"Sharpe's Justice" follows on from "Sharpe's Revenge". In both cases, Sharpe finds his reputation being trashed. First, it's Ducos creating a very contrived plot to implicate him in theft and murder - (and one that I found unconvincing and easily refuted). But our hero is absolved by a deux ex machina in the form of one letter.
Then in "Justice", it takes another letter, from a man of dubious repute, to absolve Sharpe again when his actions would be questionable in the eyes of "Horseguards" and his detractors - the more so after he has been named in newspapers as responsible for the violence against civilian protestors - and after he's killed at least one yeoman. A full-scale enquiry would have been obligatory to look at the facts. Still, for dramatic reasons at the end he gallops off back to France.
And in both episodes, a character who later influences the plot just happens to be in a tavern to help it along: the French NCO when Frederickson is enquiring about Ducos's optician and Hagman when Sharpe is made unwelcome in a Yorkshire pub.
It's strange that he and Harper seldom wear their shakos - and travel from London to Yorkshire with absolutely no sign of them or of personal possessions. And how convenient that Lady Anne Camoynes was in the locality, and so on hand to assist Sharpe.
These quibbles apart, I found "Justice" a reasonable episode in the overall series, giving an insight into Sharpe's youth - albeit as perceived not by Bernard Cornwell but scriptwriters.
Interesting to see Philip Glenister and Douglas Henshall in supporting roles before they starred in popular detective series.
Then in "Justice", it takes another letter, from a man of dubious repute, to absolve Sharpe again when his actions would be questionable in the eyes of "Horseguards" and his detractors - the more so after he has been named in newspapers as responsible for the violence against civilian protestors - and after he's killed at least one yeoman. A full-scale enquiry would have been obligatory to look at the facts. Still, for dramatic reasons at the end he gallops off back to France.
And in both episodes, a character who later influences the plot just happens to be in a tavern to help it along: the French NCO when Frederickson is enquiring about Ducos's optician and Hagman when Sharpe is made unwelcome in a Yorkshire pub.
It's strange that he and Harper seldom wear their shakos - and travel from London to Yorkshire with absolutely no sign of them or of personal possessions. And how convenient that Lady Anne Camoynes was in the locality, and so on hand to assist Sharpe.
These quibbles apart, I found "Justice" a reasonable episode in the overall series, giving an insight into Sharpe's youth - albeit as perceived not by Bernard Cornwell but scriptwriters.
Interesting to see Philip Glenister and Douglas Henshall in supporting roles before they starred in popular detective series.