Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10
Cast: Ashley Jensen, Alison O’Donnell, Steven Robertson, Jamie Sives, Nina Tousaint-White, Dawn Steele, Phyllis Logan, Lorraine McIntosh, Maisie Norma Seaton, Natasha Cottriall, Joseph Thompson, Joe Bolland, Arnas Fedaravicius, Karl Collins, Don Gilet, Annie Louise Ross, Lewis Howden, Ian Bustard, Conor McCarry, Eubha Akilade, Tibu Fortes, Jakub Bednarcyyk, Barry O’Connor, Russ Bain, Neil Pendelton, Ross Allan, Gemma Laurie, Ian Dunnett Jnr, Simon Tait, Francesco Piacentini-Smith, Jo Cameron-Brown, Steven Miller, Sandy Grierson, Sean Brown, Kevan Mackenzie, Anne Kidd, Manjinder Virk.
Having a family is complicated, being part of a small community where everybody knows your name and history, your business, can feel suffocating, the group dynamic one that is too close, smothering, almost incestuous in its frankness and approach; it is no wonder that for some it becomes too much to bear, the responsibility of forever being in a familial debt can push the one who feels to involved to run away, to be elsewhere where anonymity is sacred.
Returning to that close knit community can spell trouble, it can be the catalyst for old relationships finally being severed for good, for as the sense of anarchy unfolds around you, as you are unhindered by a truth declared where you can speak your mind in a way that was once muted, so the repercussions are to be found sharpening their pitchforks and lighting fires to throw your free soul upon.
Such is the measure of required continuality for the much-loved series of Shetland, that to replace the character of Jimmy Perez, played by the admired Douglas Henshall, insists upon a challenge which can only be matched by one who like the former Detective Inspector was a child of the islands but at times never felt as though they fitted, and when a case involving another of Shetland’s runaways crosses the path of D.I. Ruth Calder, and when worlds collide, she is deemed the best person to solve a problem on the island; one which will force a crack to reveal itself in her home life, as well as one that calls upon the one of the biggest of social taboos to be unearthed.
It could be considered too early to commit to a firm decision of acceptance for the newest face in the station, after all Ashley Jensen would undoubtedly appreciate the sense of space she has to fill from Douglas Henshall’s powerful performances as the case worn detective, but with Alison O’Donnell and Steven Robertson providing warm comfort in their returning roles, with actors of such calibre as Jamie Sives, Nina Tousaint-White, Dawn Steele, Phyllis Logan, and Don Gilet all providing the strength of aggressive passion required to give a tale of rugged islanders their true deserving understanding, so the future bodes well that Shetland will continue to be a staple of British Detective drama.
A tale that stings in all the right places, one that may be considered taboo in parts but one that is a reflection, a heartbeat, of life in such a community, and one that brings murder directly to the door.
Ian D. Hall