#oneaday Day 652: New Tricks - done

I've finished watching the full run of New Tricks, the BBC sort-of police procedural about the "Unsolved Crime and Open Case Squad", or UCOS, a unit in London's Metropolitan Police made up of one actual police officer and several other retired coppers. I enjoyed it a lot, even if the cast changes in its latter seasons arguably made it into a bit of a different show, and it meandered a bit in search of its own identity as a result.

New Tricks opens with UCOS being fronted by Sandra Pullman (Amanda Redman), a semi-disgraced police officer who gained notoriety after shooting a dog on a bungled raid that left the person she was supposed to be rescuing paralysed after falling out of a window. She assembles a colourful team of former police officers, including the diamond geezer Gerry Standing (Dennis Waterman), the extremely neurodivergent Brian "Memory" Lane and the relatively-normal-but-talks-to-his-dead-wife Jack Halford.

Between them, they form an initially uneasy alliance that subsequently blossoms into both genuine friendship and a wonderful sense of camaraderie as they solve a series of cold cases, many of which have been dormant for 20-30 years or more. As a result, Pullman more than redeems herself in the eyes of her superiors — though she still occasionally gets stick about the whole dog-shooting thing — and her band of merry old men find some meaning in their lives, as well as some closure in some longstanding issues.

This core cast remains constant for a significant proportion of the show, and we get to know them all very well. Halford is the first to leave; after finding closure on the murder of his wife, he departs to live out the end of his life peacefully after discovering he has a terminal illness. Lane is next to go, once again after reaching some closure on his "case that got away" — closure that involves him sacrificing his new career in the name of justice and the truth when he accuses a powerful member of the police for wrongdoing.

Standing lasts the longest, sticking around until the second episode of the show's final season. The two-part story that sees him departing after having faked his own death gives him a good story to go out on; he didn't have quite the same "issues" hanging over his head as Halford and Lane, so he needed something like this to make his departure an event of note in the same way, and it worked well, revealing some hitherto unknown details about his past career that felt very much in keeping with what we had learned about him over the course of the prior eleven seasons.

The replacement cast members include the Glaswegian Steve McAndrew (Denis Lawson), who is rebuilding his life following estrangement from his wife and son; Dan Griffin (Nicholas Lyndhurst), who is a frighteningly competent, knowledgeable individual who acts a bit as the group's "Superman" at times, despite occasionally demonstrating himself to be a bit unaware in terms of social interactions; and the latest to join the group, following Standing's departure, is Ted Case (Larry Lamb), a superstitious but intelligent former detective with a gift for interviewing witnesses and interrogating suspects. Outside of the "old men" of the group, Pullman is eventually replaced by Sasha Miller (Tamzin Outhwaite) towards the end of the series, and while this is probably the biggest upheaval the series saw, she settles into the new role quickly and does a good job.

New Tricks, across its entire run, strikes a good balance between the inherent comedy in such an unusual, eccentric ensemble cast, and the inherent darkness of a series about investigating longstanding cold cases, typically murders. The show thankfully sidesteps some of the clichés of police procedurals after its initial episodes; the pilot episode and the first couple of regular episodes give Pullman a superior who is the very definition of the stereotypical "shouting police chief", but before long he is replaced by Robert Strickland (Anthony Calf), an altogether calmer individual who, while coming from a background of privilege, often sides with "the little guy" (relatively speaking) rather than The Establishment as a whole. In the context of the series, this means that while he is often outwardly a by-the-book sort of individual, on the down-low he is immensely supportive of UCOS' eccentricities and lets them get away with a lot — because they get results.

(Yes, I know UCOS can be argued to be part of "The Establishment" also, given that they are a police department in their own right. But New Tricks makes a point of showing that the police as a whole are certainly not infallible, and there are several cases that involve the unit uncovering corruption within the organisation, eventually bringing justice to someone who had been wronged, many years ago in some cases.)

