Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Matthew Macfadyen, Jerome Flynn, Adam Rothenberg, Gillian Sakar, Charlene McKenna, Paul Kaye, MyAnna Buring, Gina Bellman, Justin Avoth, Chris Patrick Simpson, David Wilmot, David Dawson, Damien Molony, Kirsty Oswald, Callum Turner, Liam Burke, Gwynne McElveen.

The writers of Ripper Street have never been afraid to head down the path afforded the rich history of Whitechapel for its inspiration. Whether it is the world of male prostitution, the salaciousness of Molly Houses, the rights of women, the Irish question or the straight poison that stalked the streets of the East End in 1888, there is not a moment in that dark history of Whitechapel that isn’t worth exploring.

In A Stronger Loving World, Detective Sergeant Drake feels the full force of the religious tension that had built up over the years and the one man who sought to push a co-existing community over the edge as he sought salvation for himself and his followers. It was a force that would also see his home life mirror that of the disarray caused by Gabriel Cain, played by Paul Kaye who seems to excel in playing the unlikeable and detestable to such an extent that he makes avid viewing.

The role of the religious sect who draft people into their way of thinking, the poor, disadvantaged and vulnerable who ultimately become sacrificial offerings to which ever God the cult believe they are in commune with, destroyed both physically and mentally and whose passing only serves to remind the problems with blind faith.

It is an issue that is often steer cleared of, avoided in case of offense caused but in the hands of some rather superb but chilling acting by Paul Kaye, this cult was a byword for causing acts of terror and malicious scaremongering throughout the whole of Whitechapel with Christian set against Jew, the fires were being stoked for Gabriel Cain to cause havoc before taking the whole of Whitechapel up in smoke.

There are always innocents in these affairs and none so more than Bella Drake, the wife of the Sergeant, who found herself drawn back under the hypnotic stare, almost Charles Manson like in its delivery, of the man his cult looked upon as a father figure. It was a father figure though whose authority was warped, skewed, by his personal beliefs and Bella Drake, played once more by the likeable Gillian Sakar, was the trap in which to corrupt the dogged detective.

Although the story line centred on the relationship between father figure, husband and wife there was some great range shown by Adam Rothenberg as Captain Homer Jackson and who has had a great deal of dramatic input into the way the three male leads are pictured. A Stronger Loving World also saw, albeit briefly, a welcome return to straight British drama by Gina Bellman. This star of the Dennis Potter teleplay Black Eyes gets too few appearances on television, especially one of her whimsical and fascinating talent.

A Stronger Loving World may not have had the energy of previous episodes but its glory was in the way it presented a world of danger that was far removed from the possibilities of death that could be felt in Whitechapel in the 1890s. A world that many would not give much of a thought about but whose powers of persuasion on the weak were as every bit as a menace as those that were being reported two years earlier. For that A Stronger Loving World should be commended for its portrayal of irresponsible worship.

Ian D. Hall