Crá

I'll start by saying the scenery was beautiful. The atmosphere was perfect but the story disappointed me. I won't criticize the acting but some actors were much better than others. I didn't guess who the murderer was right away but it was so clumsy with the suspects. You know who didn't do it but it try's to make the characters suspects which is tedious. Characters are so stereotypical. The renegade, the clown, the dumb pair that insist they know who is it and refuse to investigate anyone else, The journalist was not likeable. I could label each character. It's an easy watch for sure. I enjoyed the language. I loved the gorgeous scenery.

But there was so much wrong with the dialogue, the miscasting, the endless red herrings and misbehaving cops who would have been fired in any other police force.

Cop shows like these need to be believable.

Now I am Irish by birth and I positively adore movies when they're in Gaeilge.

But there were so many tropes in this I lost track. The rogue cop. Endless staring at oceans and waves, finding others on beaches and houses when you need them, cops missing major clues (cell phone, laptop) the saucy irritating young reporter with seedy access to everything the cops missed.

The scenery was stunning though.

But the ending was cringe worthy, a total disasterama.

What an absolute waste of time for this incredulous viewer.

4/0 Acorn.

A very well written and acted murder mystery set in the stunning landscapes of north-west Eire. Dialogue is in Irish Gaelic with subtitles, which gives it a certain authenticity and makes it seem even more physically remote. I tried out the first episode, and quickly got hooked and two days later had finished the series. It's a really good choice for a binge watch. The similarities to Shetland are fairly obvious - both are set in remote communities where everyone has a past and that past is known to everyone else, but beneath the surface there are secrets too, waiting to be revealed. This series avoided the obvious and kept me guessing until the final scenes. Congratulations to the BBC for being brave enough to screen this. Thoroughly recommended.

I loved the setting and the idea of the murder being set in an insular, inward-looking community. However, the series was marred by somewhat wooden acting and implausibilities.

As always, we have to ignore the person the episodes were strongly signalling was the guilty one. It was completely obvious from episode three who we were meant to imagine had "dunnit". So we had to look elsewhere. I must admit I didn't guess who the real assassin was partly because it was such an improbable plot twist. There were other irreconcilable anomalies too. Martin was a thoroughly unpleasant character but why he should have been singled out for a beating by Connall is a mystery to me. We were meant to work out the reason why but I don't know what it was about (not a spoiler - this is the very first scene in the series).

Barry's involvement in passing on information didn't ring true either. He was such a wimp and jobsworth that I found it hard to believe in this facet of the story.

I watched it all. The final fifteen minutes were disappointing. The fate of Conall's dad is unknown but with court cases pending, would such extreme measures have been taken? And the decision to keep quiet about the conclusion of the case and leave an innocent reputation sullied didn't ring true either.

After reading back over the review, I've downgraded to a four from five stars.

I absolutely love Irish productions as well as Scottish and British but this one has been totally disappointing. The story is good, a bit predictable, but the cast is dreadful. The principal one is the worst of all of them. Someone told him that he looks like Dennis Quaid and he is copying his acting for bad. Totally unexpressive. The best one is Alex Murphy but the rest is pretty bad. The landscapes are impressive, I love Ireland, but that is not enough to keep six episodes on intrigue. If you add this cast the season becomes totally boring. There is no reason to film this kind of stories if you prolong unnecessary the plot. We use to say: "the good if brief twice good" and I think you use to say something like "brevity is the soul of wit".