New Tricks' biggest strength is in its characters. We get to know the initial ensemble cast particularly intimately over the course of their time with the show; the later additions are also plenty likeable and get their own stories to shine, though by the simple fact that they have less time on screen in total, we never feel we quite get to know them as well as Pullman, Standing, Lane and Halford. Ted Case is the character who suffers the most in this regard; joining the cast full-time partway into its final season, some of his development feels a little rushed — although this, in itself, works quite well in the context of his character. The reveal that he is gay is handled in a particularly entertaining way that, from the relatively little we know of him at that point, feels very much in keeping with how he does things.

Given that the show ran for a long time — 2003-2015, to be exact — means that things change quite significantly in society over the course of its complete run. The show starts in a pre-smartphone age, for one, though the team are all comfortably using tablets (as in, iPads, not little boxes of pills) by its conclusion, and, as you might expect from the composition of its cast, issues such as sexism and ageism are explored. Several episodes, particularly later in the show's overall run, also deal with crimes that have a racial component or that involve domestic abuse and sexual assault, and while the show isn't particularly gory or shock-horror, it also doesn't shy away from real issues.

I'm sure there's plenty one could criticise about the show as a whole, particularly as today, in 2026, a lot of people have a somewhat skeptical view of the police and their role in society — and the way in which police-centric TV shows can somewhat "whitewash" this fact. But taking it as pure escapism — as a fun detective show with some colourful characters — it was highly entertaining, and I'm glad I took the time to watch it from start to finish.

Now I need something to replace it…

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#oneaday Day 632: New Tricks

Longtime readers may recall that back in November, I started watching a show called New Tricks from the BBC. It's a detective show with an interesting concept: following the exploits of a fictional Metropolitan Police department known as the Unsolved Crime and Open Case Squad (aka UCOS), the show sees its core cast (which gradually changes over time) reopening various cold cases and getting to the bottom of them.

I'm just coming up on the end of the tenth series out of twelve and I've been enjoying it a lot. It's been a consistently interesting watch, with some excellent characters who have some good backstories that get some decent payoff over the long term. I understand that the point I'm currently watching is where some people feel like it started to run out of steam a bit, leading to, among other things, one of the original cast members moving on because he felt things had become stale and another two departing after an apparently public spat with the writers, but I'm still enjoying the show with its new cast members. Former lead Amanda Redman said she felt like the cast had lost their anarchic edge in the later episodes, and I see why she said that — but really it's just a different vibe thanks to a different set of characters.

Of particular note is the presence of Nicholas Lyndhurst, an actor who I'm sure most people associate with comedic roles thanks to his most well-known appearances as Rodney in Only Fools and Horses and Gary Sparrow in Goodnight Sweetheart, but in New Tricks he does extremely well as a particularly serious-seeming member of the team. He still has his humorous moments, but they're mostly delivered through deadpan humour; the show is somewhat on the "gritty" side, but isn't above a bit of levity, primarily through little character moments.

The show covers an interesting time period, too. It launched in an era before smartphones and ran until the mid-2010s. A lot of things changes about society in that period, in retrospect, and it's interesting to see the show reflect that. Quite a few early episodes of the show are about Redman's Detective Superintendent Pullman character having to fight to be taken seriously in a world that is still very much male-dominated — and particularly after her assignment to UCOS came after a botched raid in which she shot a dog — and there are frequent explorations of the challenges people with mental health concerns have to face in their daily life.

Of particular note in this regard is the character Brian "Memory" Lane, who is a recovering alcoholic and highly likely to be autistic. Some of the best character moments in the show come from an exploration of Brian struggling to deal with simply existing in a world that he doesn't quite feel comfortable in, and the unique challenges he faces considering his background and his daily struggles. He could easily have become a pathetic, tragic character, but the show handles him well and shows that people contending with the things he is dealing with still have something to offer society, and that they can often find great comfort from the love of people who support them unconditionally. His exit from the show, involving an extremely satisfying resolution to a plot thread that had been dangling for most of the series' run, was handled very well.

The exit of Redman's Pullman character was a little more sudden, however, and it was a little unsatisfying. It feels like she just sort of suddenly decided to move on, and her reasons for doing so just weren't really explored all that much; on top of that, I feel like it would be a much longer process for someone in the Metropolitan Police, particularly in a leadership position, to be able to move on, whereas she was pretty much just out the door and gone. Her replacement, Tamzin Outhwaite's Sasha Miller, seems like a solid character, though, and has already had some interesting things happening to her in just the two episodes I've seen her in so far.

