Rellik - BBC1 9pm

[noradurst]

Another Williams brothers' collaboration - which is competing with Liar tonight!

"A serial killer thriller told in reverse, unravelling the truth behind a series of murders as DCI Gabriel Markham hunts down a brutal killer."

The lead character is played by Beric from Game of Thrones (Richard Dormer). Sounds very good. Anyone watching this? Leave your reviews below.

I hate to say this, but I found it quite deflating. There were good bits and bad bits though.

• It was gripping.

• The Williams brothers throw around horrible sexual abuse far too easily. And it's no coincidence that, 99 times out of a 100, it happens to a woman. (A pretty young woman, but that's par for the course with TV.) Christine was sexually abused by her father, Patrick was (sort of?) abusing HIS stepdaughter, Elaine/Helena was abused.

• It was far too obvious that it was Elaine. Didn't really like the whole way the different "aspects" came together because the last half of the series focused so much on her terrible past.

• Surely I'm not the only one who found the supporting characters much more interesting than the leads? I also thought Jodi Balfour was the only weak link in the main cast, which doesn't help the Elaine revelation. But I suspect she was probably told to act po-faced and "enigmatic" (i.e. don't show any facial expression and slink around) by the director.

Or maybe that's more of a reflection on the problems with the premise. It always felt like something that worked better in microcosm (the one episode of Patrick and his stepdaughter trying to cover up her mum's murder), the engaged police officer, etc. than in the larger picture.

Also, I'm annoyed that's what they chose to do with all the supporting characters. Christine disappears - so what were the burns/scars on her face? The stepdad and stepdaughter just get away with it? We should at least have glimpsed them, even if not getting their comeuppance, IMO.

Still! The positive.s I'm really glad the BBC tried this. SO much better than that turgid soap opera Liar, what a juvenile and immature way to deal with date rape. Rellik has been genuinely novel and intriguing. While flawed, I don't think the critical hammering is deserved.

I agree - Rellik was far better than Liar.

Yes RELLIK was much much better than LIAR

Watched them both tonight followed by MEDIUM on CBS DRAMA - and MEDIUM won hands down,

Medium was/is so much better than both of them hence why I am watching them all again right from beginning of series 1

I also found this episode quite deflating, it left me feeling meh. A shame really as it definitely had some very good bits and an intriguing concept.

Yes, the abuse theme was a bit over-done. But wasn't Christine making up her abuse story to wind up Isaac? Didn't she roar out laughing at his face afterwards?

I enjoyed it, despite nearly giving up after episode 2.
It would have helped if there had been one likeable character. And a lot of stuff just wasn't believable, like a 10 yo being in an adult MH unit.

Did we see Steven Hill in Salvia when Gabriel went there?
And whose house did Steven visit when he was bleeding?

I think Christine was assaulted by her step-dad. She told the psych a story about killing people and enjoying it and then burst out laughing because he was lapping it up.

Rolf I thought it looked like Elaine's house?

I thought it might be Hello. - that certainly makes sense plot wise - although I got the impression he was in a house but Elaine lived in a flat.

I took it to be Isaac's house he broke into, due to Isaac's 'home security' of purposely-placed pencil lead (by garden door) having been trodden underfoot by an intruder!

re Christine: on her file (which Elaine read), it was highlighted that she spent time in juvenile detention and that "she had attacked step-father with ACID" (but no mention of killing him), presumably as payback for the childhood sexual abuse.

So I'm all confused now, as to
(a) when/how her face was injured?
Was it by a very coincidental acid attack in another incident by someone else, or was it burns from a fire and not acid at all?

and (b) did she even kill her step-father later IRL?

• I know NHS mental health funding's disgracefully low, but would circumstances as relatively recently as 1996 really have placed any child patient(s) in close proximity to adults?

Maybe we're supposed to assume that kids were brought in from a separate bit of the building specifically for the abusive bastards. Horrific.

• Even allowing for the fact that Isaac and Jonas probably authorised it, to prevent that same systemic abuse being uncovered, how the heck was ECT on a 10 yr old possible in 1996?

Were they hoping her memory would be so damaged as to forget she even had any unethical ECT 'treatment' (and therefore divulge it to anyone in future), as well as block the prior abuse?

• (Young) Benton referring to "the Loony Bin" was just charming. Idiot.

I liked (young) Gabriel for calling him out on that.

• Properly confused me that one of the police on Gabriel's team (Mark? Mike?) also played Laura's new boyfriend in Liar !

I thought Christine attacked her step-father with acid because he'd done the same to her mum. I don't think she killed him. Isaac told Gabriel that she 'did that to herself' regarding her burn scars in order to connect to her mum in a very warped way.