After breaking up with her long-term boyfriend, schoolteacher Laura accepts the offer of a date from Andrew, the father of one of her students.
Laura enlists Tom's help to bring Andrew to justice. However, when a deception in Laura's personal life comes to light, she is left with no one to turn to, and she resorts to dangerous methods to ...
Laura's worst fears come to pass and her hidden past is exposed. But she must fight to put her personal struggles aside for the sake of one of her pupils, whose physical distress throws her ...
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Title: Liar (2017– )
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Laura is a smart and dedicated teacher, not long out of a relationship and unsure about getting back on the dating scene. Andrew is a renowned surgeon whose son is a pupil at Laura's school. An initial attraction leads to a date, but neither fully realizes the far-reaching consequences that their meeting will have on each other or their families. Truth and consequences go hand in hand in the tense and gripping thriller that examines both sides of a relationship and both sides of the truth. Are there really two sides to every story?
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No matter the execution, anything that explores the subject of rape and its consequences is to be applauded. Rape is a very harrowing and sensitive subject and a difficult one to explore, considering how it affects the victims afterwards, and other people's misconceptions and ignorance (how many times have people resorted to victim blaming and saying they asked for it?). Talking about it and the consequences in real life and on film and television is incredibly brave and important to address.
'Liar' had such a good premise and had potential to be a strong, thought-provoking, harrowing and poignant character study and exploration of this horrible crime, the questions of who's innocent and who's guilty and how it affects the victims afterwards. While it is nowhere near as bad as some of the reviews have said, and some of the criticisms have been blown out of proportion, 'Liar' was a let down and didn't do enough with such a good and potentially relatable premise. There are good things here. 'Liar' actually does start off very well, excellently in fact.
The first two episodes were riveting and were exactly what the advertising promised. They held our attention and really made us question who was guilty and who was innocent without ever making it obvious either way. One really feels the female lead character Laura's pain and anguish. Credit is due too in that the subject is never trivialised although not fully explored from Episode 3 onward, Laura's desperation, emotional journey and her scrutinised, harsh treatment are more than capably acknowledged and convincing.
Visually, 'Liar' looks great with atmospheric locations, cohesive editing and photography that's slick and matches the characters' thought processes very well. The music is haunting but understated. The acting is very good, with the series being carried by a heart-wrenching, emotionally complex and clearly troubled Joanne Froggatt and an intense and charming (one effectively questions whether this charm is genuine or deceptive) Ioan Gruffudd, haven't seen him this good in a long time and his confusion is also believable. Of the supporting cast, all good considering what they had to work with, the most interesting and sympathetic is the female detective Vanessa played dynamically by Shelley Conn.
It is such a pity that such great potential goes off the boil, with the series taking a complete 180 and never really recovering. This is including the ending, which some have said was shocking, to me it wasn't that surprising and it felt rushed too. The tautness of the first two episodes script-wise is replaced by clunky dialogue and that it becomes biased and one sided (not sure about the sexism and feminist complaints but can kind of understand that about negative male stereotyping). What started off as an intriguing and promising character study became from Episode 3 onward overwrought melodrama and odd decision making.
Apart from Vanessa, the supporting characters are completely stock and as flimsily developed as you can possibly get, so the character study promise is thrown out of the window after the first two episodes. Let's not get started on the portrayal of a strong contender for the most incompetent police force in film and television in a long time. The initially riveting story-telling of the first two episodes becomes contrived, dull, muddled and one-sided for the other two thirds.
Rape, the conflict of guilt vs. innocence in the series, whether it was rape or not and the consequences are not harrowing or poignant enough in how they're written, very much lacking in tension and suspense. Further hampered by the inclusion of nowhere near as interesting or relevant (too many are really soap-operatic and contrived) subplots that take over too much and distract from the main story, which is not focused on enough. There are many twists here, almost too many, but some are far better done than others and too many of them are predictable and clunky, almost too thrown in.
Overall, great potential and started off so well but declines rapidly too early. 4/10 Bethany Cox