Rebus

Watched all episodes about a year ago, after enjoying one of the books, and I have to say I liked it. Having now read most of the books, it's disappointing watching the series again. Some episodes have nothing to do with the book, like Knots and Crosses, many others are loose adaptations which lose a lot of the plot intricacies and 'bite' of the books. Even allowing for the fact that they have to squeeze the stories into an hour long episodes, there could be more suspense. Stott is the best thing in it, good characterisation of Rebus, little else.

The first season has great film noir qualities. From the nearly black and white filming to the "mood of pessimism, fatalism, and menace", it is a current take on a neglected genre. My favorite added little feature is the audio narration voiced by the lead actor of season one: John Hannah. It was a very pleasant change to hear the insights, thought and reflections of the character that are not actually spoken aloud. It gave useful insight into the overall direction of the characters and the episodes.

I might agree that the lead actor John Hannah might not have been the best actor that could have been cast. However, given that I did not read the books, the only distraction he had for me was that he looked too young for the part.

After season one all the magic is gone. There is a change of lead actor. The film noir is gone. There is no narrator. It becomes just another lengthy British style detective story with no broken heart nor tortured soul. What a shame!

I loved this series. It started well and end even better unlike many others that seem to drag to a close. The actors, both John Hannah and Ken Stott did a great job. I never read the books, so have no problem with John Hannah being younger than in the books. In fact I found the John Hannah season to be a bit more appealing due to the serious nature of the episodes. The supporting cast also did their job.

Stories were well written and intriguing enough to keep you wanting more. I felt like it ended too soon. I read somewhere they were planning to restart, but haven't seen anything yet. Hope they do it.

The date indicated for this series on Prime v Video is 2015. The correct date for this series is 2000 to 2004.

It's very interesting what can be done in about one hour. I just watched an episode and I could relate completely with Rebus. I don't understand why the other reviews are so average. I taped (DVD-d) a lot of episodes and I watch them over and over. The music is also very good. And Siobhan is a very nice lady. Sometimes I feel sorry for her, with Rebus as a colleague, but in the end she always takes his side. When this is written in awful English, sorry, but the Rebus episode I just saw made such an impact I rushed to register on IMDb to let the world know I think Rebus and Siobhan are the best! Rebus doesn't seem to have any personal life, he can be compared to Jack Frost, I would like to see them as a team, maybe a writer can think of an episode with the two of them? Be creative!