The House Across the Street

Divorced single mum Claudia is desperate to get close to a couple who live across the road from her, a couple who's daughter has vanished.

The latest drama from Channel five, and it's a pretty good production. I'll applaud it for being four parts long, I am struggling with some of the series that are right parts or longer.

It's not the cleanest storyline you'll ever see, it is mixed up, it's a little jumbled, but it's well paced, it's intriguing, it's certainly well acted.

I was reminded a little bit of Deadwater Fell, it's better than some of the recent dramas that have been on, I'd put a lot of it down to Shirley Henderson, her acting was tremendous, I am a huge fan of hers. Claudia is definitely a strange character.

You are made to wait until the very end to learn what happened, and the fourth episode is arguably the most rewarding.

It's a mixed bag, but overall it's enjoyable, 6/10.

I agree as others here regarding the main actress Shirley Henderson's whispering low pitch voice. It's too much to endure for an entire episode and spoilt the series for me. She's OK in small doses, for instance she was good in Happy Valley series 2 as a supporting actor, but I don't think she's strong enough as an actress (as well as that annoying whispering voice) to carry a series as the main character. I didn't understand her motives in this and in particular the scene at the travel agency when she said something so intensely cruel to the grieving mother...why??....was she being deliberately malicious or just incredibly stupid? Her character was unlikeable, creepy, weird and bordered on psychotic - she would have made a good villain. As for her obsession with the the dad - rescuing him from ditch and then slugging a drink from his bottle - did she have a crush on him or what? She had issues with personal space, shoving her face in others and pawing over them, I cheered when her son remarked on her bad breath. I think this could have been a good series with a different, stronger and less annoying lead...such a waste, I love British series. I quite liked the music but all in all wasted on a limp lead. Bad casting.

I watched this series hoping it would be great and was very disappointed as I felt really uncomfortable watching the lead actor in her role. Most of the time Shirley Henderson was in my view, just a weird and really creepy unbelievable character with her bizarre mannerisms and behaviour. The series was all too much for me and deeply disturbing. It also pained me to listen to her child like voice and watch her do random things like stroke a piece of victims hair over her face and smell her own clothes because of someone she sat next to...huh? Why? Nothing was explained as to why she did this? Really odd.... She was a school nurse and even that didn't make sense as she just seemed disoriented all the time.

The actor portrays a fragile, meek person who sets out to solve a child murder. Fundamentally there was an error in this as she asks questions you wouldn't in normal life get answers to unless you were an official like the Police e.g. Going to a school and asking sensitive and personal questions about a former teacher, when anyone knows data protection would restrict this.... Doh!

This series could have been so much better - it was just uneasy and unenjoyable watching for me....4 hours of my life I won't get back.... I would not recommend this series to anyone.

I wanted to like this series, but it just wasn't very good. The main character was very, very annoying....... Everything from her voice, her mannerisms and her strange, obsessive behavior was creepy.....But not in a way that added to the suspense of the series....more of a distraction to the series. The ending was quite predictable, and not very believable. Also, Many parts just didn't make sense...There was no conclusion to other story lines within the series...For example, the little girl that was being abused at home...or the main character's son being involved with bike thefts and why he had such a bad relationship with his mother.

Claudia (played by Shirley Henderson) is a very strange fish. Why does she behave the way she does? Is it that breast cancer -- from which she appears to have recovered -- robbed her of control and so she feels a need to take control when a small child goes missing? And what is it with her apparently heightened sexual frustration? Where does that come from?

Being unable to take Claudia seriously, it's very hard to take this mini series seriously.

Is it entertaining? Well, I watched all four episodes, so it clearly managed to hook me. But the conclusion is rather underwhelming, so I really wouldn't recommend watching this.