Reviews & Ratings for
Prime Suspect (TV) More at IMDbPro »

Filter:

Best Chronological Prolific Authors Loved It Hated It Hide Spoilers:

Page 1 of 2:

[1] [2]

Index

12 reviews in total

---

25 out of 26 people found the following review useful:
As perfect as they come., 25 August 2000

Author: miniwidge from Calgary

This is far above the average cop series, let alone a made-for-TV cop series. Helen Mirren is, as always, outstanding as Tennyson. The rest of the series is as good as the first, which is, in itself, rare. Usually, sequels or continuations of a series try to follow the same general plot and characterizations and fail because of their lack of originality. Prime Suspect is riviting from the first to the last.

One extra note...did anyone watching it recently notice that the original victim's boyfriend was played by Ralph Fiennes? Shows that quality breeds quality.

---

19 out of 20 people found the following review useful:
Everything is brilliant and almost perfect!, 4 May 2004

Author: (sylviastel@aol.com) from United States

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Watching Prime Suspect again makes me realize and appreciate every episode. Dame Helen Mirren is always worth watching whether Prime Suspect or anything else. Her role of Jane Tennison will go down in history as one of the best female roles ever written and acted by this wonderful dame. The writing is superior to anything else on television. More than ten years after its first showing in America, Prime Suspect is classic television. The series itself has also some award winning performances by Zoe Wanamaker as the unsuspecting wife of a serial killer. Even though we suspect it, it is fascinating to unravel the mystery. When we see the female corpses, it is a gruesome look into reality. For us, it is entertainment. In the real world, they are somebody's daughter and the killer is inhuman. When we finally solve the mystery in this addition, we will have more questions and answers. The biggest question is why does this happen to begin with.

---

17 out of 18 people found the following review useful:
Excellent show, 7 May 2007

Author: Galina from Virginia, USA

Detective Chief Inspector Jane Tennison (Helen Mirren) is in charge of the investigation to uncover a serial killer who rapes, tortures, and brutally murders prostitutes in London. Tennison is put in charge after one of her fellow DCIs has a heart attack and dies. She inherits the murder case and soon comes across the connected second murder. If trying to solve not one but two rape-murder cases is not enough, Jane's work is complicated by the hostility of her staff. The members of the male-dominated police department feel humiliated and have problems following the orders of the female boss, no matter how intelligent, tough, organized, and fit for the position she is. Tennison's obsession with the cases and fighting for credibility and respect from her colleagues don't help to her relationship with the boyfriend Peter Rawlins (Tom Wilkinson), either. Helen Mirren is superb as DCI Tennison playing the character that is sympathetic, tough, vulnerable, bright, very clever, and sexy - all at the same time. Mirren was voted the sexiest 60+ star in the world few months ago. I think she's been always incredibly attractive and desirable - and always will be. She definitely lit the screen at 46, in her first season of "Prime Suspect" (1991). Creator of the show, Lynda La Plante wrote the story that ranks among the best police procedures and it is terrific - complex, dynamic, with unexpected turns, and interesting multidimensional characters. Ralph Fiennes played one of his first roles as a boyfriend of a murdered girl and he was memorable in a very emotional scene opposite Mirren. I look forward for more DVDs with the rest of the seasons coming from Netflix.

---

16 out of 17 people found the following review useful:
Intelligent, political, and mercurial, 19 December 1999

Author: loth-2 from Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada

A common problem with great British series is that as time passes, rather than become better they lose their steam or atypicality. By the time Prime Suspect 4 came about, but for the rare scene it had become virtually identical to a common copper flick.

The first series, concerning the serial killings attributed to George Marlow (With accomplices), is the most complex and riveting, more so than even Cracker's first series. I have seen the episodes through their completion on several rotations and am still finding subtle aspects of character and plot. Helen is integral and can portray a paradoxical human in every episode consistently. Almost as integral is Marlow who can just about convince you that he's innocent -- but not quite, not in the right way.

In the Prime Suspect world, everything is politics. La Plante examines the seperate realms of politics and how they interact; this is what makes up most of the running time and all of my interest. Physical details and clue tables are pushed to the side to examine one person's brain, how it reacts to the world, and how the world reacts to it. Politics, Jane, that's what it's all about.

---

14 out of 14 people found the following review useful:
Outstanding!, 28 February 2004
Author: grendelkhan from Xanadu

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This is the series that started it all. When Prime Suspect debuted, it was instantly hailed as a classic and also sparked a debate much akin to the Clarence Thomas hearings in the US. At heart, this is a police drama, but it is also a story of changing gender roles and issues of harassment.

Spoilers: Helen Mirren is outstanding as DCI Jane Tennison, a rare female detective, of high rank, on the Metropolitan Police Force. Tennison has fought her way up the ranks and is just itching to get her first crack at a murder investigation. Unfortunately, she has been overlooked, side-stepped, and ignored at every turn. Fate deals her a hand and she plays it for all it's worth. Mirren brings a wealth of experience and talent to this role and she is further aided by the top-notch writing of Lynda La Plante. Mirren is able to convey so much with a look, a smile or just a movement of her head.

John Bowe is also mesmerizing as the prime suspect of the investigation, George Marlowe. He is charming one moment, desperate the next. The series keeps you guessing as to his guilt or innocence, and Bowe is able to convey both the idea of an innocent man being railroaded, and a cold-blooded killer.

This series abounds with police procedure, the mind-numbing, but vital collection and pursuit of evidence, the methods of interrogation and the building of a case. It also details the struggle of a woman to succeed in a male-dominated field. Tennison is a good cop due to an obsessive nature; but, it has detrimental effect on her personal life. Her relationship falls apart the more she becomes immersed in the case. This theme would continue throughout the series.

