Guilt

As this series opens brothers Jake and Max are driving through an Edinburgh suburb at night. They accidentally run over and kill an elderly man. Max, a lawyer, tells his brother that he will go to jail if they report it. They establish that the man lived in the house they are in front of so take him back inside. Papers suggest that he had terminal cancer so they leave hoping his death will be considered natural. Of course things don't quite go to plan; the authorities may believe that he died of cancer but Jake gets a call saying his wallet was found in the house. He goes back and explains that he'd been there because he traded in old records and the man had a good collection. He befriends, and forms a relationship with Angie, the dead man's niece... which doesn't impress Max. Without going into details things later get complicated as Angie starts asking questions about the death; various older secrets are gradually exposed and the brothers find themselves in danger.

When I sat down to watch this show I knew nothing about it but assumed from the title it would be 'gritty' and a bit depressing... it may have moments of grittiness but it is far from depressing; in fact it is frequently hilarious. Much of the humour comes from Mark Bonnar's excellent performance as Max; it wasn't always what his character did but the subtle facial expressions as he did it. He was ably supported by Jamie Sives as his brother Jake; Ruth Bradley, as Angie; Emun Elliot, as private detective Kenny; Ellie Haddington, as a blackmailing neighbour; Sian Brooke, as Max's wife; and Bill Paterson as a local gangster. The story develops at a good pace with some plot lines originally seeming superfluous but later emerge to be essential to the story. Overall I'd definitely recommend this superior comedy drama.

Guilty

This drama cleverly played with the dilemma of the opposing forces of doing the right thing and being punished for wrong doing. Either position was justified in turns and the two brothers took their corners.

The script was tight and well paced overall, there were, however, just a couple of places where we had repetition of one brother revealing something and the other flying off the handle, these repeats needed editing out and replacing with some scenic shots of bleak Scotland to ramp up the atmosphere.

Their deception spiralled out of control and it was a really very well written black comedy. The acting was first rate from everyone. We could have had more of everything, more car chases, more sex, more violence more drama please.

This drama had it all, I was gripped from the start and this is the BBC at its best in using the fabulous talent that lays at its feet.

Great first season but season 2 lots of drawn out scenes with one to one conversations that feel like speeches where you want to fall asleep. Shame. That said, the music is superb and production very good but content just does not live up to these other aspects that are done so well.

Two brothers driving home a bit worse for where hit a pedestrian and kill him. As it turns out he has terminal cancer so the brothers return him home, his body is found and everyone from the police to coroner assume he died from the cancer. What can go wrong? Well quite a lot as it seems. A suspicious relative, a nosy neighbor and a recovering alcoholic private detective determined to rebuild his career by solving the suspicious death. The writer Neil Forsyth has struck the perfect balance between comedy and drama to make this hugely enjoyable four part series. 8/10

This starts off with a dark but humourous episode and then gets darker and less humorous, but by the end of episode 3 then I was wondering how on earth the plot would be resolved in the fourth and final episode. No need to worry. That was a joy to watch in every way, with the writing and acting simply top notch. p.s. The guy that gave it 3/10 was referring to another series of the same name from 2016. Not this series.