Shetland season 8

[laplage]

Anyone else looking forward to the new season starting on Wednesday? It will seem a bit strange without Perez but looks to be a good cast and storyline so far as we know.

I thought the very same !!!!
I remembered that Bergen was found upstairs.
Yet the fshot in the finale was him downstairs walking in on the murder of Noah's mother.
It was all a bit daft tbh.
All the murders/red herrings/ unfinished stuff.
I think the writing was better before.

No, you’re right. I noticed it too, but was trying to talk my mother down on the phone and thought there must have been an explanation I missed!

They were there to have nice knitwear and to illustrate the Shetland rule that while goodies may have lovely traditional, old houses (Perez, Ruth), big, contemporary, architect-y houses with lots of glass are always lived in by baddies.

Do you mean the procurator fiscal AKA Mr not-as-good-as-Rhona?
It's quite a thankless role in that the PF is basically there to pour cold water, but this incarnation is very uninspired. Rhona actually had some character, and even got her own storyline at one point (from the books?).

😂😂

I also found the storyline about the fishermen family unnecessarily sad. Vincent Regan made me cry.

Bergen seemed to stagger off after being shot. He didn't go down instantly like Annie did. Perhaps he went and hid.

When they found Annie's body, didn't the police see blood specs on the floor?

Also what about Ian Hart taking the Scandinavian hiding spy (with the code name I've forgotten) to a huge beach to execute her? So indiscreet

Noah heard a lot of groaning and scraping after he'd been woken up by the gunshots, which I thought was Bergen trying to get away/get help. But it's odd that having been shot on the ground floor he'd try/have the capacity to struggle up to the attic floor instead of just out the door in hopes of seeing a passing car or something.
I guess they had to solve the issue of how and why Noreen shot them both. But then why have him found in the attic in the first place?

Yes, the only explanation for Bergen dragging himself upstairs would have been to escape a pursuer - which was the impression we were given in earlier episodes. The actual resolution really didn’t make sense.

I also found it quite surprising that someone who had presumably never shot a gun in her life managed so well... I can't imagine Annie had it loaded and with the safety off around Noah, yet Noreen picks it up, fires 1-handed and hits her targets with no issues or recoil!

I thought that too.

So many soapy detectives have some mad over rich person doing something dubious in a lab or to the internet, that the huge development for one child didn't bother me.

The spy storyline was much worse, as in the scenes shown of the past Annie was just a desk top spy, but suddenly years later after retirement she was behaving as though she had been front line.

But agree (and said so yesterday!) I wish they had used the red herring story lines to be something more locally or specifically Shetland based wrong doings. Smugglining or dodgy set up ripping off tourists or ... well I dont know because I dont live there. But seems a wasted opportunity not to make use of the location.

Just out of interest if there are any on this thread from that area, or are north of the border, I have a question which is sort of telly related.

Is the inscrease in celebrations etc., that promote the link to Vikings something that was happening naturally, or was it fact a result of the spate of Viking tv sagas that started a revival.

This website says Up Helly Aa is 140 years old in its present form.

140 years old - hmmmmmmmmmm

I am sure it was celebrated but I suppose I was asking was the way in which it is now happening is more a reflection of a Hollywoodised version.

But then of course, maybe the costume designers of the early Viking series did in fact visit Shetland and carefull copied what they saw!

Wonder when this was?

https://www.northlinkferries.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Up-Helly-Aa-through-the-years.jpg

In fact for a future Shetland story line, all the planning and no doubt divisions and squabbles leading up to the day, could provide an interesting way to have more feuding families, but also a bit of history!

I seem to remember an early season (maybe even the first one?) started on Up Helly Aa night and there was a murder, presumably slightly concealed/made easier to commit by the general melee.

I suspect the lab storyline had to be there for the red herring of Bergen being shot and why. If he wasn't there Annie wouldn't have gone to the croft, she would have just gone home after the party. She only went there to keep him safe from Karin's dad as he exposed the illegal drug his daughter was receiving.

Yes I remember there being Up Helly Aa in a series, and in fact it was seeing the images from that that made me wonder about the Viking element.

Any how have now found a history that says originally it was based on fire ceremonies dating back to Napoleonic times. And gradually got bigger and a bit out of control. ie youngs lads, burning barrels, drink,

So then it was more planned and a local author who was a Viking obsessive said why not introduce this as a strand.

But interesting to see it harks back to the Old Christmas calendar.

https://shetlandhistory.com/Up_Helly_Aa

dodgy set up ripping off tourists or …

You'll be suggesting Shetlanders inflate the prices on the cake fridges next!

My uncle was Guizer Jarl of his squad in the 70s, and my sister is in the background with John Noakes the year Blue Peter covered it (73? 74?) but it does seem to be a bigger "tourist" thing these days.

Have to admit that the cake fridges are a bigger draw / more accessible to me! 🤣

Wasn't that the first ever episode of Shetland? Red Bones - where Sandy's grandmother, who was hosting an archaeological dig, was found murdered. It all involved murders committed during WWII, members of the Shetland Bus (where Norwegian and Shetland sailors smuggled money and arms into occupied Norway), and a decades old feud between local families.

I remember the finale being a tense chase through central Lerwick during the middle of the Up Helly Aa festival with Billy trying to track suspects on the CCTV among drunken Vikings.

Well I did enjoy this series but a bit confused by the sudden plot twist after all the other happenings. Might have to rewatch the last couple of episodes.