I was brought up with the TV on in the living-room every evening and often I put it on just to watch the news 24 during the day. We have loads of channels nowadays but often there’s nothing that is worth actually watching.
I rarely watch ITV because I can’t stand the adverts, but I did start to watch Scott and Bailey recently as it has been getting good reviews. I liked it, it has lots of good female characters and it seemed a good balance of their private lives and the goings on at the police station.
But, I was amazed by the last couple which I watched because it quickly became obvious that the crime which they were investigating was just a rewrite of the Fred and Rosemary West murders in Gloucester. How lazy and sloppy is that? I know that a lot of authors get their ideas from the newspapers, but they usually have the sense to disguise and twist the storyline and it eventually turns into something more original.
I kept waiting for an unusual twist in the storyline, but it never came. I was actually quite embarrassed for whoever made the programme, but they obviously didn’t feel ashamed of what they had produced.
At the end of the investigation they ‘got their man’. How did we know? Because Bailey came in and announced that the murderer had inadvertently let slip some information which he could only have known if he had been there.
We didn’t actually see that crucial part of the questioning till after we had been told it had happened which made the whole thing a damp squib. Have police drama programme makers in Britain lost it completely? The only good things recently have been Scandinavian or, yes even Italian police investigations. Bring back Inspector Montalbano!
