source: Thorne: Scaredycat

I've been a fan of Sandra Oh for years & found this TV movie on Netflix. I doubt she is proud of this one. Sandra's character kept losing her British accent. The lead was surly & I could not connect with his character. What was going on with the autopsy guy & Thorne? It was never explained. There were too many implausible circumstances in the storyline. Why did Sarah Chen send her fellow cop out to buy coffee so she could snort some coke in the bathroom? She could have done it with him in the house. It's not like a male officer is going into the bathroom with her. I doubt child protective services would allow a 5 year old boy to go home with a police detective who works all hours of the day. And I guessed who the second killer was early on - he has a multiple personality disorder (certainly not bipolar as suggested by another reviewer). Why couldn't the child identify the killer? He saw him. I have to say that the British do cop shops really well on the most part. Unfortunately this one missed the mark. Disappointing.

The first season wasn't too bad. But the second one was pure garbage. Sandra Oh? Really?? Omg she's terrible. Her accent is horrendous. I agree with the reviewer who complained about Thorne swerving around with the suspect in the back seat. Just ridiculous. I only gave two stars for David Morrissey.

2 stars is generous, and that's only because liked David M. he doesn't want to talk about his mother's death. keeps to himself. not unusual for a macho, alpha guy, esp. police or military. hardly worth the screen time. they let a 5 year old witness stay with policeman, while his father, a civilian, watches him. this after someone shoots at him. also, they all live in glass house. I doubt it. Even in UK. SPOILERS it is obvious early on that there is one guy. voices in his head; assumed personality. of the guy he killed at 12-14. . and even more so when they can't find anything, no bank, soc sec,taxes, activity.for 13 years on the 2nd guy Driving in a car, with suspect who has confessed to 2 murders, no reason not to believe him; really stupid plot points. Can't anyone figure out, that the 2 killers are a "dual" personality assumed by the same man. Don't they watch TV. cliche; been done to death. . . But Sandra's character is unbelievable. coke addict-totally incompetent. how did she make detective. Afraid of this guy, hiding in bathroom. was it coke paranoia. she sends off 2nd policeman to get good coffee, He leaves his post-m so she can get high in the bathroom. than goes off to find him. thinking it's 2 guys, without back up. and with gun to her head, she is frozen. other detectives come to her rescue. still on her knees. Unbelievable end

Ummm, some usually good actors in a really BAD movie?

Dull, plodding, poorly written, wooden acting, unrealistic character performance, etc., etc., etc.. As others have said, what is with the psuedo-psycho, guilt ridden cop genre that has cropped up, especially in Britain? I walked away from the story for a while, came back and had not missed one beat of the story (if it even had one, that is!). An especially idiotic scene has the head detective interrogating a suspect from the front seat of a car, the suspect in the back seat, while swerving across the road trying to get him to confess, when his partner in the back seat attacks the suspect,...and they get rammed by another motorist, crashing the car. Amazingly, being hit on the passenger side where the suspect was sitting, HE is the who gets out, while the so called detectives are trapped inside the car! That was enough for me.

In short, too violent and highly unlikely to be an actual case scenario. Also for officers to leave themselves that vulnerable is unlikely. SPOILER ALERT: I think it poorly portrays a person who is bi-polar or has split personality. To be that stealth and not leave clear evidence is unlikely. DNA would get him the first time.

I can suspend disbelief for any movie to a point. But a movie that is supposed to represent gritty police work can push me only so far. Why would a cop left to guard a witness go into a panic when she realized an intruder was in another room? Do they really carry no weapons at all?? I am neglecting to mention that she had just been doing cocaine in the bathroom. All she had for defense was a phone?? Really, it was all just too much to take. It was like the Keystone Kops but with British accents. And that was only one of the events I found unbelievable. Performances were fine. Just terrible writing.

A few reviewers here have rated this as a 1 which I really don't understand. The performances from the actors are first rate and the direction is superb for a TV series. If you compare it with Luther which, don't get me wrong, is wonderful, it's far more believable and better acted. Alright, it has the annoying tendency of all British cop shows to have a "damaged" police officer as the main protagonist, and yes, the procedures aren't exactly accurate, but this is a TV series, not a documentary. If it followed a police officer's role to the letter it would be pretty damn boring. If you want to see something like that then the nearest you'll get to it is the excellent Scott and Baily. Everybody in this show shines. It even has the superb Eddie Marsen in it! I suspect that followers of the books will be a little miffed but as I haven't read the books I couldn't give a monkey's. It might be worth bearing in mind that a book and a TV series are two different things. As for me, I'm gutted they decided not to make more series.

Let's first ignore the fact that you have flashbacks from a suspect, and you can't determine if the suspect is really guilty of murder or just covering up for some buddy from his childhood. The chief character is detective constable Thorne who operates on the basis of instincts and is always arguing with his obnoxious, naturally stupid superiors. Then there are his two subordinates, of which one is a an Asian woman who is a cocaine addict who does lines every chance she gets. The other subordinate is an African-Brit and when they have a free half-hour in the middle of the night, they have a go at some sex. After the sex, he then goes to the bathroom where he finds her doing lines and her response is, "Don't you knock before opening a bathroom door?" That's the end of that scene. Later that evening she is supposed to be guarding the key witness, who might be a killer (since no one has established clear evidence, but he confesses to killings presumably because he wants protection from his buddy from 10 years ago who might be the killer of women.) She sends another cop who is to help her guard the suspect for coffee, and while he's gone, she ducks into the bathroom for some more coke. She then hears noises coming from the bedroom and is terrified. Since she's not a judo expert, she tries to escape through a window or door, neither of which will open, and whispers into a cellphone for help which does arrive. Of course, this being Britain, even cops protecting someone from a killer don't carry guns. I guess that, in the UK, when a killer points a gun at a cop, he or she is supposed to do a flying tackle and hope that the criminal drops the gun. At this point, I couldn't stand the stupidity and confusion any longer and shut it off.