Between the Lines

Investigating corruption is a police matter. But what happens when the corruption comes from inside?

When those entrusted with keeping law and order are those who break the vital code of conduct?

Between the Lines is a powerful and controversial drama which tackled the touchy subject of the police investigating themselves.

Created by John Wilsher and produced by Tony Garnett, the man behind the controversial 1970s series Law and Order, the drama is a tough and uncompromising analysis of that dilemma.

Neil Pearson, perhaps best known for his role as womanising reporter Dave in Drop The Dead Donkey, took the lead role as Det Supt Tony Clark, ambitious head of Mulberry Street police station, who is asked to launch an investigation into his own men.

Recruited by the Complaints Investigations Bureau, he soon finds himself in the uncomfortable and loathesome situation of infiltrating his own station.

The first two series were superb, with great support from Tom Georgeson, Siobhan Redmond and the late Tony Doyle of Ballykissangel fame.

However, by the time a third run was commissioned, Garnett went against his better judgement and obliged with a lacklustre end to the saga.

It was a mistake he wouldn't repeat a few years later for his outstanding series This Life.

To my mind, this show, now 15 years old (well, nearly) is an excellent portrayal of the progress, or not, of its main character.

Well placed, and pushing all the right buttons, he was promoted but with a qualifier:- do this s$$t job and... so he was transferred into a job he didn't request, nor did he care for in any way, shape or form.

But, he was told, if do this you will get what you really want:- all in the fullness of time. This, over the course of the first season, proved to be BS. Luckily, or unluckily, he was blessed with a good team. He was interested in doing a good job and thought, wrongly, that it was a means to an end. Wrong, indeed. If he had not had a strong team, or if he had not been motivated to do a good job, for the job's sake, he would not have found himself in the situations revealed in Seasons Two and Three.

Without wishing to prolong the agony here, the three seasons are an excellent demonstration of a downward spiral of a police officer's career attributable largely to external forces, coupled with his own inability to cope with these forces.

Been there done that, bought the Tee shirt.

And where do I buy the DVDs ??

"Between the Lines" was a show which reflected British television's attitude to the police in the Thatcher years...namely, that the police are brutal, corrupt and fascist. If the show was merely about corrupt officers, then it could have made for gripping drama, but it had a heavy political agenda so corruption was always from up on high and institutionalised. One or two episodes of this might have been gripping, but it was constant and often Neil Pearson's character would often act as an apologist for the criminals. One of the more ludicrous episodes featured Pete Postlethwaite as a senior Metropolitan Police commander putting down a riot (by good lefties or course) which he agitated and he ends up quoting the speech made in the Falklands War: "The flag is flying over Port Stanley"...oh, is this a dig at Thatcher? But apart from the student level politics, the show gained notoriety and earned the nickname "Between the Loins" for its preponderance for sex scenes bang on the stroke of the 9 o'clock watershed. Any chance for Pearson to drop his trousers (but always in a sensitive way) and he'd grab it. Sometimes it seemed he'd abandon a case to get some more sex...can't say I blame him.

Between the Lines is gripping police drama about the CBI investigating abuse of police powers and corruption within the force. The first remarkable thing is that BTL has a fairly unlikeable protagonist: womanizing career police man Tony Clarke who is really blackmailed into joining the CBI. He acts so irresponsibly in his personal life throughout the series that it is really difficult to sympathize with him (and he wears the worst fitting suits I have ever seen). On the other hand he is very emotional about his job and also really professional about it (unless his private life or hormones get in the way) in spite of the fact that he really hates his job. His team consists of bisexual Maureen Connell and veteran copper Harry Naylor whose wife develops a terminal illness in the second series. These three really complex characters really carry the show. The standard of writing is also fairly high. The stories are complex and satisfying which is not easy to achieve in a 45 minutes format. However, in the second season they become formulaic in terms of the CBI's impotence to deal with corruption in the force. You can't help wondering why they bother at all. Apart from the strong performances of the cast (with the possible exception of the rather one dimensional DCS Graves) the series also has some episodes that are visually very well made particularly the inteview situation. For 1992 the first season is also groundbreakling in its depiction of nudity as you see some full frontal shots of Clark's beautiful girlfriend and you see Jaye Griffith's bottom.

This brilliant 90s police drama series makes the more recent Line of Duty series look very basic indeed. I remember Between the lines being compulsive viewing and subsequently found line of duty to be a pale facsimile in comparison.