Cracker, Prime Suspect and Messiah

[StPaulandTheBrokenBones]

I’m off work at the moment as I’m not well and I’ve exhausted Sky, Netflix and Amazon Prime so I thought I’d watch a few box sets that I have on dvd.

So far I’ve watched Messiah with Ken Stott which I loved at the time and is just as good now.

Prime Suspect is quality. Obviously it’s of it’s time but it’s still well written, with strong and believable characters, even if some of them are not very nice people.

I’m now rewatching Cracker, which is also excellent.

Rewatching these series has made me realise just how crap most dramas are these days, how badly written they are, what rubbish story lines most of them have. There are exceptions obviously but I wonder why this is?

Almost always I start watching some new crime drama on BBC or ITV and I sit there thinking that most of them are badly written with storylines that don’t really make any sense and the endings are usually a huge cop out.

I loved Line of Duty, although the last series was a bit of a let down but that is the only show I can think of that has been on recently that was “must watch” television.

I wonder why there hardly seems to be any quality drama on now, things that you would stay in to watch if there was no such thing as streaming or on demand.

I rewatched two of those in the last year or so, and yes, I agree. They were really high quality and good.

I think that after about the early 2000s, there was a huge drop in the quality of television. There are a few exceptions but overall, and also I've noticed an increasingly strong pattern where a show will have one or two great series and then really go off the rails.

Some thoughts on the reason:

• there was a sweet spot where a lot of dramas were nor episodic but also had a clearly mapped out story, that might last 3 to 5 years. These were often very well plotted and very tight. The tendency now is for studios to take a show that does well and squeeze it till it gives no more. Stranger Things is a good example, it was intended to be a one series story, maybe with more series featuring different stories and different casts. It was so popular they extended it, but it's clear what's happened and it affects the storytelling.

• There are a lot of shows, meant to be gritty, that end up bery style over substance. They may have a compelling premise and great actors but something goes wrong in execution - I think it is a lack of a deeper story to tell. Killing Eve is a good example. In shows like this I always feel that the writers or directors, instead of having a story, are imagining a series of cool visual images and writing the plot around those. Very Quentin Tarantino in effect.

Problems with being PC. This can take several forms. Preachy didactic shows that bash us on the head, the devolution of Dr Who being an example. Another problem can be in historical shows where all the protagonists have remarkably modern views or they are too scared to really depict how people thought and felt in a sympathetic way. Like Call the Midwife in recent series - it feels less like a biography of a real time and more like a modern person depicting what they think was good and important about the period.

Or the other way that can manifest is just blandness because the show is afraid to take any risks for fear of offending anyone. Maybe more of an issue with comedy but I think it affects drama as well.

All of it comes back to poor storytelling. Stories work when they feel like they are telling us something true and worth knowing, when they feel authentic, and about something important. When we feel manipulated by the story that is a huge turn-off.

I have wondered if good writers are being forced to write crap, aren't hired, or maybe there are no longer many of them.

Oh - I also would say there is a big change in the pacing of tv from the past. It used to be much slower. Now they need to pack in a lot of action and move things along very quickly.

I have just been watching Cracker, blimey it's magnificent!!! Absolutely mesmerising - superb acting and some absolutely terrific earrings....

What I particularly loved was the fact that they had no Internet or smartphones, they were all smoking - one scene I watched yesterday in the interrogation one on the uniformed police watching the suspect was smoking!!! I love looking at the 1990s fashion, spotting famous actors early in their careers and some of Fitz's ridiculous techniques v- he tried to prove someone was a murderer by the way he ate a sherbert lemon!!

But I have stopped watching most new things recently because they all look the same with the same actors and ultimately disappoint....

The Fall is the only series I can think of that matches the quality of Cracker and Prime Suspect, it still haunts me. Wire in the Blood in the 00's was decent, I remember enjoying it although I'd struggle to recall any storylines now. Between The Lines from the 90s was a great series and ran for few years - I bought the box set from a charity shop ages ago but it's still sitting in my bookcase

I think American shows took over about 20 years ago and we all got sucked in by them (the CSI/Mentalist type) and British ones seemed lame in comparison.

I agree with everything you have said. I’ve just taken these specific dramas because I’ve watched them all over the past few days. They all seem to have the same ingredients, authentic dialogue which is delivered in a way which is realistic and relatable. Secondly, good scripts that are portrayed by the actors with emotion. By emotion I don’t mean hand wringing, over the top delivery, but with nuance and inflections that feel real. Not over the top.

The storylines are well paced and interesting. You, as the viewer, feel involved and want to,keep watching.

In most new shows I end up fast forwarding through parts of it because I am disengaged with the story being told. I don’t care about these one dimensional characters or what happens to them. There is no depth to it. A good example of this is that drama with Suranne Jones on the submarine. I watched all episodes except the last. I don’t care “who did it”. It was crap.

Yes, Wire in the Blood was also quality. Carol Jordan is a great character. Similar in some ways to Jane Tennison but more well rounded. Smart, independent, a strong woman. Rare in television unfortunately.

You've made me nostalgic for those series now OP. Tom Bell's character in Prime Suspect still sends shivers down my spine, what an amazing actor he was.

Most dramas on terrestrial are a disappointment nowadays.

There’s some great foreign stuff around,loads of Boxsets on All4. French/Russian/skandi. Worth a look!

Have you watched Spiral? An excellent French series that gets better as it goes on IMO.

No I haven’t seen Spiral. I’ll definitely have a look because I’m so sick of our homegrown stuff.

I just want to be interested, to be involved and submerged with what I’m watching. Not to have something on in the background whilst on MN at the same time. And most shows do not do this. I think Ozark was the last thing I actually watched properly.

I thought this was a baby names thread!

At least when it’s in another language you can’t look at your phone at the same time!

@HollowTalk

I thought this was a baby names thread!

Baby names!

I now have a huge urge to re-watch all of these - if they ever come up on the "funny channels" I always do - especially Prime Suspect. which was always gripping!

I watched one recently called (IIRC) Deep Water which I enjoyed, but the ending was rather unsatisfactory.

Spiral is superb!