nick-36299

I was blown away by the first series Paris Police 1900. Extremely gritty, occasionally hard to watch and unsettling. Fabulous characters, beautifully acted in a tortuous plot were a delight.

I can say I was excited to watch this sequel. Firstly, i felt the premise of this season was, although worthy, far less dramatic than the antisemitism of the first season. It's strongest and most potent characters, were somehow weakened.

The performances, the production values and atmosphere were still first class, but the tension was gone. Oh well. Lets see if they make another. I hope so.

I am not sure i have ever left 10 stars for anything, nor have I called anything a masterpiece. This is one of the most outstanding pieces of television drama I have every seen. The writing, acting and direction are flawless. The incredibly ambitious single shot scenes are so seamlessly executed that unless you notice it, you wouldn't even know. Above all, what makes this extraordinary, is that it never tries to tell you what to think or feel. You are like a voyeur, witnessing the agony of an agonising situation and as a parent, the horror of what you don't know and cant know. How do we protect our children and how can we know what is truly happening in their lives? There are no answers here, just the real world pain and anguish. Don't imagine that this is not incredibly painful to watch and it is hard not to be painfully affected by it, but please, be brave and watch it.

This is the perfect of adapting something outstanding and trying to "upscale" it and missing the point. This version is working SO hard to make the human point of duty v personal life, which quite frankly, is becoming a bit of a cliché these days, that it is becoming heavy and lumpen. The Bureau was brilliantly gripping but not preachy. It was tense and nuanced but never lumpy. This cannot match it. The cast is fab. It is great to see Richard Gere really inhabiting his white haired gravitas. Jeffrey Wright it a good actor but so one note in this that is becoming tedious (ok, I've only watched two episodes). The problem is that Michael Fassbender is so dry and stiff while Matthieu Kassovitz was intriguing and rich. I am really struggling to sit through a whole episode at a time. Meh. I was so looking forward to this.