British TV/General Discussion

@deedee713 wrote:
I am here Brit! In a fit of pique of not finding anything decent, I cancelled Netflix. Seems I may have to restart as Britbox and Acorn equate police procedurals with ...............SPOILERS................. interoffice romance and lack of birth control.

BTW, I use CC on every show.

Deedee, there have been many times I have thrown my hands up with Netflix - the dry spells have been long where I find nothing, absolutely nothing, of interest to watch...I get to the brink of letting it go and then something whooshes in and I am transfixed again. Some of my most favorite newer series have been on Netflix (when I want older nostalgia - Britbox is my go to). So, I have come to the conclusion just to let the subscription ride because eventually something fab will pop up again.

For you though, it may be the way it was with Acorn for me, I just wasn't interested in anything new they were showing (outside of the series based in the South of France - actually filmed in Malta - with Sally Lindsey, "The Madame Blanc Mysteries" and I got to watch the first season through Prime as a monthly sample a while back). I haven't looked back since I ended that subscription and you may feel the same way with Netflix.

I get it about the Britbox police procedurals, their original content starts out strong out of the box (although not in the case of "Sister Boniface" - I was so disappointed in that after looking so forward to it. I tried and tried to give it a chance, but was bored to tears) and then they go completely in another direction the second season and downhill it goes. "The Bay" was a decent watch in S1 and 'Hope Street", though light and a bit of a soap opera, went off the cliff in S2 - I stopped watching both. I read "The Tower" and "Grace" also went this way. Obviously these shows all have their fans, but I think the point is the personal stuff took on more of the focus over the investigations. 

To be fair, I like personal interactions and life as part of the story, but not at the expense of losing sight of the investigation itself. So, I get what you are saying.

Btw, if you want to see Bill Nighy (and I know you do!) Prime is now streaming the movie "Gideon's Daughter". I haven't seen this movie myself, can't give an opinion, but the cast is a strong one. I added it to my watch list.

@BritMystery wrote:
Deedee, there have been many times I have thrown my hands up with Netflix - the dry spells have been long where I find nothing, absolutely nothing, of interest to watch...I get to the brink of letting it go and then something whooshes in and I am transfixed again. Some of my most favorite newer series have been on Netflix (when I want older nostalgia - Britbox is my go to). So, I have come to the conclusion just to let the subscription ride because eventually something fab will pop up again.

For you though, it may be the way it was with Acorn for me, I just wasn't interested in anything new they were showing (outside of the series based in the South of France - actually filmed in Malta - with Sally Lindsey, "The Madame Blanc Mysteries" and I got to watch the first season through Prime as a monthly sample a while back). I haven't looked back since I ended that subscription and you may feel the same way with Netflix.

I get it about the Britbox police procedurals, their original content starts out strong out of the box (although not in the case of "Sister Boniface" - I was so disappointed in that after looking so forward to it. I tried and tried to give it a chance, but was bored to tears) and then they go completely in another direction the second season and downhill it goes. "The Bay" was a decent watch in S1 and 'Hope Street", though light and a bit of a soap opera, went off the cliff in S2 - I stopped watching both. I read "The Tower" and "Grace" also went this way. Obviously these shows all have their fans, but I think the point is the personal stuff took on more of the focus over the investigations. 

To be fair, I like personal interactions and life as part of the story, but not at the expense of losing sight of the investigation itself. So, I get what you are saying.

Btw, if you want to see Bill Nighy (and I know you do!) Prime is now streaming the movie "Gideon's Daughter". I haven't seen this movie myself, can't give an opinion, but the cast is a strong one. I added it to my watch list.

Deedee, after writing this I got to thinking about what is a really first tier detective series and with Netflix in mind (given our discussion) Giri/Haji percolated to the top, so I thought why not, give it another go as it has been awhile. O M G... so good, just as I remember, and maybe even better. Finished E4 last night and what an episode that is! This quality blows anything original Britbox has offered right out of the park. I think I am enjoying it more this second time around. Just excellent, nothing else to say.

As a heads-up there is an Endeavour Special running on PBS "A Countdown to the Final Goodbye" which is airing on my local PBS tomorrow, Wednesday at 8:OO PM. Also, the first episode of the series "Riley" is airing this Sunday night at 8:OO PM with the first episode of S9 "Endeavour " to follow. It is going to be a great night of PBS Mystery tv!