Dennis Waterman's Gerry Standing, as the longest fixture in the series, is a great anchor point for the show. While his cheeky chappy Cockney act could have easily become a bit tiresome, he is shown throughout the series to be a character with some interesting depth and plenty of admirable qualities, even if he sometimes takes a somewhat laissez-faire approach to following the rules. Some of his interest comes from his three amicable divorces and the fact that all his ex-wives and children form one big extended family, but he also gets plenty of his own moments to shine.

The show isn't anything particularly revolutionary and I'm sure it's not regarded as a "classic" or anything, but it did successfully run for twelve series, which suggests it was doing something right along the way. I've enjoyed watching it so far, and I'm glad I took a chance on it; if you're after a detective show to spend some time with, you could do far worse.

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#oneaday Day 537: Old dogs

Since I've exhausted both Death in Paradise and its spin-off series Beyond Paradise for the moment, I was looking for a new "detective" show to watch. I considered the other Death in Paradise spinoff, Return to Paradise, but thought I fancied something a bit different. And BBC iPlayer was certainly keen to provide suggestions.

I settled on a show called New Tricks, which I hadn't heard of before, but which apparently first aired all the way back in 2003, and concluded its complete run in 2015. I've watched two episodes so far, and while it's a very different sort of show to Death in Paradise and Return to Paradise, I've enjoyed what I've seen so far.

New Tricks (at least initially) follows the semi-disgraced Detective Superintendent Sandra Pullman (Amanda Redman) of the Metropolitan Police who, after a botched hostage rescue in which she shot a dog and the person she was supposed to be rescuing flung himself out of a window, paralysing himself when he landed on a car several storeys below, has been placed in charge of the fictional "Unsolved Crime and Open Case Squad", or UCOS. This is a branch of the Met specifically tasked with re-investigating unsolved "cold cases", with the officer in charge, initially Pullman, charged with wrangling a small group of retired former officers in the hope of their insights being able to put the various cases to bed once and for all.

Conceptually, it's a tad silly, particularly since the initial lineup of old men all initially appear to be somewhat comedic caricatures. There's Brian Lane (Alun Armstrong), who struggles with severe mental health issues and an obsession over the case that ended his career on the force; there's Jack Halford (James Bolam), who talks to his dead wife when no-one else is around, but is otherwise the most well-grounded of the bunch; and there's Gerry Standing (Dennis Waterman, the only constant member of the cast throughout the entire run of the show), who is a bit of a geezer and a "naughty boy", in his words, with a string of failed marriages behind him and a somewhat unorthodox approach to following the rules. The characters are all introduced as each having their own sort of "thing" that defines them, but just the initial two episodes shows that there's clearly potential for some interesting character work going on.

What I've found quite fun about New Tricks so far is that it blends quite a few disparate elements and comes out feeling quite coherent. There's the obvious conflict between Pullman being a modern police officer (by 2003 standards, anyway) — and a woman, at that — and these retired former officers, all of whom are set in their ways to varying degrees. And then there's the friction between the private lives of all the characters and their professional responsibilities. The show is, on the whole, somewhat on the "gritty" side, with the struggles the various characters encounter all being somewhat realistic and relatable rather than the easily resolved fluff or material for comic relief that the Paradise series tended to favour, but there's also plenty of comedy inherent in the whole situation — particularly when Pullman shows herself to be the sort of woman who takes absolutely no shit from anyone.

The fact that the show premiered in 2003 with a 90-minute pilot before going into full production in 2004 is an interesting consideration, too. In some respects, the way the show is presented makes it clear it's from a different time — and while I try not to think of 2004 as being too much "of a different time" to right now, the fact is, it was over 20 years ago — and it's quite pleasant to return to that world. I'm not talking thematically or in terms of societal norms displayed in the show, obviously, but rather literally the way it is presented. It has a theme song, for Heaven's sake, and one sung by one of the cast members (Waterman), at that! What was the last show you watched that had a full-on theme song — and, more to the point, one that had been specifically composed to include the show's title as part of its lyrics?

