Customer Reviews

Wire in the Blood - Complete Second Season

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The second season is even more exciting and action-packed than the first season, especially the first DVD in this set, Still She Cries, where you get to see Dr. Hill's patient Maggie try to reconcile the haunted images of her victims by finding where she buried the bodies, Dr. Hill help DI Carol Jordan and the Bradfield police find their latest serial killer (very good bursts of analysis by Dr. Hill, very gripping. It feels as if Robson Green is now comfortable with playing Dr. Hill and is starting to live the part). There's the mind f*ck of one of Dr. Hill's post-graduates, and personally I think she should have really lost her lunch when DI Jordan told her who she'd been with.
The second, third, and fourth episodes are all as different from each other as the first season's were. Yes, there are a core group of actors but I don't feel as if I'm watching a "Crossing Jordan" sitcom. These all feel as if they are separate movies with full attention paid to script writing, location shoots, camera focus and background scenes, and sounds and soundtrack music. They don't drag out the latest high-tech gadget to solve a crime which is so common in the US (though I'm sure the crew are working their butts off behind the scenes to give me this wonderful series); Dr. Hill's analysis is the primary tool, and I'm kept glued to the screen watching and enjoying the pursuit and the twists each case takes. This is very high quality cinema that I hope will be come cult status. If you enjoy this you'd also enjoy Christopher Nolan's Memento starring Guy Pearse and Carrie-Anne Moss. Both involve your brain and your emotions in ways I'd thought the screen had long forgotten.

I just finished watching Season 3, and am officially addicted. While I am waiting for my Season 4 disc to arrive, I will try to control my jones by writing this review.

Both Hermione Norris and Robson Green were unknown to this American prior to watching this series, but they are both fabulous in their respective roles as DCI Carol Jordan and profiler extraordinaire Dr. Tony Hill. Dr. Hill can best be described as 'quirky', sometimes unsettlingly so, in his methods, and his ability to intuit the minds of twisted serial killers leaves him several bubbles off plumb in normal human interactions. However, DCI Jordan is similarly laser-focused on her career, and over the episodes she and Dr. Hill have forged a real and tender bond that makes each the other's best and most reliable friend. Though Carol and Tony often come tantalizingly close to becoming far more than friends and professional colleagues (and for these two rather damaged, very lonely people, we want them to stop dancing and just get it on already!), so far the series, prudently perhaps, keeps any romantic feelings bubbling under the surface but as yet unacted upon.

There are unmistakable echoes of 'Prime Suspect's Jane Tennyson in Carol Jordan that go beyond blonde hair; Helen Mirren brought us a cautionary portrait of a workaholic police inspector whose career and natural inclination shut meaningful personal relationships out of her life until it's too late. DCI Jordan is in danger of treading down that same path if she's not careful. Perhaps (and I hope so) this series will finally wrap up with Tony and Carol as a couple, and save Carol from Jane Tennyson's fate. In the meantime the dance is fun to watch.

"Fun" might perhaps be the wrong word for a series that is unabashedly grisly. Really. "Wire in the Blood" (and I sincerely hope I never find out what that means) is hands down the most graphic show I have seen. Indeed there are scenes here that would have not been out of place in David Fincher's "Se7en". American crime shows are fairly sanitized for this kind of thing, and we Yanks are a bit unprepared for the sheer amount of gore and even nudity of corpses which this show presents us. Be advised that the crime scenes in this series require a strong stomach, and make anything on "Law & Order" look like a children's cartoon. This show doesn't just push the envelope; it tears it completely. I find a grudging admiration in the risks this show takes--and here I thought that British TV was supposed to be so boring!

Robson Green is my new crush, and writer Val McDermid, who created the character says that Mr. Green is the 'definitive' Tony Hill as he existed in her imagination. I know he certainly fires up my imagination, and has grown on me as this series has progressed. If you're a fan of crime dramas, gird your stomach and watch this--you won't be sorry.

I became a Robson Green fan when I saw the first season of Wire in the Blood. Since then, I have read the books, and watched Green in his other crime series, Touching Evil. If you like to watch films about police solving serial killer crimes, you will enjoy this. The crimes are shocking, the denouement is interesting, and at the heart of the story is the developing relationship between Dr. Tony Hill (Green) and the police woman with whom he works these crimes.

The writers for this show must be psychopaths. I can't imagine coming up with these compelling twisted stories, but thank goodness for british TV, because they obviously have brilliant, though possibly, deranged, talents to do this for a living. Oh, great actors to bring it life, as well.