Another "Endeavour" special popped up, well actually I have it DVR'd, it recorded sometime yesterday it seems - "Morse & the Last Endeavour". I am going to watch it now.

Thank you, that sums up nicely my feelings about the train derailments (nauseating romances) on some very good shows. 

Brit, you are right about Giri, it was that good. Also got me to thinking about my favorite, Midnight Diner. It appears that it is not available for streaming!

Re the ramp up to the last Endeavour and the reviews plus pitches, the candids with the cast were delightful - Adrian with grey hair, Sean so very trim. As a standalone show, I will miss it. The closeups of Thaw were still sad for me. I expect the end of Endeavour will be sad, they'd better not pull a fast one.

The cast is indeed talented, thanks, I'll give Gideon's Daughter a try.

 Still watchin  '  Designated  Survivor  ' ,  Brit  ...   a  good  binge.  On going , never ending  intrigue .  Got  ' Morse and the Last Endeavour '  special  in  PVR . Will  get to it in time but as  Shaun  Evans  was never , what I considered a good Morse replacement ,  it's not up high on my  PVR list .   Brit , you called it  Riley ... do you mean  Ridley ?  ...   coming on this Sunday  , June 18 th  The Peaceful  Garden  Part  1  with  Adrian  Dunbar ?   Still got  some Prime Suspect  eps. I got dropin' in from one of my obscure cable channels, as well as   ' Keeping up  Appearances '  which is a classic  Brit.  sitcom.   Never get tired of watching these .   Been watchin' the news and seein' all the trouble ya all have been having with  wildfire smoke  comin' from  here . How is it now ???  

@deedee713, I didn't know that "Midnight Diner" was no longer on Netflix!  Absolutely one of my all time favorites, ever. I have an emotional response to that series that is unlike any other - I feel like I am there, part of it all. If we had such a place here in the States you and I would be regulars, hanging out a few nights a week with the crew - eating omelets and noodles and just being. It is a special thing to have a place where you truly feel you belong, no pretense - that is the feeling that you get from Midnight Diner.

Okay... found it streaming on Peacock (Free HD), I think though that Peacock has ads which would spoil the flow.  Netflix still has "Midnight Diner - Tokyo", which is your favorite of the two series. Netflix developed that series as a continuation of the original MD, so it will always live there. Of the two series, Tokyo is your favorite, that is the one you watched first.

I too have always viewed "Endeavour" as a stand-alone show. I, like @solar have never seen Shaun Evans as Morse, in fact, watching that special (I found out once I started that it was part of a pledge drive 🙄) made it all the more apparent how much unlike Morse, Evans' portrayal is. It was glaring to me. 

That being said though, I enjoy the series very much (more than I ever did "Lewis") - and this grew as the series continued. The cast/characters are so good...Fred and Win Thursday, Bright, Bradshaw, Frazil, even Joan -  I am sad to see it go, it is the last of an era which all started with Thaw (and Whately) so many years ago.

@solar, so glad you are enjoying "Designated Survivor"! I thought you would... it is not too heavy, but the storyline keeps you going from episode to episode - they know how to grab your interest at the end of each to propel you to the next - as you say, lots of intrigue. I started S2 last night.

Yes, I meant "Ridley" with Adrian Dunbar. I have a very good feeling about this one. I hope it is one that we can see some future with. We are in need of more long-term mystery shows to look forward to. At least now we have "Magpie Murders" - I see this staying with us for a few more seasons (I know they got the greenlight for season two).

We are still having issues with the air quality by me! For a day or so it looked as if it had passed us, but it came back - we don't have the grey smoke in the air to the extent we first did, but you can smell burning wood in the air. We had a heavy rain a few nights ago and I thought that would be it, but no - it came back and the air is still heavy with the smell of smoke. This has caused havoc with my asthma, I have had a hard time breathing with it. It is going to rain again later today, maybe that will help, but something tells me we are not yet done with this.

solar, SO true. as  Shaun  Evans  was never , what I considered a good Morse replacement , You'd think he'd have read our comments and tried a little harder. As I said, the supporting cast was good and the stories were good as standalone police procedurals, so I'll miss the show. There's precious little coming up.

solar, it was a science fiction movie, and I hope all is better up there and not too many people or animals were severely impacted. I woke to a very yellow sun, and a smell of BBQ, as well as I could describe it. I had been reading about the fires and the warnings in NYC but it didn't dawn on me until late, duh, because we are north of NYC. I immediately thought of the movie Melancholia, which is a dark watch but had the same special effects. Many in the neighborhood compared the sky to Mars.

