It's difficult for a TV detective series to find an acceptable place for itself and its central character in an over-crowded market - and to portray police procedures in way that is not too unrealistic.
"Grace" succeeds reasonably well, though the John Simm character is a bit flat, as are most of his team, but then we don't want a collection of larger-than-life police officers. Craig Parkinson as DS Norman Potting does provide the occasional spark, as when , unabashed, he interviewed his superior, ACC Cassian Pewe, in the previous episode
Others have remarked about the prompt arrival of DSI Grace and most of his team to investigate a traffic accident - and before Ecstasy tablets were discovered on the victim. Still, I suppose that the plot had to progress quickly, as indeed it did, with a bewildering succession of names being introduced, followed by the characters themselves. I had to work hard to keep up, and I remained confused about why some were killed.
The bereaved mother's relatively civil reception of the driver who'd killed her son was surprising in the light of future developments.
An enthusiastic reviewer of the book on which this episode is based has remarked "I have to admit that I did slightly have to suspend my disbelief at the coincidences needed for the plot to work", and thus it was with this adaptation. But then this a very frequent feature of detective fiction.
I confess to not being too bothered with the private lives of Grace and his sergeant, though the re-appearance of the former's wife, long presumed to be dead, is intriguing.
"Grace" succeeds reasonably well, though the John Simm character is a bit flat, as are most of his team, but then we don't want a collection of larger-than-life police officers. Craig Parkinson as DS Norman Potting does provide the occasional spark, as when , unabashed, he interviewed his superior, ACC Cassian Pewe, in the previous episode
Others have remarked about the prompt arrival of DSI Grace and most of his team to investigate a traffic accident - and before Ecstasy tablets were discovered on the victim. Still, I suppose that the plot had to progress quickly, as indeed it did, with a bewildering succession of names being introduced, followed by the characters themselves. I had to work hard to keep up, and I remained confused about why some were killed.
The bereaved mother's relatively civil reception of the driver who'd killed her son was surprising in the light of future developments.
An enthusiastic reviewer of the book on which this episode is based has remarked "I have to admit that I did slightly have to suspend my disbelief at the coincidences needed for the plot to work", and thus it was with this adaptation. But then this a very frequent feature of detective fiction.
I confess to not being too bothered with the private lives of Grace and his sergeant, though the re-appearance of the former's wife, long presumed to be dead, is intriguing.