The Commander

It's the first movie or tv show I've seen where I kept saying "stupid" or "you're so stupid" out loud. Noone this clueless could possibly have risen to the job of commander.

I generally love police procedurals. This one was awful, because of its premise.

Commander Clare Blake (Amanda Burton) is the head of the serious crimes unit in the New Scotland Yard. In 1989, she arrested James Lampton (Hugh Bonneville) for murdering his girlfriend. He is supposed to be reformed and gets paroled. She allows her forward to be printed in his best-selling book with the proceeds going to victim support. DCI Mike Hedges investigates a murder and arrests Lampton. Hedges do not get along with Blake. Meanwhile, there is a cover-up of a police shooting unbeknown to Blake. Surveillance footage is edited. Also the movie follows another criminal on the loose.

I like the idea of a female commander in a male-dominated world. Blake doesn't have the gravitas of a hard-nosed investigator that somebody in her position should have. There is one really bad turn which devalues a lot of the early work and only adds to the questionable Blake character. I have big problems with her relationship to Lampton. Also, I don't particularly like the ending. This is a solid police crime drama for two thirds and then I have problems.

Really like Lynda LaPlante's writing, I find Amanda Burton really easy to watch so thought this would be great right?

Some were excellent and engaging, I couldn't stop watching but...

Come on who as a senior police officer jumps in the sack with some psychopathic ex con who she herself put away 12 years ago? Any copper I have ever met is generally a great judge of character and recognises a nutter (see what I did there). Yet apparently she thinks it's fine.

That aside, the acting was all pretty good, a few bits staged slowly for effect which made them feel clunky but overall an easy watch, especially when each of the paired episodes could be watched stand alone easily enough (my stupid streaming app started me in series three and it didn't feel awful going back to one once I spotted it.

Watched all the episodes on Acorn TV recently. It's certainly a series that one watches to pass the time but in the long run, it's nothing special. The acting is good, the camera work is not. There are just too many closeups of eyes, mouths, teeth etc. In the episodes where there is violence, waving the camera around and having the images go in every direction, does little to add to the scene. The editing is sometimes ridiculous as scenes are interspersed randomly with others to which they have no relevance or relationship. Makes it all very confusing and distracting for the viewer.

Each episode seems to show that the police can do very bad things but still continue to work in their very high positions. Makes one wonder about the integrity of New Scotland Yard. Overall, it's something to watch but just veray average, and nothing to rave about at all!

Moments of intensity followed by gross abuse of the viewer by having the Commander of an elite police unit fall under the spell of a convicted murderer. WOULD NOT EVER HAPPEN, NOT EVER, NOT IN THIS UNIVERSE !!! I will be writing the producer as well. They should watch good murder mysteries and then at least copy them !