★★★★
If I worked in ITV’s publicity department, two things would happen. One, everyone else would quit. Two, I’d issue a ban on anyone suggesting a police drama might be “the new Broadchurch”.
The latest victim of the curse is The Bay. A more than passable seaside whodunnit it may be, but it will never be Broadchurch. TV detective pairings like Olivia Colman and David Tennant come along once a decade. Broadchurch also had a top-drawer supporting cast.
Still, as tribute acts go The Bay is bubbling up rather nicely a couple of episodes in. It’s also been beautifully shot, some scenes on Morecambe beach so brooding I was half expecting to see Julien Baptiste.
I’ll forgive the writer for making me spend last week’s opener yelling: “It’s 2019! Why doesn’t that policewoman tell her boss she slept with one of the suspects on the night the teenage siblings disappeared and ask to be taken off the case?”
Partly because we have since been flooded with so many suspects/red herrings I can’t really spare the brain cells to be mad anymore. But mainly because Morven Christie has been fabulous as the policewoman in question, Lisa Armstrong.
Anyway, despite the fact that we’ve probably not even met the killer yet I’m going to stick my neck out and say the grandma did it.
Or the builder/drug dealer bloke.
Or Lenny Henry.
