Dust from a distant sun, will shower over everyone

Introduction

You wait ages for a crime drama starring Lennie James and then two come along at once…

First, let’s be clear. This is not the 2006 two parter broadcast on Channel 4, written by Simon Donald, and starring Mark Strong as Detective Sergeant Frank Agnew, a police officer who murders a fellow officer and believes he has committed the perfect crime.

This is the 2013 ten parter, broadcast on AMC in the USA, developed by Chris Mundy and starring Mark Strong as Detective Sergeant Frank Agnew, a police officer who murders a fellow officer and believes he has committed the perfect crime.



Yes, it’s a much longer remake, with the same lead actor playing the same character, but on the other side of the Atlantic. This might be confusing if you saw the original Channel 4 series, but I didn’t.

Here’s the basic story, but as usual, can’t give too much away without spoiling it for you. Detroit Homicide Detectives Frank Agnew (Mark Strong) and Joe Geddes (Lennie James) murder fellow cop Brendan McCann (Michael McGrady) and stage it to look like a suicide. Neither Agnew nor Geddes claims to know Internal Affairs was already investigating McCann, and their tense relationship is pushed to breaking point many times as the case of McCann’s murder is investigated and linked to other crimes and police corruption in the city of Detroit.

Video + Audio

An excellent 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer, as first broadcast. Nothing wrong from a technical point of view. We also get a choice of DD5.1 surround soundtrack or DD2.0 stereo soundtrack. I opted for the DD5.1 track, and it was very good, with all channels being used at different points during the episodes. There’s a nice scene where a helicopter is buzzing round outside, and you might even get up and look out of your window to make sure they are not hovering over your house.



I haven’t had the chance to grab screenshots yet, so the images featured here are from AMC promotional material (images copyright AMC)

Extra Features

Sadly nothing here.

Conclusion

A nice piece of crime drama. Everyone is always on the lookout for the “next Breaking Bad” or the “next Wire”. And it’s easy to draw lazy comparisons with both of those shows here, with references to drugs, gangs, crime and police. But don’t go into it with any pre-conceptions like that and just enjoy a nicely told story which weaves together well across ten forty minute episodes.



In the “box set culture” that has developed in the last few years, this is almost the perfect answer as there are around 7 hours of drama here which you could do in a day if you were in for a marathon session, or it spreads out nicely across a week or even longer.

Good performances from all of the lead cast help this drama along. The last time I watched Lennie James was in the BBC 2 crime drama Line of Duty (in which he also played a police officer who had crossed the line between good and bad). I always associated him with Sol from Snatch, but after watching that I saw him as DCI Gates. And now I see him as Joe Geddes.

Definitely worth seeking this one out if you like a bit of crime drama. Well worth watching.