Kiri, Channel4, Wed 10th Jan

[southeastdweller]

Anyone else looking forward to this? The writer also wrote the recent Robbie Coltrane drama, National Treasure, and Sarah Lancashire is always superb.

www.radiotimes.com/news/tv/2017-10-31/kiri-channel-4-trailer/

@westridingpauperlunaticasylum I tend to agree but think if so, it is really lazy writing.

If it was any of injury I would think accidental death.

Why do we keep having Sarah Lancashire reminding us she's not a lefty Guardian reader? To avoid seeming cliched? But then I imagine real-life social workers would rather be portrayed as Guardian readers who understand the value of unions, than drink-drivers who leave dogs in the car while they vom on a crack addict's floor....?

And as she is so avowedly not a Guardian-type, I thought it was strange that she came out with that speech about Othering black children - 'an environment in which she is always Other' is not a very Daily Mail kind of line, is it?

@Italiangreyhound I took 'white, blue-eyed Jesus' as a way of summarising how the foster parents whitewash life.

On a tangent it is weird that the figure that is depicted as the Jesus is usually white and blue-eyed in so many faiths, despite the writings from the same faith saying he was from the Middle East!!

At the moment there really isn't any character in it with a motive to strangle a little girl. I'm wondering if she was accidentally choked with that scarf by someone trying to stop her from running. Not sure how that could happen though.

@Italiangreyhound I took it that she was removed at age four and the foster family were her first placement, I seem to remember the foster mum talking about the conditions she'd been found in. Hard to know how old she was when her mother died, as you say the maternal grandmother did talk about that being the first she knew of Kiri but when I heard that I didn't picture a baby. Perhaps these things will clarify.

Sorry I thought she was aged four when she went there.

I really didn’t like the way the foster mother was describing Kiri’s parents. Yes they were both drug addicts and incapable parents but there was a real disgust oozing from her and Like she didn’t want to leave anyone with any doubt about what gutter filth they were. I hate to think Kiri would face the same attitude when asking about her Mum. It’s the sort of thing would put her off asking.

That bunny t shirt bit was confusing. Why did it smell? Someone upthread suggested it had semen on it.But that wouldn't smell, and she pulled a face as if it stank.

No the smell was from the the tissues she lifted out of his bed. She gathered them, then threw them in the bin and sniffed her hand (why on earth would you do that??) and said “eww” then she reached back into the bin and saw the t-shirt and lifted it out.

@JaneyEJones I was shouting at the TV "No, that is so stupid!"

Yes, I think she was four, was in foster care for five years and was nine now. But I kept getting my 4 and 5 mixed up!

@DonnyAndVladSittingInATree I though they were cotton balls on the bed. The whole thing was weird! I was thinking asitone, nail polish remover. That has a really strong smell.

Thing is, I am not sure it is well written but I think it is well acted and in one sense the death of the child is kind of in the background.

There's something spookily weird about the foster mother- she flinches at any physical contact from her son and husband.
She completely evaded the question about what she was doing on the day of the murder apart from saying she was off sick.

I just don't trust her.

Especially as she would have known Kiri left the grandads house if she followed SL in the car there.

I had a thought last night. We have assumed it was the first mother in the car behind SL and watching the gold car pull up. It may have been the foster son! He was off school that day. The foster Mum has very short hair. A brief blurry glance in a mirror was all we saw of the driver.

foster mother.

But isn't he only fifteen? Would he be driving?

@DonnyAndVladSittingInATree how much time are we (me and you) devoting to the drama!!!!!!!!!

The acting is phenomenal. I like SL but I think she's being completely over shadowed by the rest of them.

Just wondering if having a long neck is a some sort of cultural reference? I'm sure I'm being very ignorant so please forgive me but I'm sure in some cultures a long neck is seen as desireable.

Just reading on here about the tissues she took from the sons bed and it made me think, I wonder if kiri's clothes will be examined and if the son's semen will be found on the t-shirt. The police won't believe the mum when she tells them she put the spunky tissues in on top of it and contaminated it. Thinking about this waaaaay too much!

Too much italian! I’m sure there is laundry somewhere that needs maybe attention!

But isn't he only fifteen? Would he be driving?

I was thinking he maybe stole the car and the mother knows this but is covering for him. She seems nervous around him.

They’re definitely pushing the “she should know her background” theme - also with the grandad asking where the detective where her parents were from and she said she had been brought up in care. He feels an affinity with the detective because she is black, but she doesn't appear to share this affinity. I agree it is not a classic whodunnit, but more an exploration of the complexities of a case like this. I thought the little girl in the crack den was to show us why Kiri had been taken into care in the first place. The maternal grandmother clearly blamed Kiri's dad for leading her daughter astray, her grandad didn't want to take her because he blamed himself for the way his son had turned out, there's a sense that the white foster family feel morally superior to the grandparents and they are not particularly sympathetically portrayed. SL's speech to the press at the end was spot on. But what is the right thing for children like Kiri? The detective had grown up in the care system and it hasn't done her any harm you might argue so should Kiri have been left to languish there? The grandad now wished he had taken her in and you can't help wondering that would have been so bad. It's looking increasingly as if she came to harm at the hands of the family who were supposed to be giving her better life. The story is exposing the damned if you do damned if you don't nature of social work - no wonder SL's hitting the bottle.

I agree it seems very much like there being no right answer and SL would have faced criticism if she hadn’t allowed Kiri to see her birth family.

But she was allowed to see them, there had been supervised visits.

It was the unsupervised one which was dodgy.