Simon from London summed it up well in his 2000 review...
The first series' theme song sounded like the opening to 'A Touch Of Frost' and the second series intro theme sounded like 'The Sweeney'! From the third series on, they settled for scene intros.
As popular as this was back in the early eighties, the evolution of TV has exposed its flaws. Jill Gascoine frequently drifts in and out of a terrible cockney accent, the 'crim-speak' ("E's got a shooter, guv?") is straight out of a comic book and the dramatic dialog is very wordy and borders on pretentious and preachy... but back then we were easily fooled and it's unfair to base a very old drama based on precepts and expectations of today.
There's a lot of nostalgic value to be had by watching the re-runs. Britain was going through a seismic social and cultural update and many episodes reflect these changes well. The interesting thing about this series (which probably kept it afloat long past it's 'sell-by date') was the diversity of the topics it covered. Although the central players remained the same, the 'song' didn't. Each week would toss out a surprise of its own.
William Marlowe and the other actors were a treat to watch, as they managed to play it straight-faced despite some bizarre lines they had to mete out.
Interestingly, the BBC came out with an almost identical police procedural featuring a lead woman detective which ran for the same amount of time: Juliet Bravo. The BBC version had a better theme song, better graphics and even better guest actors... Inspector Jean Darblay, though, was a business-like copper rather than the flawed and much more interesting Det. Insp. Maggie Forbes.
Nonetheless, it was still the same dreary and depressing view of the 1980s! There's not much to choose between the two. Check them out on YouTube!
