More Complicated Reaction to Life on Mars

[lesbiassparrow]

Having seen  Episode 7, which really freaked me out...  This is more serious than my last 'review' and contains some rather bitter comments on a real police force in the UK, so not really filled with squee.  Though this is one amazing series.

The results at any cost... Well, it's really chilling and made me hate Gene, and pretty much the entire police squad.  Though I did understand them, though I didn't agree not one little bit.

Because. Well it reminds me of the real West Midlands Serious Crime Squad.  You might not know who these people were, but they're the division responsible for getting the confessions and convictions on the Guildford Six and many others.  Of course, they were aided in their framing of groups of Irish people by the 'get results at any cost' mentality of the period, which was freaked out by the IRA bombings and didn't care who they arrested. They were disbanded in the early 90s (or late 80s?) because so many of their convictions were overturned by the courts and also for massive corruption and perversion of justice. Seriously those people made the Rampart Division in Los Angeles look like choirboys. (And it wasn't just the Irish, there were many others whom they picked up and got convicted who were later freed; they had a marvellous success rate.)

So I was with Sam all the way. Because all those convictions were pointless and guilty people went free and the innocent went to jail for years and years and what for? 

And it broke my heart because Sam knows all this and while he's doing it for himself, he's also aware of what will happen as a result of this sort of behaviour. Then there's Gene, at the end, wanting to be clean but manipulating Sam and justifying things that you know he knows are wrong.  (Or at least you hope he knows they are wrong).  And so bloody aware of his own limitations.

But, guh, this is an amazing series. Though it does open a lot of old issues that I think the UK police probably hopes it has buried for good.
 
I'd really be interested to see English reviews of this episode in particular.

Comments

[ysrith.livejournal.com]

It is one of the reasons I do love this show. They don't try and be politically correct. The behaviour is a reflection of the times, and yes it makes us uncomfortable to watch, as it was unacceptable, and I would have been very disappointed if they had not behaved in that way.


I read somewhere that they are planning to address the IRA bombing campaign in the second series, and the attitudes towards the Irish in Manchester. It will be very interesting to see how they play that out.

As far as I remember the reviews on this were very positive. Same comments as I mentioned. There was a review section for each episode over on the BBC website, and they often get ex-policemen posting. It is really interesting reading

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the information about the review section on the BBC website! And the news about the possible storyline. Interesting...