The 50 best TV shows of 2017: No 2 Line of Duty
Gender struggles, elusive truths and almost unbearable tension turned Jed Mercutio’s prescient police drama into a fascinating mirror of 2017’s big issues
In a year when so many television headlines have involved gender issues – from pay at the BBC, and the casting of the next Doctor Who, to The Handmaid’s Tale’s chilling portrayal of turbocharged patriarchy – it’s fitting that the year’s most memorable TV villain should be a woman. Whether this was prescience or sheer luck on the part of Line of Duty showrunner Jed Mercurio remains to be seen. But given that Mercurio usually seems to have thought of everything, he deserves the benefit of the doubt.
What is beyond dispute is that Thandie Newton’s DCI Roz Huntley was a startling creation, equal parts brittle anxiety and relentless, shameless calculation. It was hard to know whether to admire her sheer chutzpah or shudder at the ice flowing through her veins. As has been the case with almost all of Line of Duty’s bad apples, there were mitigating factors. Just as Denton and Waldron from seasons two and three seemed more sympathetic the more we learned about their motivations, so it was with Huntley. Hers was a strikingly appropriate backstory for 2017. Here was a woman who had managed admirable career progress only to find her momentum stalled by motherhood; a police officer who was forced to humour the creepy advances of an older male colleague (the unctuous ACC Derek Hilton) in order to retain his patronage.
Continue reading...from The Guardian http://ift.tt/2CzaOg3
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