Anyway, that's about all I want to say about it for the moment. I'm looking forward to getting to know the series a bit better. I'd actually never heard of it before, somehow, but I guess if it ran for twelve seasons, it must have had something to it, no?

Or, to put it another way: it's all right. It's okay!

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#oneaday Day 496: Farewell, DI Parker

I am still watching Death in Paradise on my lunch breaks, and I've just got to the end of Ralf Little's run as the lead, Detective Inspector Neville Parker. He follows Ardal O'Hanlon, Kris Marshall and Ben Miller in taking the central role, and I think his run on the series might have been one of my favourites to date.

I enjoyed Miller, Marshall and O'Hanlon's time in the leading role, too, but Little's time in the hot seat felt like it had one of the most coherent character arcs for the central character. It helped that he, as a character, probably had the most room to grow of all the show's leading men to date — and the fact he was in place for about three and a half seasons, which is longer than his predecessors.

Death in Paradise is a heavily formulaic show, and to some people, that sort of thing can be annoying. Hell, formulaic shows are, at times, anathema to me — I can't stand reality TV shows that all adopt the "one of them gets voted off after a long, pregnant pause" format, for example — but for some reason, I find the relative predictability of Death in Paradise enjoyable, even comforting.

That extends to the role of the lead character, too: they're always a fish-out-of-water detective who has been brought across from some British police force (O'Hanlon's character, despite being Irish, was part of the Metropolitan Police in London before joining the Honoré gang) but the exact form of that varies somewhat. Miller's DI Poole was a grumpy old fart who gradually softened as he spent time with his comrades, until he was murdered, anyway; Marshall's DI Goodman was clumsy and scatterbrained but brilliant; O'Hanlon's DI Mooney was by far the character who was most at ease on the island; then Little's DI Parker went to the other extreme.

Initially resistant to everything the island of Saint-Marie had to offer — and allergic to everything — Parker was gradually brought out of his mosquito-repellent shell by his DS, Florence Cassell (Josephine Jobert), who had been a fixture on the show for some time, and showed some real character growth, culminating in him developing feelings for Florence. It was not to be, however, as not only did she reject him, at least partly because she was still smarting from the murder of her former fiancée, but a case forced her undercover and subsequently into the witness protection programme, conveniently bringing her time on the show to a close for a while.

Parker had a number of other good storylines along the way, too. They were ridiculous if you stop to think about them for a moment, but the same is true for the entirety of Death in Paradise. If a single locale had the murders per capita that Saint-Marie has, I suspect the authorities would declare it a complete lost cause and just firebomb it into oblivion. But I digress.

Probably the best of Parker's storylines was his holiday romance with a woman named Sophie. This initially appeared to be a complete mirror image of Goodman's romance with Martha, which ultimately led to him departing the show (and the pair getting their own spinoff series) but subsequently developed into something much more interesting. I doubt any of you reading this particularly care about Death in Paradise spoilers, but for the sake of anyone who might fancy watching this silly show, I will refrain from giving any further details for now.

Parker's finale, which saw him all set to depart Saint-Marie on a worldwide journey of self-discovery — just in time for Florence to return to the island and realise her feelings for him — was a good one, too. The promotional material for the episodes on BBC iPlayer did a good job of implying that it might be Parker who ended up murdered in his last episode — as previously noted, it wouldn't be the first time the show had killed off its lead — but he ultimately got a good, happy sendoff. I was glad about that; as a character, it felt like he deserved a happy ending. Not that Miller's poor old DI Poole didn't, but the surprise, sudden nature of his departure was very effective, and I'm not sure it would have worked for a second time, even with multiple seasons in between them.

Anyway, I'm surprised at a few things about my enjoyment of this show. Firstly, quite how attached I am to the various characters. Secondly, how well it handles feeling coherent despite a core cast that has been almost completely replaced multiple times over the course of its various seasons. By firmly grounding the show in its geographical setting, and having characters like Commissioner Patterson and bar owner-turned-mayor Catherine, the show establishes itself as a firm base that the rotating core cast builds atop, and it works. It helps prevent the show feeling too stale — and it's nice to see that some characters do get the chance to come back, too. I was particularly pleased to see the return of Danny John-Jules' Dwayne Myers, especially since his former squeeze Darlene had become an officer of the Honoré force in the meantime.

