We all have the networks--whether broadcast or cable, legacy or newbie--that we gravitate to, but I was wondering this morning about so-called indispensable networks.
Given that I write about television, nearly all networks could be said to be indispensable in one way or another, but what I was pondering was that one specific television channel that you can't turn away from, that you automatically switch to when you turn on the television, or which you have on as background while you're doing other things in our multi-tasking obsessed society.
Many years ago, that channel was--perhaps not surprisingly for those of you who know me--Food Network, but it was replaced by BBC America around 2000 and for many years that was my go-to network, the one spot on the metaphorical dial that I could always depend on for diverting fare, soothing background noise, or a sense of the familiar and comforting.
For whatever the reason, sadly, that's not the case anymore and--shock, horror--I've actually gone so far as to remove BBC America from my list of TiVo favorite channels as it's become a 24-hour network showcasing little other than Star Trek: The Next Generation, Top Gear, and repeats of three ubiquitous Gordon Ramsay reality series. (Three standouts this year: crime drama Luther, reality series The Choir, and culinary competition series Come Dine with Me all had short runs, unfortunately, and Doctor Who can't run all year long.)
But that's a rant for another post (and, believe me, it's coming).
What I am curious about is whether you have a specific network that fulfills those needs and just what network that might be. Are you addicted to USA? Hooked on HBO? Famished for Food Network? Drawn to Cartoon Network? Ingratiated towards IFC? Perpetually amazed by AMC?
Head to the comments section to discuss and debate.
Idris Elba's haunted detective, DCI John Luther, is at the center of BBC America's newest drama offering, the intense psychological drama Luther, created by Neil Cross (Spooks). Fiery-tempered and prone to violence, Luther is often a thug with a policeman's badge, an amoral copper with a need for justice and a taste of darkness.
The six-episode first season of Luther begins this Sunday on BBC America after a successful run on BBC One earlier this year. A bruised Valentine of a police procedural, the series charts the moral disintegration of John Luther following an incident in which he seemingly let a child killer fall to his death rather than saving him. Was it justice? And is there a difference between man's justice and the law's?
Elba plays Luther with a burning anger, a righteous indignation at the presence of evil in the world. But like any man who has stared into the abyss, it has stared right back into him, corrupting him with its darkness. Returning to work after a breakdown, all eyes are on the unpredictable Luther, even as he attempts to get his life back on track in light of that moral breach. (You can read my interview with Elba at The Daily Beast.)
But life has moved on without John Luther.
His marriage to wife Zoe (Rome's great Indira Varma) in in shambles. Zoe has taken up with a new lover, human rights lawyer Mark North (Collision's Paul McGann), but Luther can't wrap his head around the fact that their relationship is over. It, however, only makes too much sense that Zoe has chosen to start over with someone who happens to be Luther's polar opposite: a sensitive soul whose profession is at odds with Luther's unorthodox methods. She's chosen saintly over id-driven, really.
As he attempts to reclaim his life following his suspension from the Metropolitan Police, Luther is assigned a new partner--Detective Sergeant Justin Ripley (Occupation's Warren Brown)--and a new case: the brutal murder of a couple and their dog, a crimson-stained bloodbath that turns up few leads and only one suspect: the couple's icy and brilliant physicist daughter, Alice Morgan (Jane Eyre's Ruth Wilson).
Did Alice viciously murder her parents? And for what end? What secrets do her crystal blue eyes conceal? And just why is she taking an interest in Luther's own life? Is she friend or foe? It's these answers that the first season of Luther seeks to answer, positioning Luther and Alice as a cross between combatants and potential lovers, two brilliant minds whose instantaneous connection will either save or damn them both.
What follows is a taut psychological thriller, an intense game of cat and mouse that pits the wits of Luther and Alice against each other, even as it offers an exploration of moral relativism. Alice's belief that nothing matters is at cross-purposes with Luther's need for justice; her cool detachment the opposite of Luther's fiery anger. Sparks, as they say, instantly fly between the two.
On the surface, Luther is a police procedural: ghastly crimes--everything from Satanic kidnappings, sniper attacks, and serial killings--occur and Luther and Ripley investigate and attempt to apprehend the perpetrator, who is each week identified at the start of the episode, making it less of a whodunit and more of a "whydoneit" akin to Columbo or a Ruth Rendell novel.
It's also an incisive workplace drama, depicting the inner workings of the Metropolitan Police's Serious Crime Unit and the temptation that detectives face to cut corners, to exact their own vengeance, to test their own moral ambiguity in pursuit of some serious villains. Saskia Reeves (Spooks) plays Luther's well-intentioned boss, Detective Superintendent Rose Teller, who attempts to balance the needs of the force against her support of Luther and his unusual policing style. Steven Mackintosh (Criminal Justice) is Luther's trusted ally, DCI Ian Reed, a man who has Luther's back but may have inherited his friend's own sometimes dubious outlook on life.
And it's also a gripping, white-knuckle psychological thriller, as Luther faces off with Wilson's Alice Morgan, a woman so gifted that she excels at everything she encounters, including murder. Once Luther has entered her dangerous web, he's ensnared by her madness and her genius, their every encounter escalating as Alice makes Luther her latest project. But does she want to kiss him or kill him?
Elba crackles with energy as John Luther, easily the best role he's played since The Wire's Stringer Bell. It's fantastic to see Elba in such a physical and emotionally draining role: his passion, his fury, and his thirst for justice resonate in every scene. Wilson is breathtaking as Alice, incandescent and smoldering even as she buries her emotion under a veneer of ice. But there's a coquettish danger to her every movement, every bite of her lower lip, toss of her hair reveals a cold-blooded serpentine nature to Alice. (It's almost impossible to tear yourself away from Wilson's performance, so perfectly cast as she is here.)
