staying with my daughter - she has never seen it so we started from the beginning last night. She is properly hooked and I will be bereft when I go home on Friday - we have Netflix, but it isn't the UK version so no LOD for me when I get home Have just acquired S4 on DVD but really enjoying a refresher on previous series'

gussiefox are you sure you don't have series 1-3 on Netflix? I have "foreign" Netflix and we have the first 3 series on there. And when I finish those, you can kindly send me your DVD of series 4