It's ultimately all rather silly comfort TV, and I suspect as soon as I've finished watching its complete run, I'll forget all about it. But for now, Death in Paradise has been a thoroughly pleasant watch — and I look forward to seeing where it goes from hereon.

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#oneaday Day 388: Death in Paradise

I've started watching Death in Paradise. This is a TV show that my wife watched in its entirety during quiet and boring moments at work a while back (she has a lot of quiet and boring moments at her job) and which I always enjoyed any time I happened to sit in the comfy chair in her study, usually to cuddle a demanding cat.

After watching Shakespeare & Hathaway: Private Investigators and A Good Girl's Guide to Murder, I thought I may as well just watch Death in Paradise from the start. And I'm really enjoying it.

For the uninitiated, Death in Paradise is a heavily formulaic murder mystery show in which a fish-out-of-water detective from Great Britain (or, for a period later in its run, Ireland) finds themselves acting as the Detective Inspector for a little police station in the town of Honoré on the fictional Caribbean island of Saint Marie. Initially, this role is taken up by Ben Miller (of comedy duo Armstrong and Miller fame) who plays Detective Richard Poole, but over the course of the show's complete run to date, the lead role changes several times — including, via a rather ballsy move at the opening of the third series, the murder of said lead. Spoilers, I guess.

Death in Paradsise is not a particularly demanding watch. And when I say it's formulaic, I really mean it; each episode very much has a standard structure, and it sticks pretty rigidly to that format. Sometimes this sort of thing annoys me, as I find myself expecting each of the obvious story beats, but the cases themselves are interesting and varied enough that the repetitive structure of the show has not yet become an issue for me.

The show is helped along very much by its cast. Thus far, I'm coming towards the end of the second season, so I'm still in Ben Miller/Detective Richard Poole territory, but I've caught a little bit of several of the later series, which include excellent comic actors such as Kris Marshall, Ardal O'Hanlon and Ralf Little. The supporting characters are also very good, with Danny John-Jules (best known as Cat from Red Dwarf) putting in a particularly strong performance as one of the station's regular police officers, and Don Warrington as Commissioner Selwyn Patterson steals the show any time he's on screen with his understated, deadpan performances.

The show strikes a great balance between serious drama and entertainment. It's not as explicitly comedic as something like Shakespeare & Hathaway, but it is notably light-hearted — perhaps a strange thing to say about a show in which at least one person gets murdered every episode, but an accurate statement, nonetheless. It captures a good feeling of camaraderie between the core cast, and the growth in Miller's Poole character as the series goes on is endearing to watch, even as he remains steadfastly stiff-upper-lip British about everything.

Like I say, it's an undemanding watch, good to throw on when you don't really want to tax your brain too much, and thus I'm never going to hold it up as The Best Thing Ever or anything. But sometimes that doesn't matter; sometimes you just want something that has enough substance to be genuinely engaging and entertaining, but which doesn't make excessive demands of its audience. Death in Paradise very much falls into that category. No deep lore, no need to listen to podcasts to understand each episode after watching them, no worrying that you've missed out on major serialised storylines — aside from the occasional replacement of the lead role, of course.

It's simple, uncomplicated entertainment, and I'm all for that. So I'll be watching a lot more of it!

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#oneaday Day 366: Bardic Investigations

I have now watched roughly half of the complete run to date of Shakespeare and Hathaway: Private Investigators, and I'm still really enjoying it. It's low-effort TV but not in an "insulting to your intelligence" sort of way; more that it's quite gentle in terms of both it's dramatic and comedic aspects.

A good example of this is the fact that in the 21 episodes I've watched so far, there hasn't been a single fight scene, and action scenes in general are fairly limited. There's been a few car chases and a number of on-foot pursuits, too, but given the two protagonists are neither exactly in the prime of life, they mostly conclude with them outwitting their quarry rather than taking them down dramatically.