I will say that some of Luther's action--particularly in the later part of the season--does require a very willing suspension of disbelief and the procedural mysteries often have a hole or two in the plotting that niggle afterwards, but that's a rare flaw in an otherwise taut and accomplished series, casting an intoxicating spell that sticks with you long after the final scene.
It's not one to be missed.
Luther begins Sunday night at 10 pm ET/PT on BBC America.
Idris Elba is everywhere, from The Big C to next summer’s Thor to playing Alex Cross in the rebooted James Patterson franchise. His BBC America mystery, Luther, begins Sunday.
Over at The Daily Beast, I talk to the former star of HBO's The Wire about his career and about his new BBC show Luther in my latest feature, "The Next Denzel," in which we discuss everything from Luther to The Big C and The Office and his role in James Patterson's Alex Cross franchise, a role he takes over from Morgan Freeman.
Personally, I had a blast chatting with Idris, who has an immense amount of charm and charisma... as well as a way with colorful turns of phrases.
Luther begins Sunday night at 10 pm ET/PT on BBC America.
My fall TV preview--or at least part of it, anyway--is finally up.
Head over to The Daily Beast, where you can read my latest feature, "Nine Shows to Watch, Six Shows to Shun," where I offer up nine new series to watch this fall and six shows to avoid like the plague.
Just which ended up on which list? Hint, The Event ended up on my worst-of list, while things like Boardwalk Empire, Terriers, Nikita, Sherlock, Luther, Undercovers and others ended up on my watch list. (While The Walking Dead is on there, I still--like every other critic--have not seen a full episode, so there's that to consider.)
But while this is my list, I'm also extremely curious to find out what you're looking forward to this autumn. What are you most excited about watching this fall? Head to the comments section to discuss, debate, and tear into my list.
Yes, I'm back from my holiday-slash-birthday-weekend-extravaganza and catching up on what I missed while I was gone, including news about three of my favorite series, all of which happen to hail from the other side of the pond, and a fourth that is likely to become a new favorite when it launches next year. (Hint: it involves the creators of Life on Mars/Ashes to Ashes and novelist Kate Atkinson.)
Doctor Who showrunner Steven Moffat has indicated that Season Six of the time-travel drama series will be split into two separate segments, with seven episodes to air in the first half of 2011 and six episodes to air in fall 2011.
"Looking at the next series I thought what this show needs is a big event in the middle," said Moffat. "I kept referring to a mid-season finale. So we are going to make it two series – seven episodes at Easter building to an earth-shattering climax, a cliffhanger we could never normally do because it would be too long before it came back. An enormous game-changing cliffhanger that will change everything. The wrong expression would be to say we are splitting it in two. We are making it two separate series."
"What I love about this idea is that when kids see Doctor Who go off the air, they will be noticeably taller when it comes back," he continued. "It's an age for children. With an Easter series, an autumn series and a Christmas special, you are never going to be more than few months from the new series of Doctor Who. Tart that I am, we will now have two first nights and two finales, twice as many event episodes as we had before."
Let the guessing games begin about just what the cliffhanger might be...
(It's not a surprise as the first season of Sherlock--which consisted of three feature-length mysteries--lured approximately 9 million viewers in the U.K. It launches Stateside next month on PBS' Masterpiece Mystery.)
BBC One has ordered another three feature-length cases for Holmes (Benedict Cumberbatch) and Watson (Martin Freeman), set to launch in fall 2011. The creators have promised "baffling new puzzles, old friends and new enemies" when the series returns. (Holmesians will be happy to note that I put in a request for Irene Adler when I met with Moffat and Gatiss a few weeks back.)
Luther.BBC One has ordered two hour-long specials for psychological crime drama Luther, which wrapped up its sixth episode run earlier this year in the UK and which will launch this fall on BBC America. A co-production between BBC One and BBC America, Luther stars Idris Elba; the two specials will air in 2011.
Case Histories. Elsewhere, Monastic Production's Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah--the creators of Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes--have announced their new project: an adaptation of Kate Atkinson's Jackson Brodie novels, beginning with "Case Histories." I'm a huge fan of Atkinson's novels and Graham and Pharoah, so I can't wait to see how they tackle her books and adapt them for television.
The duo will adapt all three novels--"Case Histories," "One Good Turn," "When Will There Be Good News," for the first season of Case Histories, with Pharoah set to adapt the first, Graham to adapt the second, and an as-yet-unnamed writer to tackle the third. Project, which will be produced by Ruby Television with Monastic, is set to air in 2011, with production slated to begin in Edinburgh this autumn.
But the best bit is who the guys have got to play Jackson Brodie: none other than Jason Isaacs (Brotherhood) himself. Isaacs was attached to play the lead in FOX drama pilot Pleading Guilty (an adaptation of Scott Turow's novel), which was overseen by Bones creator Hart Hanson, but the project was not ordered to series.
FOX's loss is Case Histories' gain. Congrats to Ash and Matt for the commission and for landing Isaacs. Can't wait to see him as Jackson!
What do you make of the news? What's behind the splitting up of the next season of Doctor Who? Anxious for more Sherlock? Ready to have Luther put you on the edge of your seat again? Head to the comments section to discuss.
We all have the networks--whether broadcast or cable, legacy or newbie--that we gravitate to, but I was wondering this morning about so-called indispensable networks.
