Line of Duty; fantastic BBC drama-series!

By now I don't know anyone who's still waiting for H, in fact it's become 'the' joke.

Not sure why but Ted, Steve and Kate's characters are really annoying me now. We've got the same things happening, even the best the 'interviews' now look ridiculous, if you actually think about what's happening, the end of 4 was when Ted turns into Robocop.

I think I'll watch episode 3 but it needs to win me back and that's from someone who spread the word about this show, I know other people who aren't invested in this show now.

 

This series went downhill after Keely Hawes left.

Martin Compston I find as wooden as was John Nettles as "Barney Bee."
The personal issues in this latest series I find uninteresting, but they are present as an attempt to make the characters so.

Contrast this with "The Unforgotten,"on ITV. I found that far superior, down to the recording used for the introduction.

 

I think Mercurio got into Bond mode and started to feel the need to top whatever whatever he did the previous series - at the expense of the genuine drama. The 'let's guess about Ted' series was dreadful. There's a long shot of Ted, his hand hovering above the biscuit jar as he looks furtively around then closes the blinds in his office. Surely this proves he's H? Well, okay, not quite like that, but not far from it.

I wonder if Mercurio's pulling back with this series and trying to tie it in to its earlier, better years.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy it and I'm hooked, but the last season I thought was really good was the Keeley Hawes one.

As for British TV always doing it better... I'm reminded of an interview I read in NME years ago with, I think, the director or wtiter of the Albert Finney movie, Gumshoe, who said there are two lies in life: 1. I won't come in your mouth and 2. British TV is the best. He was, at the time, extolling the virtues of Jim Rockford.

While I like this, I've preferred other shows in recent memory, such as: The Swedish Wallanders (minus the second Henrickssen season), Trapped (from Iceland, no less), Spiral, the first series of The Killing and more obviously, perhaps, Homicide (minus the last two series) and The Wire. I do enjoy a good conspiracy show, though.

 

You , I can't listen to that now without crying but you're correct it's still on form after 4 seasons, I just hope season 5 is feasible.

 

I have only recently been watching this series - each weekend for the last 6 weeks I have watched a season from the beginning and finally caught up yesterday, in time to watch the season finale last night on BBC1.

Anyone in the UK cannot have escaped the hype about this finale, but without giving anything away, I am feeling a little underwhelmed!

 

Totally disappointed with the ending. Jed Mercurio is too clever for his own good.

 

Yes it was underwhelming for sure.
Jed Mercurio should give it up if he thinks that was a good finale.

 

I think I read that the ending of each season is fairly flexible based on whether it is likely to be recommissioned for another season, so maybe that's why this season seemed to end on a damp squib.

I could be wrong but it felt to me that they are close to a conclusion - closer than another full season away. Maybe they are saving it for a Christmas episode!!

 

It must be pretty difficult to simultaneously keep the twists and reveals coming, while leaving the door ajar for further episodes. It just seems though that at this point in the overall story arc that it's running out of steam.

Yet there are unresolved questions and a couple of questionable characters that remain.
Enough for another season? Possibly.

 

I think a lot of fans are going to be disappointed with the season 6 (series?) finale, I certainly was. A whole bunch of unanswered questions and resolutions to tie up. It was an open-ended finale so there is certainly potential to have another season or maybe a two-part miniseries movie of sorts.

What was really baffling was how this was a 7 episode season, yet the finale felt extremely rushed. It almost seemed too quick to get to the point of finding the "fourth man" and then there were other parts of the story arc that literally disappeared (the Jo Davidson storyline for example). My guess is they will offer some kind of excuse for the finale where "nothing in real life is final and no one truly gets resolution". I get that but I still feel robbed of some characters getting their comeuppance and/or redemption.

 

It's the same with many series.
Writers leave some loose ends, in the hope a further series will be commissioned.
The fact that they leave those viewers, who've loyally followed every episode, hoping that, "all will be revealed" at the conclusion of the final episode, totally unsatisfied, is the least consideration.

 

For me, I didn't mind the 'twist' of who 'H' was. If the series had a little bit of the 'sparkle' that earlier ones had, I'd be happy - I always liked Buckells' character.
But I found Jo Davidson to be such an un-engaging character that it was a slog to get through the whole series. She was so very bland that I had no feeling for her and no dislike for her... she was just a 'nothing' antagonist/protagonist.
The whole nonsense car chase last week was a stretch and the James Nesbitt nowhere story was just another sigh of exasperation from me.
Even Carmichael felt like she was shoehorned in because we all loved her last series. She really had very little to do this time around.

 

Give me The Wire or Homicide any day, but I can't deny I was gripped, even when things went awry, like Kate running around with machinegun a la Stallone or the hedge-trimmer incident or dead-eye Steve popping the guy in the window. What I didn't like - it was wholly unnecessary - was the text sections explaining what had happened to the characters at the end. Mercurio is a clever guy and knew he had his audience just where he wanted. To look at the way the show was covered in the UK Media would be a lesson in the obsessions of fandom that would put comic book geeks to shame. I'm sure there'll be a season 7, but if Ted ain't in, I'm not sure I am.

 

Line of Duty - Series 7

Line of Duty series 7 release date: All the new on the BBC drama's future

Spoiler: Series 7

Nothing is confirmed

 

With all the twists and turns the story has taken, I will not be convinced that Ted has left until it is officially announced. There was an indication towards the end of the last episode of an appeal of the 'retirement'.

 

I certainly hope so.

 

pffffrt.

it's no Spiral, that's for sure.

 

My wife has been a fan of the series for a long time (I can't stand it, so I head for the bunker). She was very underwhelmed and disappointed with this latest series.

 

Absolutely. It was as though he didn't know how to end it, or (more likely) he wants to milk the BBC licence payer for another series.
It's gone on for too long now, just retire it.

 

Line of Duty creator Jed Mercurio says he knew ending 'wouldn't appeal to all'

 

because he knew it was rubbish (?)

 

Up until the last 10 minutes it could go out with a bang....and it just sort of faded out, with loads of loose strings and unfinished business. Sad the fantastic string of series ended with the weakest few episodes of them all, even the dialogues became a bit dull and cliché-ridden. Was Mercurio convinced to keep the main characters alive and well for a new series?

 

I agree - I was looking at my watch 10 minutes before the end thinking 'they are going to have to pull something out of the bag soon'.

The interviews with Jo Davidson and Ian Buckles were also lacklustre. Whereas previously the thrill of those interviews were seeing them pull all the evidence together and gradually seeing the mask slip, here all we got was 'no comment'.

It seems they were sacrificing good drama at the expense of trying to make a point that corruption is out there and it won't give you any satisfying endings.

 

I can't quite believe they cast someone of that calibre just to be in a dodgy photo in two episodes. Did he end up on the cutting room floor? Or are rumours of his death greatly exaggerated?

 

I think, as he was in Bloodlands or whatever it was called - that was also Jed, I think - and always banging on about how he wanted to be in LOD, he probably just allowed them to use his photo/s free of charge to be the huge red herring