If we had such a place here in the States you and I would be regulars, hanging out a few nights a week with the crew - eating omelets and noodles and just being....Amen, Brit. Darn, now I will have to reclaim Netflix. They said they'd gladly welcome me back, lol. And yes to Endeavour over Lewis, that's how much I enjoyed the supporting cast.

Found Lost: Those Who Kill on Acorn, a nice gruesome dark series, from Denmark. No dead giraffes yet. Then saw in the comments on Facebook that there are 2 other series. No surprise, Acorn on Prime has one other, but not all three. They are standalone, but still and all, Bezos doesn't have enough money to make his customers happy?

Saw drone footage of streets totally wiped out but there was 1  house  completely unscathed ,  can't imagine how those people feel when they were allowed back and saw this .  151 homes  destroyed .  The animals are a concern , they could not evacuate and the effects of long term smoke inhalation are still unknown. 

@solar wrote:
Saw drone footage of streets totally wiped out but there was 1  house  completely unscathed ,  can't imagine how those people feel when they were allowed back and saw this .  151 homes  destroyed .  The animals are a concern , they could not evacuate and the effects of long term smoke inhalation are still unknown. 

Solar, how horribly devastating...from what I am reading today there are fires still raging. People losing homes and entire neighborhoods due to fire... how to comprehend that and the long term impact of this is difficult to get your head around when you are not directly involved, for those directly affected, I don't even know how you take this level of destruction in. The animals though bear the brunt of this, people can leave, they can't. It's a horror. 

Wonder how/why that one home escaped the fire?

@BritMystery  wrote :

Wonder how/why that one home escaped the fire?

Apparently Brit ,  this is not uncommon for odd houses to  survive like this .  These fires are driven by  wind  and in this case the wind must have turned just before it reached there.  These people should go out and buy a whole mess of  lotto tickets and see if their luck still holds . lol    Glenda  Jackson died , 87 .  

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12211211/Angela-Thorne-dies-aged-84-Actress-best-known-starring-Manor-Born-passes-away.html#article-12211211

Angela Thorne who played Marjorie Frobisher in To The Manor Born has died.

@Sheerwater wrote:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12211211/Angela-Thorne-dies-aged-84-Actress-best-known-starring-Manor-Born-passes-away.html#article-12211211

Angela Thorne who played Marjorie Frobisher in To The Manor Born has died.

Oh Sheerwater, this is such sad, sad news. I loved her... whenever she was on screen - no matter if the show was my thing or not - I watched for her and she would always just light it up. She was a true beauty - she took second stage to Penelope Keith in "To the Manor Born", and played that role to perfection; but in truth, she was a star in her own right. "To the Manor Born", "Farrington of the FO", "Three Up Two Down", "Midsomer Murders" - whatever TV show starring her I could get my hands on to watch, I did. She even did a stage play of "Mapp & Lucia" where she played Lucia - I have a copy of the stagebill saved somewhere. I would have loved to have seen that.

She will be greatly missed by me... all my people are going. Just sad.

I watched the first episode of Ridley last night, I am going to rewatch it because I was so focused on taking it all in I think I need to rewatch to key in on the investigation itself.  I am going out on a limb here and say that Deedee loved it - right up her alley, Ridley is her kind of detective. I liked it, but it is too soon for me to know if I will love it. With Vera I knew from the first episode that this was my series - I loved it day one. Ridley, I feel I am going to like - it is yet to be seen if it moves any higher up.

Held off on Endeavour - I didn't want to overload myself - will watch in a day or so. Very much looking forward to it.

all my people are going. Just sad.

So true, Brit. She was another actor whose name I didn't know, took them for granted when they were on screen, whilst they did an outstanding acting job that made their series top notch.

Same here, Brit. I had to rewatch both Ridley and Endeavour. So Ridley is from 2022? Wiki has said a second series has been commissioned. Tick. Tock. 

