Page 5 | The Long Shadow - ITV1 - Monday September 25th at 9pm

Southeastdweller · 2023-09-17T06:47:39+00:00

Anyone else looking forward to watching this seven part drama? [[https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/the-long-shadow-release-date-newsupdate https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/the-long-shadow-release-date-newsupdate/]]

LittleMonks11 · 28/09/2023 09:08

Yes. Love Toby Jones in anything.

Iwasafool · 28/09/2023 09:36

Daffodilsandtuplips · 27/09/2023 21:50

I’ve mentioned this upthread, I was a barmaid in 1975, a second job to my full time job. I was working three nights in a working men’s club to save up for a car. Beer was 13pence a pint where I worked and I recall petrol at 33p a gallon. My dad gave me £1.00 note hide under the cover on the steering wheel that hid the big nut holding the steering wheel in place. he said it was for emergencies, it would get me home if I ever ran short of cash or fuel.
I know beer was slightly cheaper where I worked.
£5.00 doesn’t sound a lot now but It bought a weeks food shopping back then.

Show quote history

I'm sure you are right about 1975, inflation was going mad so it was probably more by the time he stopped.

I was a young mum, had a baby in 1975, and my shopping budget was £5 a week so yes it was a lot of money to me. I knew someone who was broke with a few kids, she found £1 note on Christmas Eve and said she cried because she could buy chicken and stuff for Christmas dinner.

Iwasafool · 28/09/2023 09:39

Daffodilsandtuplips · 27/09/2023 22:11

I may be mistaken here but I think Family Allowance, as it was known then, was initially paid to the man. By the time I claimed it, it had changed to being paid to the mother. I received 4.50 a week for my first child in 1979.
I

My mum got it in the 50s and 60s. I can remember going to collect it as she had agoraphobia, I'd have been about 10. She'd sign the front and the there was a bit on the back where I'd have to sign. Then I'd go to the co-op and get shopping.

Men got the tax allowance usually and women got the family allowance.

Janiie · 28/09/2023 18:44

I like how the drama is showing us the lives and personalities of the victims and isn't just focusing on gratuitous violence. They were loved and valued people, something the media in the 70s and 80s didn't seem to care about.

I watched the Netflix series after seeing the first episode of this and can't believe how the victims were referred to. There's one PC referring back to how embarrassed he was accompanying Maureen Long (a survivor) to the venue where she met Sutcliffe to see if she could identify him. He was so sneery even saying how she 'liked a drink'. Then when later victims were identified as students and the police kept calling them 'respectable women' as if that made them matter more.

I'm just surprised that as the murderer seemed to take his time with his victims they didn't catch him sooner. I know there wasn't dna then but surely forensics would have shown up something. Were the police crap or was PS very clever? he didn't seem to be.

Motnight · 28/09/2023 19:05

I have just started watching this.

I usually wait for a whole series to be available so I can binge watch but I don't think that I could face more than one episode of this at a time. I think that the making of this around the victims takes away from what could be a really unpleasant salacious programme. Very hard viewing. I can remember the 1970s.

Thank you to those signposting to other programmes.

Hazara2220 · 28/09/2023 21:13

I think the reason he initially targeted prostitutes was because he saw them as an easy target as they were easy to lure into his car and take to secluded locations. The first 3 attacks that he was convicted of / admitted to had no links to prostitute. This included 14 year old girl who was walking down a country lane near the farm where she lived with her family. Thankfully they survived as he was interrupted.

I find it hard to believe that he genuinely thought that Marguerite Walls was a prostitute, she was attacked in an
upmarket residential area outside of Leeds, nowhere near the light district. The police didn't link her murder with Sutcliffe initially because he used a different method to kill her . They reported the murder as sexually motivated as like many of sutcliffes other victims she had injuries consistent with sexual assault.

If Sutcliffe commited his crimes because God told him to "clean up the streets" he would just kill them, he wouldn't inflict sexual injuries on his victims or ejaculated over them as they lay dying. When he was arrested he was also found to be wearing custom made undergarment designed with a hole in the front designed in the front to give easy access to his appendage.

