McCallum

I love this series, my only complaint being the brevity of it. I would have liked to see more episodes with this fine ensemble cast, led by John Hannah. The opening credits with the beautiful aerial views of London are stunning. I was prompted to write this to correct what is misleading in the Trivia paragraph about this show. It most definitely is set in London and not my beloved Edinburgh.

As with some of the best films and series, I stumbled across this quite by accident. It was late, a storm was in full force outside and I was sitting comfortably on the sofa when I flicked past a channel that was just about to show one of the episodes. I intended merely to watch a couple of minutes while waiting for the commercials to be finished on another channel before switching back to some or other sitcom. About an hour and a half later I remembered my resolve and was so happy that I hadn't done that. Needless to say I made sure I saw all the other episodes.

John Hannah has been brilliant in almost everything I have seen him in and he does not let down here either. All other cast members do a stellar job too. My personal favourite (aside from John Hannah, of course) is Gerard Murphy.

The only negative side to this series are the limited amount of episodes. Only 8 with JH himself and an additional 1 with someone else. I would love to see McCallum back on the screens, though it would have to be with JH!

Thanks to the Shazam app, I was finally able to identify the gorgeous intro & closing music to McCallum. It's a song called Country Memories by Guy Fletcher & Rod Williams. I've spent hours trying to ID this instrumental & finally I found it.

The first couple of episodes were pretty good, but things went down hill from there. McCallum's personal life became the focus rather than being a background element. I wonder if they didn't change writers: the plots became implausible. The pacing was slow. They appear to have tried to stretch material that suited a one hr. show into 1.5 hrs. Midway through the second season we abandoned the show. My wife and I wouldn't recommend it. There is no way that this show deserves the high rating that it has on IMDB.

What a shame this series was cancelled after just two short seasons. While the US seems to run good television series into the ground long after they should have been cancelled, the British seem to do the opposite. I really would have liked to see a third series at the very least.

The story lines were inventive, edgy and gripping. The acting excellent. The characters believable and I was always left looking forward to the next episodes.

From what I read on the net when my curiosity about why it was cancelled took me to Google, I'm not the only one who is disappointed by the cancellation after only nine episodes. But I've yet to find an answer to my question: Why was it cancelled?