Grimerlana
Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike
AnhartLinkin
This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.
Roxie
The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;
spskstal48
These actors act like real cops. The good the bad as well as the ugly. Please don't change a thing and you will go far. It is very funny without trying to be funny.Pay your writers more money. They are earning it. Great great show!To think all shows have to have super heroes or super cops is complete nonsense. It might help if they don't solve all their cases every episode.These actors have that New York attitude down pat. What was really interesting was when some police officers traveled to other areas doing investigations and we were able to see the different styles of cops which really do exist. I'd like to see more of that. Whether it be small towns or larger cities. Anyway, keep up the great work. Let's just hope the moron squad doesn't cancel such a great show like they have done so many times in the past.
Mahmoud Sh
This series is perhaps one of the best detective series I have ever seen. It is a rich drama. First, it is not overwhelmingly focused on crime scene investigation. There other series for that purpose. Second, the characters are depicted in a three dimensional frame work. The police officers are not portrait as always perfect. The criminals are also not always presented as incorrigibly nefarious. The good guy does not always win and the strong sometimes cries. I was very impressed with the first episode when the strong lady detective went home and cried in the arms of her husband. She was simply human. Finally, this series has avoided irrelevant office work romance. The main detective is a married woman who only works in her office. This series has provided the balance between a rich drama and entertainment.
pvbklyn
I think the new Prime Suspect is watchable and has some believable aspects. Maria Bello is very good in the role -- except for the hat. (I hate the hat. Way too trendy and cliché.) But comparing this series or disliking it because it wasn't like the Helen Mirren gem does a bit of disservice to the new show and to Maria Bello. Let the new one develop it's own way. As police dramas go this one is not bad.. . I've watched many detective & police dramas: Brit, Canadian, American. Outside of Homicide: Life on the Street (and I won't even mention "The Wire") very few American police dramas have any credibility other than just pure entertainment and distraction or just for looking at pretty people with guns. I've seen four episodes of Prime Suspect so far and though I think Jane's detective counterparts are a bit over the top sexist wise since it is 2011 and I think more respect is given to women these days, that's an area that needs to be developed better. It makes the male cops look really stupid. And homicide cops are anything but. There must be more subtle ways of demonstrating sexism. Use irony instead of sarcasm & meatball comments.
Pansopher
Briefly: She's tough and cold (and smart at her job). The men are irrational whim-worshipping wimps (and chase along behind her like barking dogs while she solves the crimes). Prime Suspect was a disappointment to me. I like Bello and was prepared to love seeing her in her own show. But several things precluded that:The writing suffers from too much naturalism: the 2 writers wanted (as they said in their interviews) to keep things really really *real*. But their idea of reality is to show most NYC cops as sophomoric, drunken, foul-mouthed, narrow-minded, anti-woman buffoons. I can't stand a one of them, and the idea of those morons working to protect citizens' rights... is a bad joke.Maria Bello's character is a cut above the sub-human males, but at a terrible price: her femininity is somehow missing. She's tougher than the men--and more important, far more intelligent and reasonable in her work. I could get to liking a woman like Jane T., if she were written *as* a woman. In her present form, I don't quite know *what* she is. Seeing her act like that makes me cringe.In another TV board, they were talking about the "empowered women" trend in new shows, and a fellow reviewer complained about all the emphasis on gender, asking "why can't we just be human beings instead of male and female?" My answer to that is apropos to Prime Suspect: We can't "just be human beings" because our gender is built in, and deeply affects our world view and sense-of-life. That, in a nutshell, is my problem with Prime Suspect, which portrays a woman who's more gruffly manly than any of the men in the show. (In fact, the men are painted as either wimps or frothing idiots -- or both.) Every second we have to spend watching the needless nagging and straining based on anti-women silliness -- is a precious second taken from the advancement of the real plot: solving crimes with tenacity, ingenuity, and guts. That gender-battle stuff bores me to death.Somewhere buried down amongst the fol-de-rol of this show is a grand potential: to portray a woman who's bold, courageous, independent in her thinking, and a very clever, intuitive cop.I wish we could have more of that. Prime Suspect could be - and should have been - great TV art. Unfortunately, as it stands now, it ain't.
