Down Cemetery Road [SPOILERS]

[LushLemonTart]

Is there a thread yet?

Just finished watching the second episode. Wow it's good. I always love the leads anyway and yes it was a bit predictable but am hooked.

It's helped fill the Slow horses hole. Absolutely loved that. Tense ending but so clever.

I liked it! I love both Emma and Ruth Also Emma's husband.
How great does Emma look, btw?

I really liked it. Love Emma Thompsons look and couldn't believe her bucket mouth, it looked like she was really enjoying herself, love her hair.
Ruth Wilson was good and lots of red herrings. Why is she married to that idiot.
Also loved ET husband he really loved her and she walked all over him. Was sorry about what happened. Can't wait for episode 3.
I know it's not like Slow Horses but it's not about spies running about with guns etc. I would give it a chance.

DH last night said "gosh, Emma Thompson is doing Jackson Lamb". I am loving the idea of her in her leather jacket, hair and make up letting one rip or showing us her crusty, stinky feet. Come on Emma, you can do it.

Episode 3 is better.

Largely because (and I hope this isn’t a spoiler) Nathan Stewart-Jarrett is on screen more. I hadn’t fully realised until today how he’s grown into one of my favourite actors - just so wondrously watchable in everything.

The show is still half OG Utopia and half a cobbling together of every other similar thing - but they did at least make progress with the story today.

One of my pet peeves in dramas is when several characters are cast with actors who
look similar. I’m on episode 3 and only just got to grips with the different actors playing Axel/Amos/Michael! They are all men of a similar age, build and ethnicity.

Before anyone says anything, it’s not only about ethnicity. I’ve had similar challenges in the past with dramas where main characters consist of four white men with dark hair and beards!

I'm not enjoying it. I was looking forward to it because of the connection to Slow Horses but the characters are very much caricatures. Emma Thompsons character is just the female version of Jackson Lamb.

To be honest slow horses is becoming a bit silly too. That group of officers has saved the country four times now and everyone is still suggesting they're useless and should work in a shit hole.

There are 3 of them then?
Thank God, I was getting very confused especially as they were all "brothers" but now I think maybe they are/were brothers in an army sense

So disappointed, it looked so promising. Everything seems so improbable. The end of episode 2 did surprise me so will watch another episode but might give up after that.

@Hoppinggreen i only knew the characters because I’ve recently read the book. I’d have been even more confused otherwise.

Emma Thompson is not the Zoë boehm in my head so I'll give it a miss. I watched the first two but wasn't taken with it. Zoe has dark curly hair and Emma is too old.

But that was deliberate visual trickery, @Helloautumnagain! It wasn’t just happenstance - they deliberately cast those three people so viewers might be misled. I thought it was rather clever.

I’ve also enjoyed Sara Kestelman as Zoe’s MIL. Such a beautiful, watchable face.

Anyhow … Shetland returns to our TV screens tonight - I hope Cemetery Road won’t be overlapping too much.

Ruth Wilson can never get her accent consistent. I always want to like her but her acting bothers me a bit, she just has these moments where she doesn’t seem fully immersed in the role.

Emma Thomson is just irritating lately. She’s getting like Olivia Coleman, always playing herself and too over the top.

Apart from that it was alright, a few exaggerations but I’ll carry on watching and look forward to episode 3 later.

I watched episode 1 and 2 back to back, then got confused when Apple auto played the opening of Slow Horses (which I haven’t seen before) without me noticing it had switched to a new programme - that was a shift in pace! 😂

Just watched episode 1 and found it almost unbearable for all the reasons mentioned by pp on this thread. Dear God - the unbelievable charicatures, the weird cliches, the extremely silly plot, the nurse in the pub shouting "hey everyone, he's going to buy us all a drink", the over-acting. The foul-mouthed Government Minister and his cringing civil servant accidentally thumping his hand down in his curry. And you don't get your water cut off in this country.

Terrible, dreadful bobbins.

Yep agreed with most, I've watched the first few. Ruth Wilson is always so good, and Emma Thompson is having fun with the part. But they were the only reason I kept watching really.

Joe acted well too, but everything just felt so unbelievable and cartoonish. The dialogue was especially terrible, and the MoD scenes... I just couldn't suspend belief, it was all too derivative.

I'm struggling with it. I think also slow horses and dept Q were so good and easy to follow and much more enjoyable. Currently re watching dept Q.

Has anyone watched Dept Q?

I watched Shetland but the ending of series 3 annoyed me. So haven't watched any others yet.

I didn't realise there were 3 people that looked the same. I thought there were only 2. DH had a go at me and called me racist! but like other posters I would get confused with 4 white men with dark hair and beards.

I liked episode 3 however I find that the casting of ET's lover a bit off

The Darren Boyd and Tom Goodman-Hill characters might as well have been wearing T-shirts saying VILLAIN!!

Interestingly, my DD has just finished a Masters in screen writing, and she says they are being taught to state the obvious in scripts and give loads of exposition to cater for the modern phenomenom of being so distracted by your phone that you don't fully watch. Sad.

@DeepfriedPizza ET's lover seems dodgy.

@LindorDoubleChoc oh dear very sad indeed. I love a plot twist. So many are predictable though.

Dept Q had a bit that shocked me. I won't say what in case anyone wants to watch.

Department Q was excellent.

Slow horses 1 and 2 were excellent too. Then it got a bit silly. Again it's the caricatures. Jackson lamb is a great character and but there's no need to go so completely over the top.

I loved Dept Q! Properly exaggerated and absurd.

People seem to be slightly missing the point with Cenetery Road. It wasn’t about a generic ‘all looking the same’; it was deliberately confusing the viewer as to familial relationships.

I watched Department Q @LushLemonTart. I quite enjoyed it up to the final episode and had some questions about the plot, which is good I suppose as it wasn't all glaringly obvious. I think there's going to be another series?

@Perfidia I don’t agree about the casting being designed to confuse. Fair enough for Rufus/Axel and Amos who are brothers, but not the Michael character. From what I remember of the book they’re pretty stand alone characters.

Also, given @LindorDoubleChoc’s valid point about them including guff about water being cut off etc, I don’t think the producers are that sophisticated! Don’t get me started on bloody Wigmam who seems to be chanelling Alice in the Vicar of Dibley.

Dept Q was much better. A bit grim in parts but a better storyline. I thought it reminded me of early Slow Horses.

They were deliberately confusing the viewer in the tv series though, we were definitely meant to think Michael was Axel, so it would be more shocking when it was revealed who Axel was. So he had to look enough like Amos that they could plausibly be brothers.

I thought the same about Wigwam and Alice from Vicar of Dibley!
It's a pity that a show with such a cast is so implausible and silly.

Dept Q and Slow Horses both significantly better.

E 3 was v silly, I agree. It's going downhill.