As in, the occasional detective series starring the goddesslike Helen Mirren as Inspector Jane Tennison. Link, for those who haven’t had the pleasure.
There’s an all new episode being broadcast on Sunday. I’m almost terrified it’s going to suck. But at the same time I can’t wait 
Any other fans here?
Thanks for that link ruadh, what a lovely skip down memory lane. I find several aspects of most of these series quite remarkable; the relentless quality of the scripts, the pacing and space which draws out what teevee could do so much better than film if it had the quality of writers and film makers (as Dennis Potter sometimes managed, but few others), the characterisations and acting that brings such depth and realism to those people . . .it just goes on.
And, of course, there’s the gorgeous rudeness herself Ms Ilyena Lydia Mironoff (Mirren), if anyone ever put their heart and sole (and RSC training) into a character it was her in this series. Quite wonderful – I take it she wouldn’t be reprising the role unless it was up to snuff . . .
I won’t be seeing it, but it’s an occasion I did wish I still had an idiot box.
This series was PHENOMENAL. I hope the new ones are as good.
That’s my hope, as her standards in general are quite high.
Sorry you won’t get to see it LC. I’ll let you know how it goes.
AAAAARGH!
Sunday night is film night on Irish telly. Lately all the films have been crap - bad action movies starring Nicholas Cage and that sort of thing. Tonight, what’s on at exactly the same time as Prime Suspect? Some Mother’s Son - powerful Irish drama about the 1981 hunger strikes, starring Helen Mirren.
They did this on purpose 
God ruadh that’s mean of them!
However, the video store has some mothers son, it doesn’t have a new Prime Suspect mini-series.
Oh my god, did I just say that? A new series of Prime Suspect?!
Bloody Sweden! I want, I want!
I don’t have a video player though! I’ve seen Some Mother’s Son before, of course, so I’ll watch Prime Suspect … but it’s not very nice to have to choose.
The subject of the new episode sounds very interesting, BTW: a murder suspect turns out to be a Balkan War criminal who was given a new identity in Britain in exchange for identifying former associates. It’s a two-parter; anyone want to take bets on what film RTÉ will have competing with it next week?
Oh fuckity fuck fuck fuck. It turns out part 2 is on tomorrow night and conflicts with the BBC’s Holy Cross drama.
Any of the DubDopers want to loan me a video player for a couple days?
No spoilers in this post, don’t worry.
Thought this one started a bit slowly, but did manage to reel me in and I now can’t wait for the conclusion tomorrow. Helen is fantastic as always. My one criticism is a lot of the stuff about her relationship with her co-workers is a bit dull and predictable.
Did anybody else watch it? There are a couple things I’d like clarified.
Me. Fucking good as usual I thought, but get your questions in now as I’m going to miss part two :(.
In fact I’ll be the one with the questions after the concluding part.
OK … probably some spoilers here …
I got a bit distracted at one point and missed what the story was with the optician. Do they think he was in cahoots with the other guy? What was the whole point of Jane’s visit to him? Was that the reason for them swooping on the hospital - or did he find out the sister was working there some other way?
Well, Mr Sqwert & I discussed the optician bit, and we arrived at the conclusion that
he may well be the ‘suave, smiling’ Serbian Militia Commander that was responsible for the atrocities in the 1990s, as the reaction that Zyzic (?sp) (alleged to be a Sergeant) had to his appearance as interpreter seemed a little too warm for a new acquaintance. Jane seemed to make the connection when reviewing the interview tapes.
That’s only our WAG.
As to the hospital swoop, we obviously were too busy discussing the optician to take in how that came about. Still, I’m sure we’ll all work that one out at about 11pm tonight. 
These aren’t really spoliers as I haven’t seen part 2 yet, obviously, but if anyone has taped part 1 and doesn’t want to know what happened, then don’t read any more here!
I reckon the optician is The Devil character - the man who raped and tortured the women in their homeland. As such, he would have been the prime suspect’s commanding officer, back in the day. Jane watched the tapes where the suspect met the optician, as the optician was acting as interpreter and she noted that he was a lot more delighted to see him than the second interpreter guy they brought in.
Jane went to see him, under the guise of getting her eyes tested, as per his smarmy suggestion, to get a handle on his character, which she duly did with the whole “separate your knees” mallarkey.
The optician/commanding officer/Devil/murderer found out the sister was working in the hospital through an article in the paper.
So off he went and did the deed.
Were my eyes deceiving me or did we briefly see the big prime suspect guy on a hospital trolley when the police were dashing into the hospital to find the sister?
