Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Iain Glen, Siobhán O’Kelly, Jack Monaghan, Elva Trill, Alan McKee, Ross McKinney, Shane Robinson, Lalor Roddy, Killian Scott, Sinead Watters.

To take and consider revenge is the point where lives become meaningless, that you may as well take the whole Human Race with you in a blaze of remorseless fury for the want of practising the harder emotion of forgiveness. To want revenge is natural, it is perhaps inherent in us all but to actually physically take a life for a sleight, for an accident which robbed you of someone you loved; the question being could you truly want to keep perpetuating the agony and pain just to satisfy blood lust.

The return of the dark but enjoyable Private Detective, the gum shoe of Galway, Jack Taylor opened up its third series with the notion of revenge, of the never ending cycle of ill will in the dramatic and emotionally stirring Blood Cross.

Not everything is as it ever seems in Galway, the reminders of a past way of life are never far from the surface, the prospect of punishment dealt out by the gang a thought perhaps that symbolises the point of blood being thicker than water, and whilst a retribution from those with clubs and knives is bad, the castigation from a relative for not adhering and sticking to the family line is infinitely worse.

With the superb Killian Scott enjoying success elsewhere on television, it is only right that his character, Cody Farraher, is left to find his own way to pastures new and in his place is an actor who does the role of sidekick to Jack Taylor just as much justice that Killian Scott brought to the role. Jack Monaghan’s Darragh is something different though, not a trace of the wide eyed expectancy, of the hero worship and eventual downfall that would become Cody, instead this a man hardened by blood in a different way, whose inner peace and reflection, his lust for danger could lead Jack into more jeopardy than at any time in his life.

The point of revenge always becomes lost, some find it hard to let go of some parts of their lives, Jack Taylor is not immune to that struggle and as he balances the issues surrounding both families that have become embroiled in a war that was avoidable, so to must he find a way to reconcile his own feelings against something that his hurting his best friend.

A welcome return for one of the most interesting detectives, gritty, damaged and dark, Jack Taylor finally breaks the monotony that had settled in on television during 2016.

Ian D. Hall