This series is a fine example of great writing, acting, and direction. The script is first rate and all of the actors, right down to background characters, are outstanding. It has been said that Helen Mirren's Oscar nomination for the Madness of King George was actually an acknowledgement of her work here (her role in that film was far smaller than those generally nominated in the same category). There may be some truth there. Mirren is so powerful in this role, you wish the Oscars did cover tv features.

If you are a fan of good drama, crime drama, or fine acting, check this out.

---

15 out of 17 people found the following review useful:
Great Series!, 22 August 1999
Author: Niche from Wisconsin, USA

"Prime Suspect" is a dark, sometimes cynical, sometimes inspiring, always disturbing series. I watched most of the series on PBS a few summers back, and found myself instantly hooked. Helen Mirren is simply one of the best actresses alive today. It's a police drama with little on camera violence and true human emotion; you'd be hard pressed to find such a series on American television.

---

7 out of 10 people found the following review useful:
Plateau, 1 December 2006
Author: Rick Blaine from London

Normally when things are this good you predict 'it's all downhill from here' but with this series things never dip really - small bumps in the road perhaps but the quality is uniformly high.

These are close on four hour dramas. They weren't shown in one stretch on the telly but if you get the boxed set that's how they'll be presented - with no pauses in between and no signs of where they would have gone either. (Thank you British television.)

Episode I is written by the creator of the series and it's nigh on perfect with all the stacked decks where you want them and a masterful revelation of the lead character 'gradually'. Tom Wilkinson great in a small supporting role.

This one has everything and some of the sequels won't have it as well. Upon viewing the start of episode two the girlfriend immediately blurted 'one was cacophony in the station room - this one is a light hum'. You want that cacophony and this one has it.

Get comfortable for you're in for a heady four hour ride.

---

10 out of 18 people found the following review useful:
Marvelous Near to Life Cold Blooded British Cop Film, 5 July 2003

Author: Samuel Cohen from Israel

What is excellant about this TV-Movie is that there are so many loose ends. We Do Not know if the Prime Suspect is guilty or not. This Happens in true life situations. We have Police Harassment and many Realistic Human situations. Enjoyable and Interesting. I watched DVD Version. Even DCI Jane Tennison is not perfect and makes human errors! Sam C.

---

3 out of 5 people found the following review useful:
Leave well enough alone, 30 July 2007

Author: keith-moyes from United Kingdom

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

There is little that needs to be added to the other highly appreciative reviews already posted on this site.

The first Prime Suspect was a landmark in British TV drama. It had all the virtues of a good mystery thriller but was enriched by a densely-researched exposition of police procedure and closely observed characterisation. The cast and their performances are all outstanding. There had been nothing quite like it on British TV before.

I am pleased to see that its merits are widely recognised wherever it has been shown, but I also note that there is a tendency to use it as a stick with which to beat American TV. I would only point out that this gritty approach to the cop genre was actually pioneered in America - particularly with Hill Street Blues. I suspect it was the success of that show that encouraged ATV to go ahead with this gruelling series. Without it, Lynda La Plant may never have been able to get Prime Suspect off the ground.

It has one big advantage over similar American shows (before and since). It is a stand-alone serial. Free from the requirement to fill a 22 week season, it could be written by one person and tell a single coherent story over three and a half hours. Even the best US shows eventually suffer from multiple writers and directors trying to maintain a consistent vision that is ultimately not their own. Even a show as good as The Sopranos succumbed to the flattening effect of this conveyor belt approach to drama.

This is equally true of Prime Suspect. Subsequent series had their merits and were consistently above average for TV drama, but ultimately they were all just sequels. As so often happens, they tried to replicate the success of the original series by simply ringing a few changes on all the elements that were once such a fresh and original mix.

It is we who are to blame. When we see something we like, we greedily demand more and more, so the virtues of the original show soon get overwhelmed and diluted by the increasingly desperate attempts of the film-makers to make something that is seemingly different while being exactly the same.

I doubt if there is more than handful of sequels in the whole history of cinema and TV that are truly better than the shows that gave them their inspiration.

Prime Suspect Two, Three, Four etc. are not amongst them.

---

Jane Tennison is an adorable and admirable character because of it's passionate quest for justice., 30 January 2012

Author: roisfamily from United States

PS 1 is fantastic! The intensity of the whole George Marlow storyline is simply brilliant. You can tell why this one started the whole series. PS 2 while not as good as the first, still delivers. PS 3 is also good and continues the same "homicide feel" of 1 & 2.

PS 4 is a 3 movie episode season. "The Lost Child" would of excelled all preceding story lines had it not being for "Scent of Darkness" which continues the George Marlow storyline and becomes to me the best PS story of the entire series. It outdoes it's self.

PS 5 is purely and simply a disappointment. It goes into an entirely different direction and ambient that makes this series so great. worst of the series.

PS6 WOW!! Simply the best episode of the entire series to me. Not because it is the best plot written, the George Marlow storyline is still superior, but I choose this one as the best because it emphasizes into Jane Tenison's ever-growing sense of justice and how she never allows anything/anyone to obstruct justice from being served. In previous season's Jane overcomes obstacles made by her superiors to solve each case. In this season the obstacle is as "high as it can be".

PS7 should not have being made. The case is very weak and it focuses far too much into the character's weakness and life misfortunes. Which is not what audiences want to see. We know jane has personal problems but it is her gigantic sense of justice that we fell in love with and we come to admire her for. This is the key to Prime Suspects success. I absolutely love this series and rank it amongst the top 5 best British TV series ever made.

By Dedoshucos.

---

---

Page 1 of 2:

[1] [2]

Add another review

---

Related Links

Plot summary	Amazon.com summary	Ratings
Awards	External reviews	Official site
Plot keywords	Main details	Your user reviews
Your vote history