There's no swearing, either. I don't mind a bit of effing and jeffing at all — heaven knows I do it enough around here — but it is nice to watch a show that isn't being particularly tryhard about showing the "gritty" side of life.

In fact, as I noted in my first impressions, Shakespeare and Hathaway is mostly rather cartoonish, or perhaps more accurately, theatrical. Villains are unmistakably evil, with most of them practically twirling their figurative moustaches at every opportunity. Far from making the show cheesy and silly, though, this is one of many things that helps it to be so easily digestible and enjoyable without demanding too much of the viewer.

I'm not saying all TV should be like that by any means, but in an age where I know multiple people who won't start watching a new series if there isn't an analysis podcast running alongside it, it is very nice to watch something that just knows what it is, and which delivers consistent, straightforward entertainment.

An easy recommendation, then, if only for the exchange "What's the first rule of stakeouts?" "…no farting?"

#oneaday Day 357: Shakespeare & Hathaway

So, dear reader, you may be wondering: after my frankly unnecessary agonising over whether or not I "should" start watching it, given all the other stuff on my media plate right now, I did, in fact, start watching Shakespeare & Hathaway: Private Investigators. And I'm enjoying it a lot!

For the unfamiliar, Shakespeare & Hathaway (as I shall refer to it hereafter) is a fairly light-hearted crime drama about the unlikely Stratford-upon-Avon-based duo of private detective Frank Hathaway and his partner in crime-solving, Lu Shakespeare. The pair are brought together during the first episode when there is a murder case at Lou's wedding, and they just sort of… stick together after that.

Shakespeare & Hathaway is not a show that concerns itself with small details, such as whether or not Lu would be allowed to work with Frank as an investigator with no experience or qualifications — a quick Google reveals that private investigator licenses are not actually required here in the UK, but they are strongly advised — but rather in simply providing a series of interesting crimes for the duo to solve. And in that, it succeeds pretty admirably.

As with most crime dramas, each episode focuses on a single case. And they're a varied bunch, to be sure. In one episode, the duo are investigating on behalf of an undertaker who has been given 24 hours to live by a pair of sinister hitmen. In another, they look into the case of a boy who has curious blackouts and is convinced that he is going to commit a murder. In another still, a gift shop owner turns up dead after an apparently botched break-in, but something just doesn't quite seem right.

One of the things I really like about the show is how it isn't afraid to be kind of "cartoony", particularly where its villains are concerned. This is a show where the villains don't exactly twirl their moustaches and do full-on evil laughs, but they honestly come pretty damn close on quite a few occasions.

Perhaps it's more accurate (and fitting) to say that the show is rather theatrical, given its setting and title — and the fact that Shakespeare and Hathaway's long-suffering assistant Sebastian is a RADA-trained (but out-of-work, natch) actor. And, yes, he is often convinced to perform (pun intended) undercover assignments that involve him dressing up in elaborate costumes and often playing "characters" that are very different from his rather mild-mannered but camp and sarcastic real persona. The highlight so far was a scene where he attended a cross-dressing bar and made such a convincing woman that he turned everyone's heads — and I suspect more than a few viewers might not have immediately clocked it was him until he opened his mouth, either.

Also, as you might expect given the Stratford setting, the show is riddled with Shakespearean references, both subtle and slap-you-in-the-face obvious. But Bard nerds will be happy.

The show's not going to win any grand awards or be remembered for years to come, I'm sure. But it is an eminently likeable piece of television, featuring a central cast who have good chemistry with one another. This isn't a show about said central cast going through high drama or amazing revelations — at least, it hasn't been yet — but I'm honestly fine with that. Frank is a pleasingly likeable, flawed everyman type — and I appreciate that he's a larger gentleman, played excellently by Mark Benton — while Lu is someone keen to prove her usefulness, yet endearingly ditzy. There's more than a touch of Daisy from Spaced about her in terms of personality and mannerisms.

I'm coming up on the end of the first series, and I've very much enjoyed it so far. If you're a fan of crime drama that doesn't get too grim, and which takes joy in theatrics and comedy, I would comfortably recommend it to anyone. It's not a demanding watch, but it is oddly compelling. And I'm looking forward to watching more!

