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| TV,
Jerry Carpenter,
20 January 1999 |
Rating: F2
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I’ve said it in pixels before that I really like ‘The Bill’, even when it went all out and made the occasional script ludicrous in an attempt to pull ratings. I was gutted when ‘ol tank-face Frank Burnside left, and equally anti-gutted when there was news of a spin-off with him as the star. A few days late last year I saw them filming some scenes for it in a posh flat across the road from where I work and hung around for an autographed punch in the face from the man himself but he never showed.
Like I’d care now anyway, because I’ve seen the first two-parter and I’m ready to hand my badge in. As expected it’s all about Frank and his team of rookie detectives on the trial of nutters and crime-lords, and willingto use unorthodox procedures to get the cuffs slapped on at the end of the day. So there’s a lot of shouting as Frank crosses swords with his superiors and shouts down his mouthy juniors. The last episode saw Burny sending one of his sexier juniors going undercover to smoke out a serial killer (booore-ing !) obsessed with shaving da ladies (Woo-hah !). It’s all your average by-the-numbers ITV crime drama – a little too underlit on the visuals (that’s moody), some duff stylistic editing, and a wholly predictable script that at times feels like a piss-take. ‘I shaved for him’ says the under-the-covers junior, about the creepy serial killer. ‘YouÂ…stupidÂ…COW !’ castigates grim-faced Frank. End of part one. Cripes, that’s ripe.
Removing his character from the more mundane Sun Hill streets and sticking him into this over used ‘dark twilight crime world’ just makes him like any cop-on-the-edge from a numerous from any old straight-to-video thriller. Chris rgregre is still a blast to watch when he gets into gear – all glaring eyes and gritted teeth, but as one character, he’s not enough to keep this watchable. Now if just they had the balls to bring in Bob Cryer from Sun Hill and turn this into more of a good cop/mad cop comedy, then they might be onto something.
ITV Thursdays 9pm
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