Sutcliffe brother claimed in an interview that he had told him that he had lied about his paranoid delusions in an attempt to receive a reduced sentance in a cushier environment. This all casts doubts on Sutcliffes claims that he did this due to having paranoid schizophrenia and wanting to do God's work.

Jennalong · 29/09/2023 08:23

@Hazara2220

Don't all y fronts have that ? I'm sure they used to years ago ?

longwayoff · 29/09/2023 12:08

How long did he spend in Broadmoor? Rampton? Is anyone seriously suggesting he was able to fool all those psychiatric staff for so many years?

longwayoff · 29/09/2023 12:11

Family Allowance was paid to mothers as so many men kept their wives short of enough money to feed the kids.

ilovebrie8 · 29/09/2023 12:24

It’s grim to watch! Times were tough then no benefits like there are today…those 4 kiddies going to the bus stop to look for their mum …so sad 😞

squareyedannie · 29/09/2023 13:04

I was a small child at the time. My mum was a single parent and every time she went out I imagined her being murdered by this creature.

ilovebrie8 · 29/09/2023 13:33

Toby Jones is brilliant....

PictureConsequences · 29/09/2023 15:09

Daffodilwoman · 27/09/2023 21:34

I don’t believe a word that came out of Sutcliffe’s mouth. He claimed to have paranoid schizophrenia, that was a lie, his wife did and that is how he was able to fool certain professionals. He attacked a man, he wasn’t a prostitute. He attacked a child, she wasn’t a prostitute. He tried to justify his behaviour by claiming it was ‘only prostitutes.’ Christ even now, many, many people think prostitutes and sex workers are ‘less than.’ Look at the news, the majority of males believe they are better than females full stop, never mind ‘dirty prostitutes/slappers/whores’ insert whatever derogatory term you want.
It pisses me off when victims are defined in that way. What the fuck does it matter if a woman was a prostitute? How come a man is never described as ‘some dirty bastard who pays women for sex?’
Sutcliffe murdered a bank clerk. I doubt very much whether her family will allow her name to be used in this or any other programme. It absolutely suited the narrative that Sutcliffe hated prostitutes and wanted to clear the streets of them or whatever crap he said.
The fact is some people are evil bastards who do not have empathy.
They do not need a reason to do what they do. They enjoy it.
They can live seemingly normal lives. They don’t act weird or anything like that. They have jobs, wives, children.
People want them to give a reason for what they did. To justify it. He happily obliged.

Absolutely, he stole Sonia's schizophrenic

PictureConsequences · 29/09/2023 15:10

Arghhh - symptoms. And he knew perfectly well that all the victims weren't prostitutes. No place in hell is bad enough for him.

Daffodilsandtuplips · 29/09/2023 16:02

Jennalong · 29/09/2023 08:23

@Hazara2220

Don't all y fronts have that ? I'm sure they used to years ago ?

Y fronts have a Y shaped cross piece open on one side so the appendage can be pulled out, it isn’t a hole as such. If a man stood in front of you was wearing a pair you wouldn’t see anything ( unless he wanted you to).

Hazara2220 · 29/09/2023 16:27

@Jennalong

He wasn't wearing any y fronts. It was a custom made outfit

It is mentioned in this article; https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/yorkshire-ripper-peter-sutcliffes-gruesome-25042550

"Underneath his trousers, Sutcliffe was wearing an upside down V-neck jumper, which exposed his genitals, and padding on his knees so he wouldn't be scratched as he knelt over the bodies of his victims"

Peter Sutcliffe's gruesome murder technique as cause of death is confirmed

Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe died from Covid-19 in November after refusing to shield in his prison cell

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/yorkshire-ripper-peter-sutcliffes-gruesome-25042550

ilovebrie8 · 29/09/2023 17:05

Took a long time to catch him !

