Taggart

It's several years now since Taggart ended, and it's still a great watch. It spanned many years, and had different phases, in my opinion the early years with Mark McManus were the best, the dark, gritty writing, coupled with the charisma of the original Detective are a winning combination. I enjoyed the later years also, but wish they'd stuck with the longer running times, the character development in the earlier years was tremendous.

Some wonderful episodes over the years, my personal favourite Death Call had all of the elements, drama, crazed killers and a complex story, but there were many classics, Nest of Vipers, A Death Foretold and Gingerbread, I could go on, there were many.

Many wonderful guest and regular performances over the years, Blythe Duff shone over the years, she was the glue that held it all together, when she was given great material she performed amazingly.

It did seem to end at the right time, the last series was poor, particularly when compared to episodes from the show's glory years. I think it's still the longest running Detective series, will Midsomer Murders overtake it?

I love the accents, landscapes and views of Scotland.

Excellent series 9/10

Probably the best detective-show in the world, it is even better than "Rejseholdet". The very best thing about Taggart is probably that you never know who the criminal is until 5 minutes before the credits, so it is intensely thrilling to the very last minute. Another remarkable feature is the constant focus on the personality of the men and women of the Maryhill police, they never end up as boring detective-robots, the show even allows their personal troubles to play a part in the plot. Another thing I like about Taggart is the way that twice (in the parts, I've watched) they borrow the outlines of another story - ex. Treasure Island by R.L. Stevenson. It adds a unique taste to the plot and makes you wonder, whether the Taggart-plot will end similar to the plot in the other story, but it never does. Finally I just have to emphasize the unique dialect spoken in the show. It is FANTASTIC!!

Taggart is now officially the longest running cop show on British T.V. and indeed has been on for 3/4 of my lifetime. There are several reasons for its longevity but surely the main one is the underlying grim humour that enhances every episode. While it was undoubtedly at it's peak in the Mark "there's been a muurder" McManus years, it has recently returned to peak form with the introduction Alec Norton as the "heid man." Norton combines McManus's tough demeanor with an acting ability that outweighs his predecessor. But then McManus didn't need to be an Al Pacino, he WAS the character, dour and caustic. The other characters always provided a little colour along with occasionally convoluted personal lives. However the real star in Taggart was always Glasgow. while Glasgow has changed greatly since the '80's the city's character and natural humour always shines through. The title song puts it that "this is no mean town, this is no mean city", well it's obviously a mean enough city to sustain a 22 year murder series without ever really seeming unbelievable like the village of "Midsomer Murder" which has a body count higher than New York's! All in all a good cop show and one that as long as it can keep Alec Norton, should continue for a few more years yet.

My wife and I recently watched all 11 seasons on Amazon and really liked it. McManas is great as DCI Taggart. The show keeps you guessing until the end of each episode. My wife and I often pick a minor background character as the murderer, which turns out to be correct. It deserves better than its 7.2 rating. We gave it an 8.0, but would like to give it a 7.5. We think the low rating is due to most episodes being over 2 hrs. long and sometimes slow-moving

Taggart is definitely the best of these British murder mystery police shows. Inspector Morse is good, but Taggart takes the cake due to its huge body count and fantastic Scottish accents. The body count is the major thing lacking in series like Morse and the woeful Inspector Wexford. With Taggart, we are barely given a chance to come up with a suspect for one murder and suddenly someone else has copped it and throws a spanner in the works. Excellent show.