LINE OF DUTY - thread 3 - NO SPOILERS

[Blondeshavemorefun]

Thought better do new thread. Hope haven’t jumped on anyone’s toes

Re the uniform, it's not about rank... It's that detectives wear plain clothes and non-detectives uniform (though this confuses me about Ted as he is meant to be a detective!).

Also, detectives aren't a higher rank than non-detectives, it's just that they've done the detective training (but they have to have been an on-the-beat officer for a minimum of two years before they can specialise in any way, including becoming a detective).

So the ranks are equal:
DC and PC (Detective Constable and Police Constable).
DS and PS (Detective Sergeant and Police Sergeant)
Detective Inspector and Inspector
Detective Chief Inspector and Chief Inspector

And so on...

I am finding the number of women police officers, particularly BAME women police officers, that are either being killed or corrupt very annoying now

I'm not a big fan of LoD but in the absence of anything else to watch, I've seen every episode, series 1:1 to series 6:3 in the last week. I know - I really was desperate.

It's been really annoying me how BAME characters are almost all shown as corrupt or inadequate in some way. I'm assuming that the reason they can't usually rise above DC level is in recognition of institutionalised racism in the police? There was Gates, of course, but how corrupt was he? Pfft. And Asian women characters, in particular, are always in supporting roles, finding some information to help important white people, but then becoming overwhelmed, scared, misled, acting foolishly or whatever. Where are the strong BAME women we meet in everyday life? Not represented in Line of Duty.

Oh, that's so sad about Sarah Hughes

@DoingItMyself

I am finding the number of women police officers, particularly BAME women police officers, that are either being killed or corrupt very annoying now

I'm not a big fan of LoD but in the absence of anything else to watch, I've seen every episode, series 1:1 to series 6:3 in the last week. I know - I really was desperate.

It's been really annoying me how BAME characters are almost all shown as corrupt or inadequate in some way. I'm assuming that the reason they can't usually rise above DC level is in recognition of institutionalised racism in the police? There was Gates, of course, but how corrupt was he? Pfft. And Asian women characters, in particular, are always in supporting roles, finding some information to help important white people, but then becoming overwhelmed, scared, misled, acting foolishly or whatever. Where are the strong BAME women we meet in everyday life? Not represented in Line of Duty.

Roz Huntley was both senior rank and a major character. She was corrupt too of course but a BAME woman in a major role with rank.

I guess we have to wait and see whether PS Jatri is corrupt, but she's at least risen above constable.

She was CORRUPT!
Yes, I admit she was a BAME woman in a major role with rank. You are right. I'd got so wound about this that I'd managed to overlook a whole series.

I think LoD has perhaps tried quite hard to increase its multi racial casting and then fallen foil of not noticing the typical outcomes for these characters . The poor survival rates of Asian females is noticeable but Asian males too are usually corrupt. More noticeable even is that since Tony there have been very few black characters , not even as extras. To the extent that we assume any mixed race character is related to Tony. Hmmm.

@GuyFawkesDay

Oooh I am back on S1, Tony Gates's daughter is called Chloe....

Do we think she's now working in AC-12? There's no surname for the character listed in the cast, which is suspect!!

No. The ages are different.

@BentBastard

I don't think it's trying to be accurate adulting. The whole point is that it's drama. Accuracy is rather more mundane. Drama is never accurate, it's what makes it exciting.

Oh I quite agree! There does need to be element of creative license to make it interesting/dramatic. But sometimes you can stretch things too far into the realm of complete inaccuracies/ridiculousness.

@TopBitchoftheWitches Er yes actually I am. Been a firearms officer for the last five years, been on the force 14 years. What, you don’t think police officers use MN? Or watch Line of Duty?

[quote Adultingin2021]@TopBitchoftheWitches Er yes actually I am. Been a firearms officer for the last five years, been on the force 14 years. What, you don’t think police officers use MN? Or watch Line of Duty?[/quote]
How often are you called out with fire arms? Is it quite a common occurrence or quite rare?

In response to the questions-

@AgentCooper We all have call signs (both individually and for ‘teams’). In most forces the firearms team would be called ‘Trojan’ but each force has its own call signs/team call signs etc. The amount of radio traffic on the show is quite extreme, it’s not like that in real life.

@MoonCatcher It varies from force to force depending on force size. Some smaller forces will have AFOs as part of a wider shift and they will go to regular incidents but be pulled away if there is a firearms incident. Larger forces (particularly ones who have anti terror teams) will have a decimated AFO team who will just be sitting around waiting for a call out. But they tend to have a much higher rate of gun/knife crime so there’s not a huge amount of sitting around in reality!

@ChocBeforeCock I’ve not heard of ‘Fahrenheit’ as a code word used for the kill shot, we don’t use it in my force, the order would be ‘critical shot’.

