After Men Behaving Badly and, in particular, Life Begins, I’ll watch almost anything Caroline Quentin appears in.
Blue Murder follows the work and life of newly promoted DCI Janine Lewis (Quentin) as she juggles the fallout from her recent marriage break-up with the full-on investigation of a brutal murder. The Goddess and I watched the first season (all of 2x60min eps) earlier in the week.
INT. LOUNGE – NIGHT
Credits scroll upwards on a TELEVISION, WRITER and THE GODDESS on the COUCH stretching and remembering forgotten cups of tea.
WRITER
Um. What’d you think?
THE GODDESS
It was a bit... pedestrian.
BEAT as our writer tries a long gulp of long-cooled english breakfast.
THE GODDESS
And what did you think?
WRITER
Eye-wateringly boring.
That’s one of the many things I treasure about my relationship with The Goddess: she’s compassionate, polite and humane while I am just intolerant.
Intolerant of things like —
— our detective heroine being given 48 hours to clear the case or else be replaced —
— our detective heroine and her team being the only cops available to respond to dramatic turns in the investigation —
— and the grinding exposition, absolutely stultifying with sequences like:
INT. INTERVIEW ROOM, POLICE STATION – DAY
DETECTIVE HEROINE and NERVOUS SUSPECT have a silent, tense moment.
DETECTIVE HEROINE
Why don’t you just let it all out so we can have tea and kippers?
Suspect makes pained expression.
NERVOUS SUSPECT
Oh, alright: I’ve been holding out on you all this time.
(licks lips)
The gardener did it.
DETECTIVE HEROINE
The gardener. Right. With the electric carving knife.
NERVOUS SUSPECT
Yeah. To throw you off the scent.
INT. CORRIDOR, POLICE STATION – SOON AFTER
Detective Heroine and her MALE CHAUVINIST BOSS travel down the CORRIDOR –
MALE CHAUVINIST BOSS
You have forty-eight hours –
DETECTIVE HEROINE
Yes, you said.
MALE CHAUVINIST BOSS
– so you better have something to show for it.
DETECTIVE HEROINE
Well, actually, I just came out of an interview with Nervous Suspect.
MALE CHAUVINIST BOSS
Yes?
DETECTIVE HEROINE
And she dobbed in the gardener.
MALE CHAUVINIST BOSS
But an electric carving knife was used.
DETECTIVE HEROINE
Yes. It was to throw us off the scent.
Besides mentally screaming at the screen, I’m like, Whoa – I’m the audience and I was there: you think I forgot already?
I certainly appreciated the portrayal of Quentin’s character trying to balance work and family. There were some moments between her team-members that entertained and spoke volumes about their personalities.
Maybe I should approach this as more of a relationship drama than a procedural. Maybe things tighten up in subsequent seasons (it’s up to season five).
And maybe I should get around to trying some Prime Suspect.