"Wire in the Blood," another strong British television detective series, is based upon the work of prize-winning British author Val McDermid; it's based in her fictional Midlands city of Bradfield, which she undoubtedly based upon the very real Midlands city of Manchester, where she worked as a journalist for 16 years, and still lives. It's filmed in the little-seen-here Midlands, rather than London, of which we see so much, and as such, it has a real background feel to it. It's a crime drama/police procedural, dealing as a rule with the capture of serial killers (a theme some of us may find we've seen too much), and it is gritty, sometimes gory. McDermid, of course, is considered one of the leading lights of the school of British mystery writing known as tartan noir -- rather more violent and bloody than the usual, and, thankfully, lightened occasionally by that dour Scots humor. Written by a Scot, duh, which McDermid is. And all those English seem to whisper while they work: it could sure use subtitles.

The series advertises itself these days as "based upon characters created" by McDermid. Robson Green stars as Dr. Tony Hill, psychologist-academic-profiler, giving a wondrous performance; handsome, praises be, intense, intelligent, fallible and flexible. He is ably supported by Hermione Norris as Detective Chief Inspector Carol Jordan, Emma Hardy as DC Paula McIntyre, and Mark Letheren as DS Kevin Geoffries. And they all seem to whisper while they work: the series could sure use subtitles.

Unfortunately, McDermid hasn't written nearly enough to keep a series going, and the episodes collected in Series 2, which are written by others, are not up to her standard. For those of you who've never had the privilege, she's a daring writer, breaking new ground with every step; and her best work is troubling, intensely gory and violent; frequently involving torture of a sexual nature. Unfortunately, the four episodes that comprise this series just don't go there.

Disk 1, "Still She Cries," is the strongest, involving Maggie Thomas, a troubled, convicted female serial killer in jail for life(many people would argue that, in fact, there never has been a female serial killer; the American, Aileen Wuornos, was not a proactive hunter, merely a reactive.) It also involves a predatory, pretty blond student of Hill's, and a new serial killer preying on pretty blond girls.

Disk 2,"The Darkness of Light," concerns an overly religious young woman. Somewhere on the internet, I noted a comment from a British crime scene investigator to the effect that the hotel room in which a murder takes place in this episode is, in fact, the hotel room in which a murder once took place.

Disk 3, "The Right to Silence," opens on a particularly gruesome murder, body found at a slaughterhouse. The work appears to be that of a local gangster, already imprisoned. The story is made a bit stronger by father/son, and brother/brother arcs.

Disk 4, "Sharp Compassion." Someone's killing very sick people in a hospital. And somehow terrorists, and MI5 are shoehorned in.

The series takes its name from an early Dr. Hill book: The Wire in the Blood (Dr. Tony Hill and Carol Jordan Mysteries). That book was violent in the extreme, and considerably cleaned up for Series 1. I recommend it whole-heartedly, but not if violence disturbs you. I understand the title quote comes from a poem by T.S. Eliot, and rather meant an irresistible urge to kill. At one time, while he was writing Blood Work; I believe, Michael Connelly, currently most popular American crime writer, mentioned "Wire in the Blood," and said he was going to collaborate on the writing of it. (He had a habit of mentioning past and future books, in each book he then wrote.) In the event, of course, McDermid wrote "Wire" alone. Well, the current TV series is worth watching - watered-down McDermid is better than no McDermid - but don't judge the author's writing by it.

I love the series, and the videos are great. The quality is excellent. However, English is not my first language and the lack of Spanish (and any other language) subtitles was a sort of disappointment. I didn't know that before the purchase. Fortunatly, the audio is great. And if you don't mind the absence of subtitles, I totally recommend it!

If you are not a fan of Robson's, that's your loss. Everyting he does is well written, well acted, filmed and edited. He's courageous for bringing jobs to the NE Region of Scotland, and works tirelessly to keep his region in the news. If you are adventurous and not afraid of what goes bump in the night, view the entire series of WITB 1-6. Series 7 is in production as of November 2009, and I cannot wait.
Cheers to all of Robson's fans and to those I think will become fans.
A loyal and grateful watcher of British media.

A quirky irresistable series essential to true mystery lovers
and psychological thrillers. Brilliantly produced and acted, every episode is
a teriffic night at the movies. Don't miss it.

I just discovered this show a few months ago on BBC America. I'm totally hooked on Robson Green. I've just ordered Touching Evil as well. This is quality adult television.

I liked the episodes but they weren't closed caption which was disappointing. The English seem to speak softly and have the music loud over the talking.