This is How Movies Should Be Made

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

I hope they continue this series. I've been binge watching for a week and cannot stop. Characters are so real. There are no extraordinary heroes with superpowers. All contribute and also all have their quirks. The stories are very interesting. Good length and intriguing for me.

This century has generated and produced so many distinct TV series that one would inevitably become "spoilt" by them, you become picky and demand fluent and smooth course of events, lots of twists and turns, and sharp focusing on the approach or topic you prefer. I, for example, withstand some mysticism in the background, but wrongdoers should be'of flesh and blood' and the crimes should be using wisdom and attentiveness, not a divine hand or someone from outer space...So, to me, Whitechapel had some pain to kick start, and the first 2 seasons seemed protracted and vague; references to old mysteries did not clarify present matters, but added odd comparisons and hectic events. True the cast was distinct, to be followed with interest and sympathy, particularly Phil Davis as D.S. Ray Miles and Steve Pemberton as Edward Buchan (at first, Rupert Penry-Jones reminded me of Monk too much). Nevertheless, I decided to watch all 4 seasons in sequence, and began to somehow plunge into their mood and depiction manners, trying to "skate over" long time lags and playful mysticism... A case per 2 episodes seemed good to me, the events became catchier, but the final case (4/3) did not round up the Series in a reasonable manner, just added confusion about the possible Season 5 that has never come into existence.Thus, "only" 7 points from me, as the UK series like Luther or What Remains have been more to my taste. But still a good work, better than many US related series.

I watch a lot of crime dramas. I also did a final paper on Jack the Ripper for my high school forensics class. These two facts led me to this program. At first, I wasn't quite sure what to make of it. It seemed to be teetering between "Well, why keep watching?" and "I have to know what happens next!" in the first two episodes, but by the third episode, I was hooked and by the end of the second series, I was sold completely especially as it branched out into historical parallels. This program got me on the historical parallels because well, frankly, I have a History degree. This is my field. The real strength of the show is in the actors. First, Penry-Jones, Davis, and Pemberton make a strong core. You have the rookie/leader, the experience cop/family man, and then the intelligent/semi-creeper tropes mixed and played so well. The strength in acting carries through to the secondary characters. They become believable people, which sometimes gets lost in other crime dramas. That believability of the team, however, makes up for the somewhat lack of believability in the foes the team faces. This is where that fine line occurs. The show is wonderful, but sometimes the foes or story line circumstances push the boundaries of believability.

This is something a bit different from the usual police procedural and it works very well because of the stylish and stylised direction and some great acting. The different sides of policing are painted with a broad brush but are essentially true, from the squad-room boys' club to the top brass—all management-speak plus old boys' network. Anyone who works in a company, private or public, of any scale, has seen these in action even today! Phil Davis is cast very much to type as the cynical, angry, working policeman but the twist here is that he is the one who makes major mistakes every time about the perpetrator of the crimes and the possible suspects. Steve Pemberton manages to be creepy and sympathetic at the same time.Rupert Penry-Jones' subtle and far-from-heroic presentation of the "useless" plastic fast-tracker is spot-on, as is his gradual realisation that he's out of his depth and is being cast adrift by his "puppetmasters". He's been brilliant at the slow transformation into a real investigator, going with his instincts instead of by the book. It's a very unshowy but intense and believable performance and one of his best to date. The premise is highly imaginative by its nature but the mix of factual background and stylised dramatisation is so effective because it exercises the imagination. So many people, on the net and round the water-cooler, are talking about this drama, who dunnit and how the main characters are going to pan out, whether successful or failed or shattered. That's the mark of a really successful piece of TV!