In recent years, British TV has produced three outstanding modern-day thriller series, "Line Of Duty, "Happy Valley" and this. Although all very different in their own ways, they share common values of identifiable characters, credible situations, fine ensemble acting and subtle, suspenseful direction.
This third series of "Broadchurch" this time gave us a different central crime of the rape of a middle-aged woman at the 50th birthday of her best girl friend. This one incident rightly dominates the narrative and I for one appreciated the seriousness with which the crime and its effect on the victim was treated and that no subsequent crime, like a murder for instance, was introduced to take the focus away from it, although a previous rape victim did come forward to add further emphasis.
Over eight episodes, to the spectacular backdrop of the cliff by the beach of the fictional seaside town of Broadchurch, Detective Alec Hardy (David Tennant) and his trusty right-hand woman Miller (Olivia Colman), painstakingly compile a list of four possible main suspects and as they go about their work, the subplots of these and other supporting characters are played out.
There are left over themes from the previous two series, concentrating on the Latimer family central to those, as well as, more on the periphery this time, the parish vicar, principled newspaper editor and the children of the two detectives but these I think it's fair to say are secondary to the investigation itself, the sometimes prickly relationship of the two detectives and into the motivations and inner-lives of the victim and suspects. While the last-episode conclusion with its revelation of the perpetrator of the crime came so far out of left field as to defy belief, it didn't detract too much from what had gone before.
There were some surprising casting choices with the familiar from other fields Charlie Higson and Lenny Henry in prominent roles as suspects but both acquitted themselves well in their parts, but it's a major strength of this series that it's excellently cast and acted throughout, although it's probably fair to say that Tennant and Colman edge the plaudits here.
As I understand it, this is the last series of what has proved to be one of those shows everyone watches and talks about and I think that's a good thing. There was a sense of closure with pretty much all the characters and further crimes in the town would start to have echoes of "Midsomer Murders" with its much-derided another week, another murder justification.
Best to let the Broachurch characters move on with their everyday, if sometimes difficult lives, much like the rest of us I guess.