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#oneaday Day 165: A first look at Ludwig

Like many of us, I have become increasingly disillusioned with the role of police in today's society. I'm not an "ACAB" (look it up… actually, don't) type, but there have been too many instances in my personal experience of a clear crime being reported to the cops and them basically going ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ before spectacularly failing to do anything whatsoever. Despite this, I love a good detective drama, police procedural, anything like that. And so it was with some curiosity that I decided to start watching Ludwig from the BBC, a David Mitchell-fronted detective drama with a bit of a twist.

In Ludwig, Mitchell's character John Taylor is a renowned puzzle author who goes by the name "Ludwig", a nom de plume he adopted when first developing puzzles as a child while listening to Beethoven symphonies on vinyl records.

As the series opens, he is contacted by his identical twin brother's wife Lucy, who has booked a taxi for him to take the 150-mile drive to come and see her, but refuses to tell him anything. John, we quickly learn, is not a sociable type, and dislikes leaving the house at the best of times; Lucy, having known him (and his brother) since childhood, knows very well that presenting him with incomplete information will drive him nuts enough to actually leave his house and discover what mystery awaits his solution.

Turns out that Lucy's husband, John's brother James, has gone missing. He left behind a curious note basically telling his family to flee as quickly as possible; Lucy, being a headstrong type, refuses to do this and instead recruits John to pose as James — they are identical twins, remember — in an attempt to discover the truth of what happened to him. The only slight snag in this? James was a detective working at the local constabulary, meaning John must sneak into an environment he has no professional knowledge of and attempt to find some information from under the noses of people that, presumably, James knows quite well.

Matters are further complicated where, upon John's arrival at the police station, he is almost immediately dragged off to go and look at a crime scene. Caught in a situation where he is simply not able to refuse his partner, he ends up attending the scene of a murder and is completely out of his depth. After briefly fleeing the scene on the pretence of "getting some air", he realises that the case is nothing but a logic puzzle; putting on his "puzzling" hat, he then proceeds to solve it in the same manner he would solve one of those old logic puzzles from the books with the guy in his pyjamas on the front.

His unorthodox methods net him a suspect and a confession, though his colleagues and superiors note that had the confession not been forthcoming, the complete lack of evidence would have made the case impossible to prosecute.

What then follows is John continuing to pose as his brother, working on several cases while attempting to ascertain the truth of what happened to his brother. It gradually becomes apparent that his brother left a trail of puzzle-like "breadcrumbs" to follow, leading John to believe that his disappearance was not accidental or circumstantial; it was planned out in advance. And cracking a cipher James left behind in his notebooks is going to be key to getting to the bottom of the case.

So far I've watched two episodes of the series with Andie and we've both enjoyed it a lot. Mitchell is, of course, playing a variation on the bumbling, socially awkward character he always plays, but it works well in the context. The positioning of an obviously autistic character in a professional role he is absolutely not comfortable with (or trained for) is, at times, borderline farcical, but suspension of disbelief allows you to simply enjoy the spectacle of what unfolds. They mysteries presented are intriguing and keep you guessing, and John's tendency to follow through on his "hunches" keeps things interesting and pacy.

The music throughout each episode is absolutely excellent, too; perhaps predictably for a show called Ludwig, it's all based on themes by Beethoven. Rather than just using the themes straight, however, they are all interesting rearrangements, with variations on Für Elise making up the majority of the soundtrack and the show's main theme.

Genre critics might argue that each individual episode maybe wraps itself up a little too neat and tidily to be truly plausible — in both the episodes so far, the case being solved was dependent on one of the suspects "cracking" under the pressure of John's logical deductions — but honestly? I don't care. For the most part, I don't engage with any form of fiction, regardless of medium, to ponder its realism; I engage with it to be entertained and to get to know interesting characters. And Ludwig certainly provides both in spades. It's good, old-fashioned, entertaining television that strikes an excellent balance between drama and moments of levity, as one has surely come to expect from anything with Mitchell involved at this point.

It's a short series — just six hour-long episodes — so I'm looking forward to seeing where things go. I'm definitely glad I started watching it, and if you enjoy a good mystery, I'd recommend you give it a look, too.

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