That of course should read ‘dedicated’ not ‘decimated’

@stevematekatemate In my force it’s rare, but often enough that we do have permanent 24 hour AFO cover but they are integrated as part of the shift so will respond to regular incidents.

We mostly deal with knife incidents, extremely rare to have any gun crime where we are (small rural force).

We do respond a lot to incidents involving other types of weapons- baseball bats, pipes etc, basically anything capable of inflicting serious harm or lethal injury, and also if someone was being extremely violent (say having taken drugs).

Sorry I’ve derailed the thread a bit now- maybe I should do a AMA thread!

Back to Line of Duty discussions/theories!

Jo's flat is deeply stylish - French blue walls and white table lamps. Verrry nice!

[quote Adultingin2021]@stevematekatemate In my force it’s rare, but often enough that we do have permanent 24 hour AFO cover but they are integrated as part of the shift so will respond to regular incidents.

We mostly deal with knife incidents, extremely rare to have any gun crime where we are (small rural force).

We do respond a lot to incidents involving other types of weapons- baseball bats, pipes etc, basically anything capable of inflicting serious harm or lethal injury, and also if someone was being extremely violent (say having taken drugs).[/quote]
Thanks for answering. It’s very interesting.

@Adultingin2021 an AMA thread would be great if you have time.

Thank you for answering @Adulting

That’s interesting @Adultingin2021, I have heard it mentioned that they have police advisors. Initially the MET said no but after series one have been pretty involved in consultations about accuracy... how strange!

Shrine of Duty is fantastic today, I love them three!

I'm thinking it is too obvious having Jo as bent and my wild imaginings are that she is working undercover for another part of anti-corruption/serious crime investigation within the Police, rather as Steve was. I wondered if she could be working for Anna Maxwell Martin's character, DCS Patricia Carmichael

Yes or even MI5, would they get involved with the child sex abuse ring cover up? And if Gail Vella was working on that, they could want Jo on the case?

I agree too obvious for her to just be bent. We are meant to think it but actually have seen nothing to confirm it, just stuff to hint at it. We don’t know who the guy she drove to under the underpass was. We don’t know who she was talking to on fake MSN messenger. Maybe she had a tip off about the armed robbery?

I find it really intriguing and love the way Kelly McDonald is playing it.

intermittentparps I agree if she is corrupt she is under extreme duress. But how does that fit with the fancy flat? Presumably if the OCG can blackmail you to work for them, they don’t also bribe you. So the OCG wouldn’t explain her money in that case.

Thank you @Adultingin2021!

Davidson is definitely corrupt. That's how the other series have gone anyway. They could change the winning formula but I hope not.

@GoofyIsACow

That’s interesting *@Adultingin2021*, I have heard it mentioned that they have police advisors. Initially the MET said no but after series one have been pretty involved in consultations about accuracy... how strange!

Shrine of Duty is fantastic today, I love them three!

It is quite possible they do have advisors, most likely for the big procedural stuff and getting the language right. I guess I’m probably noticing the smaller stuff- for example in the last episode there were armed officers all scanning the edge of the lake with torches.

This would be unlikely to happen. The armed officers would be there for a cordon, they would not be armed and searching through the grass for evidence. If the area needed searching, it would be cordoned off and specially trained search team officers brought in.

And they were right next to forensic officers who were all fully suited up in the forensic suits- a silly detail, but why were they in the forensic suits (to prevent cross contamination) but right next to the AFOs who were just roaming around?

I think I’m over thinking this and should stop highjacking this thread! Sorry everyone

To be fair Piggywaspushed, it depends what the ethnic makeup of LOD’s fictional north midlands town is. There’s a fair few UK towns/cities of that kind of size with a mix of more or less 80% white, 15% Asian, 4% mixed, 1% Black which would more or less match the LOD cast over the years. I think it looks like a real town.

I'm still putting a teeny wager on Andrew Laverty coming up.... I may be wrong (!) but -
We never got to see him in s1
Only a small mention that he and Jackie divorced, but he was a millionaire...

If they divorced, why was Jackie buying properties, like the hairdressers, for the OCG to money launder... was it as the money was tied up in them from Andrew, or maybe she just burned through the money herself and took a huge wrong turn with her investments....

I think something will come up as they're looping so much back to s1 and Jackie's been brought back up a few times (and out the freezer!)

I'm intrigued if we see PC Bannerjee again, he was the nice PC and who tried to help Ryan, had he stayed clean or now bent....?

And something someone said on another thread, in s1 when young Ryan is being interviewed by Kate, he has an entourage as he's young/vulnerable, one of which is his social worker Jane HARGREAVES.... was she any link to Les HARGREAVES, exposed as linked to OGC and a balaclava man in s5 then killed....

Also nothing more from Nigel Morton.... (medically retired but was faking it)

And I agree with the posters mentioning Steve's old boss in s1 (who tried to get him to change position on the terrible raid which ended up at wrong door number)- something will come back up with him.... he's ducked in and out of a couple of seasons so stayed around....