Daffodilwoman · 29/09/2023 17:58

They did arrest him several times. He must have had an alibi.
I suppose the police were not used to serial killers roaming the streets of Yorkshire.
However, the character who I believe Neil Morrisey will be playing, George Oldfield was a complete and utter fuckwit. He was the one who believed the fake tapes were genuine despite several survivors stating that Sutcliffe spoke with a local Yorkshire accent. He was also the one who said one of the victims was a woman of ill repute and loose morals because she had gone to the pub without her husband.
Christ only knows what the fuck he said about the victims in private when he wasn’t speaking on camera.
The police did narrow down the search to the company Sutcliffe worked for and to someone with small feet ( the same size as Sutcliffes). Then there is the photo fit which could not be any clearer if he’d drawn it himself. Yet Sutcliffe did not have the required Geordie? Or Wearside? accent so Oldfield dismissed it.

Daffodilwoman · 29/09/2023 18:00

Old field was also told by an FBI agent who was brought in that the tapes were fake.

XDownwiththissortofthingX · 29/09/2023 18:22

Saucery · 28/09/2023 07:42

To go against the consensus on here, I don’t remember the 1970s being that dark! We were more rural though, so perhaps not so much industrial and traffic fog.
I think it’s quite respectful so far, but David Morrissey is a bit overexposed as a senior policeman. Did he buy his own uniform and insists on only going for parts where he gets to wear it?

Cities were much dirtier and grimier because folk were still burning coal, and most of the older buildings covered in soot and dirt weren't cleaned until after smokeless laws came about in the 90's.

I have really vivid memories of my home town being really dull, grey, and depressing in the 1970's , yet 90% of the buildings that pre-date the 70's are still there and today it feels totally different because they've been cleaned and there are nowhere near the number of pollutants around, no coal smog, cleaner car exhausts etc.

Original poster

Southeastdweller · 29/09/2023 18:37

During the 18 months when Oldfield and his team were preoccupied with Wearside Jack, Sutcliffe killed three women and attacked three more. At his trial, even Sutcliffe said “It was just a miracle they did not apprehend me earlier – they had all the facts.”

OP posts:

Janiie · 29/09/2023 18:49

Southeastdweller · 29/09/2023 18:37

During the 18 months when Oldfield and his team were preoccupied with Wearside Jack, Sutcliffe killed three women and attacked three more. At his trial, even Sutcliffe said “It was just a miracle they did not apprehend me earlier – they had all the facts.”

Just utterly shocking. Of course the letters needed investigating but not at the cost of every other line of enquiry. They seemed to have had the manpower and resources, I wonder what went wrong. It'd be interesting to hear the opinion of a modern day detective reviewing the evidence to see how things would have been done differently now.

We'll maybe learn more in this series but I found the Netflix docuseries glossed over the possible failures of those in charge of the investigation.

Hazara2220 · 29/09/2023 19:39

I think it was a very unfortunate coincidence that the hoaxer had the same rare blood type as Sutcliffe and correctly predicted that the next victim would be an older sex workers. This gave the tapes more credibility.

JenniferBooth · 29/09/2023 19:59

Daffodil woman. The Dear Boss letter was sent to the Central News Agency (then forwarded to Scotland Yard) in 1888 by someone claiming to be Jack the Ripper. When i saw Oldfield on a documentary listening to the Dear Boss letter being recited word for word on that tape and believing in it i remember screaming at the screen "you idiot. dont you fucking read.

Iwasafool · 29/09/2023 20:46

XDownwiththissortofthingX · 29/09/2023 18:22

Cities were much dirtier and grimier because folk were still burning coal, and most of the older buildings covered in soot and dirt weren't cleaned until after smokeless laws came about in the 90's.

I have really vivid memories of my home town being really dull, grey, and depressing in the 1970's , yet 90% of the buildings that pre-date the 70's are still there and today it feels totally different because they've been cleaned and there are nowhere near the number of pollutants around, no coal smog, cleaner car exhausts etc.

Show quote history

It was amazing when we had the three day week, think it was 1974 or 5. With factories shut down for 4 days the skies started to clear. People remember the hot summer of 76 but they forget that 75 was also hot and sunny.

It made such a difference.