Dead Clever: The Life and Crimes of Julie Bottomley

This was a great drama in which both the writing and the acting was fantastic. The story was a little over the top but it was meant to be, it's a black comedy similar to ITV's earlier outstanding drama 'At Home With The Braithwaites'. The scenes between Helen Baxendale and Suranne Jones were undoubtedly the best, they had great chemistry and bounced well off each other. The return of Helen Baxendale to our screens was fantastic, she has done a few other one off dramas but none as good as 'Dead Cever'. It's a must see for anyone who is a fan of these dramas and is not the 'terrible drama' that has been described by others.

But don't take my word for it the critics aren't always right as everyone has different tastes, see it before you judge it but you must see it whatever you do.

This play was cleverly crafted and brilliantly acted. Unfortunately I felt the writer ran out of 'dead clever' ideas towards the end. The decision to introduce a spectacular gun scene was 'dead un-clever', and did not fit the menacing style of the overall drama. The endless stream of guns suddenly surfacing at the actors' fingertips was absurd and far fetched. Following this the final scenes pulled the drama back on line in that they were suitably 'clever' and in keeping with the story, but they did not redeem the silliness of the previous shoot-out. The standard of acting, set and costume design were all first class. The script was very well written and the story was excellent except for that one scene. More drama of this type please.

Before you begin to contemplate whether to spend 2 hours of your precious life watching this utter pile of pathetic rubbish, can I suggest you think of the very worst piece of Television Drama you have ever seen, add 2, multiply by 400, and you will begin to get close as to how bad this drama really was. It's hard to know where to begin to describe why this Drama should never ever have seen the light of day.

Let's begin at the story, I don't know whether this originated in the writers imagination (Sally Wainwright)or was adapted from a Book, but either way they should be utterly ashamed to put there name to this script. It defied every last ounce of reality, never knowing whether to play it for comedy or serious, and failing miserably on both fronts. Advertised as a "Black Comedy", then I suggest that ITV should be prosecuted under the Trade descriptions Act. It was most definitely NOT comedy and the only Black was the Bin liner where the whole project should have been consigned.

Sometimes a film or drama can be so bad it ends up being good because you end up laughing so much, however I just ended up feeling angry at having my intelligence insulted so much by this feeble effort. Quite how other people who reviewed this found this "Fabulous" defies belief, it just goe's to show that the quality gene in some people went sadly missing at conception.

To be fair to the actors, there was not a lot you could do to recover the inane script, but why oh why do people at ITV believe that Suranne Jones is a leading actress, admittedly she is a gorgeous gal, but I saw better acting from 2 Christmas trees in our local Panto last week (Please ITV, the Girl CAN'T ACT !!!!!! stop trying to turn her into a Star Vehicle). I hope Dean Lennox Lewis picked up a hefty check for appearing in this rubbish, and now returns to The excellent "Shameless" with instructions to his agent to never again accept calls from ITV's Drama Dept.

It is clear that ITV are determined to dumb the channel down to the most basic moronic television eg X Factor, I'm a celebrity,endless reality shows,in other words "The Chavs Channel" and now ITV Drama seem intent on joining this stampede.

If you have videoed Dead Clever, can I suggest you fast forward to the Adverts and watch them instead, believe me at least that way you will retain the will to live.

By the way, my friend Carol loved Dead Clever but then again, she has been in a Coma for the last seven years

well, i sat all the way threw this drama and thought it was an amazingly written story and thought everyone in it was brilliant, well done itv bring on more. surranne jones was fantastic and so where all the other cast. well done to sally wainwright for great writing and i thoroughly enjoyed the whole think, sorry to the saddo people who commented in the opposite context but they must be in coma's or just feeling sorry for themselves after a miserably seeing the new year in but i thought it was may be the best thing to have entertained us in a very long time, to much reality TV has been our way lately and its good to see some old faces back on our screens.

I had high expectations when i saw the trailer for this, it looked amusing and thrilling with a big cast, namely Suranne Jones, Helen Baxendale and the bloke out of Shameless. But after a promising opening five minutes it descended into farce. The script and direction obviously did not know whether this was a serious thriller or a black comedy. It came off as a poor combination of the two. The characters lurch between sympathetic, risible and plain stupid. The ending can only be described as farcical and lazy, obviously copied completely from a famous film (you will know which one if you make it to the ending of this). Clichéd, contrived and an hour too long. Give it a miss.