Betcha the evil optician was to blame. We saw the prime suspect polishing his boots in a very military fashion, which I suspect has something to do with the fact that he was due to meet his former CO. I am presuming the optician then went and tried to bump him off, as he had seen the dead girl on the day she died and now knew that his erstwhile cook had not disposed of them as per his orders. So he was going to punish him for disobeying a direct order.
Of course, if my eyes were deceiving me and it wasn’t him at all, on the trolley then he is in the frame for the second murder. If the optician didn’t manage to kill him, then he has an alibi for he second murder - he was in the hospital on a life support machine.
Of course, this is only my reading of it, we may tune in tonight and find that I am totally mistaken.
ruadh, I would offer you the services of my video recorder, but it is very temperamental at the moment and takes mad vagaries of taping the wrong side, so I won’t offer as I don’t trust it myself. Sorry about that.
Thanks Curly. I really should learn not to try to watch TV and surf the web at the same time.
So what is the theory - the optician saw the girl, somehow realised she was the same young teenager he’d pulled off the bus ten years ago (that’s a bit dubious IMHO but I suppose if she reacted strongly enough to seeing him he could work out why), then got the prime suspect to bump her off? Or are they suggesting the optician bumped her off (but using the prime suspect’s wire)?
The optician is a bad 'un. The whole eye test thing was a bit like Marathon Man. He’s going to turn into a key player I’m sure.
The security guard is reprising an almost identical role he had in the Bill, did anyone else seee that?
Still very good so far. Let’s see where it goes.
Helen Mirren has a house not a million miles from Owl Towers and I occasionally see her out and about in bars and restaurants, and once on the tube. She is still a very attractive woman in real life too.
Well I’ve been beaten to the punch while in preview (what a waste of typing ;)).
I can’t say I noticed Lukic (the optician) on the trolley, but I do reckon Zigic pulled the trigger on Lukic’s orders rather than Lukic doing the deed himself.
The newpaper story was full of Jasmina’s so-called links to the Serbian/Bosnian mafia, so even if Lukic didn’t recognise her he could have wanted her killed just in case, but the implication is that he did recognise her.
I reckon that the optician killed them both, using the wire from the prime suspect’s box for the first murder.
Did he recognise the younger sister from ten years previously?
Yeah, that’s a bit thin, now as you say it, but maybe.
The phone message the younger sister left with the little girl in the house said that she saw The Devil. Maybe she had made an appointment to get her eyes tested and of all the opticians in the big bad city she had to walk into his? Maybe not though, it looked like a swanky place and she couldn’t even afford the bus fare home after her night shift. Although, as one of the invisible, she whouldn’t have been able to get her specs on the NHS, would she, so she would have had to go to a private optician.
Hmmmm. Arguing with myself is vaguely disconcerting!
Although, the graphic at the start of the programme and in the ad breaks is an eye and the name of the episode is “The last witness”, so eyes are crucial, I think.
See, I would find that difficult to believe. Remember the way the men greeted each other in the police station? They looked like two people who hadn’t seen each other for yonks. But I can’t imagine how the optician would have got that wire if the prime suspect hadn’t given it to him.
BTW I also thought the guy playing the black cleaner, the last one to see the younger sister alive, was outstanding. You can really see how he’s tormenting himself thinking “if only I’d walked her home …”
Lukic could have planted the wire on Zigic, though, couldn’t he?
We don’t know whose swanky new flat it was that the floors were ripped up to find all the forensic evidence, do we?
Could be that it’s Lukic’s. Maybe, maybe not.
Could be that it has nothing to do with Lukic and I’m just ravelling.
I don’t know that Lukic and Zigic greeted each other as though they hadn’t seen each other for ages, because, surely if they hadn’t seen each other since the war, Zigic would have been a bit more circumspect?
Stone me, here’s that scary old sadist whose orders I disobeyed when I didn’t shoot that poor little girl and her sister.
As it was, I though he seemed pleased to see him, so maybe they were in some sort of ex-pats club in the new country and Zigic didn’t know Lukic was aware of his previous insubordination??
Once Lukic had seen the women, the first in the flesh and the second in the paper, he knew Zigic had disobeyed his orders. So by killing the two women, he knew they couldn’t get him arrested for war crimes and by pinning it on Zigic, he got himself out of the frame while simultaneously punishing his old cook/sargeant.
Whaddyasay?
No mention of the fact that Kazim is an illegal importer of cigarettes and the first victim was tortured then and now with cigarettes?
I reckon it’s a red herring, but that they will pull him in for questioning once Zigic is off the hook and Jane will get a flashback where she recalls that Jasmina was terrrified of him.
Never trust a Gooner, especially former palyers. That’s all I can say . . .