As usual, you know me like a book! I like my detectives with angst, I don't like schmoopy romance (seriously Grace?), and I liked it. Didn't love it as I loved my Vera and my Thaw Morse and my Hickson Marple and my Brett Holmes. But it appears to have legs. Had to use CC. Get on it, ITV.

Endeavour - I'll only say, I again had to use CC. It was lovely to see them all again, but I think 'it's time'. Be sure to catch the candids after the promos (oh boy, does Ben Miller NOT fit Professor T). Anton Lesser closes out the 90 minutes, and he is absolutely delightful.

Enjoy, Brit. BTW, don't read the web, and there are only 3 short episodes.

 Read about  Angela  Thorne  Sheerwater   ..  remember seeing her .  Age gets us all .  RIP  Angela .  As for  ' Ridley ' ,  who killed that  shady sheep farmer Jesse Halpin , just walking home from the pub .   Don't know much about  Alex  Ridley  .    yet   ..  circumstances  surrounding  him leaving the force  ,   what happened to his  wife / daughter  ,  that fellow he visited in prison that he brought books  who said to him  "  you're fault what I did that night  "  ...   one thing we do know at this point is that he's a pretty good singer .  lol     Same as  Brit , will watch again  ta fill in the small bits .   

First, before I forget... yes Deedee, Ben Miller did not fit the Professor T character. I didn't last more than an episode or two with that version. I have yet to see an English remake that has ever come close to being as good as the original. 

Well, I did my rewatch of "Ridley" - I don't know people, having the opportunity to really focus this second watch made it apparent to me that this series/story is choppy and kind of all over the place like it doesn't know what it wants to be... is it moody noir,  is it a contemporary police procedural or do we have a singing detective in the vein of the poet/inspector Adam Dalgliesh? 

Granted it is only the first episode and needs time to find its' feet, but it will need to find its' vibe if it is going to last for more than a season or two. 

"Van Der Valk" started out the same way - wasn't quite sure what they were doing with that remake, but by the second series - with the help of the supporting cast - it found its' stride. I think "Ridley" will fall into the same category as "Van Der Valk" for me - an entertaining mystery series running in the middle of the pack.

I thoroughly enjoyed the first episode of "Endeavour". It was so good to see everyone again and it totally had my attention for the entire episode. Such detail and character development in this series - it is so well done. Glad to see they really are trying to tie up old storylines and loose ends. We now know Ronnie Box lives.

My quibble, the interview after the episode with Shaun Evans where he says Joan (probably) was the love of Morse's life! Did you all hear that - after all these years the man still doesn't get it... Morse is not the man you made, that character was and always will be Thaw's and there was no Joan in Morse's life (or Thursday for that matter). There is poetic license, I get it, but fact is fact - we already know who Morse is in his latter years and from this who was important and had an impact on him from his younger years. 

It amazes me how clueless Evans remains - he wants to happily live in his bubble by making believe that we didn't have thirty-three episodes of Morse's life prior to his portrayal. The woman that had the most profound impact on Morse was Susan, his ex- fiance. He may have developed feelings for Joan as part of the Endeavour story, but the love of his life? Just no.

You did it again, Brit! Hit the nails on the head. I should stop reading reviews and just wait for yours.

I'm glad I missed the Evans interview, I hope you saw Lesser's comment on the amount of story he had to follow and his bit with the glasses.

If Thaw was here, he would so agree with you.

Thanks @deedee713! We all understand each other here, when someone makes a comment we know what the other person is saying, there is no misconstruing the meaning of it - can you imagine if I made the same observations on one of the British TV pages - oh my Lord,  it would be a blood bath, they would come out of the woodwork with pitchforks. If I have something to say, I say it among friends or 🤐. I have no time to waste on other people's nonsense.

@solar, are you still watching "Designated Survivor"? I am mid S2 and I am finding the second season better than the first! I watched three episodes in a row the other night - I have to stop myself and give it a rest for a few days so I don't go through it too quickly.

Btw, I did watch the latest Downton movie... the one where some go to the South of France, while tons of stuff is happening at Downton (don't want to give it away). I loved it!! It was even better than the first Christmas movie. I don't know what critics were talking about - boring is the last thing I would say about it! Great fun and a must watch - at least in my book.