I had thought right away that because SHOOT TO KILL had the name Peter Kominsky in the credits I`d be watching an entirely biased , speculative infactual docudrama that portrayed Northern Ireland policeman as SS troopers while armed terrorists were going to be shown as being either fiesty freedom fighters or peace loving pacifists . I must say I was surprised
This docudrama revolves around the very real life case of the investigation brought against E4A , the Royal Ulster Constabulary ( RUC ) elite undercover unit who were responsible for shooting dead several republican terrorists engaged in terrorist activities in 1982 . This led to the director of public prosecutions in Britain setting up " The Stalker Inquiry " where Deputy Chief Constable John Stalker ( Played here by Jack Shepard ) of Manchester police force investigated the cases to see if there were any unlawful killings by the RUC .
As I stated at the start of this review as was expecting there to be pro republican bias throughout but there`s none . In fact it`s a refreshing change to see terrorists in Ireland portrayed as terrorists with SHOOT TO KILL opening with a car bombing that murders three police reservists . The teleplay also shows the resentment shown by RUC men that the British state are investigating them when they`re engaged in a conflict against ruthless killers and Stalker is told " In the last year tweleve policemen , twenty eight soldiers and fifty seven innocent civilians have died at the hands of terrorists " , so thanks to the production team for pointing out that the IRA and INLA are not the boy scouts . The only thing the RUC men seen here are guilty of is that they falsified statements when engaged in their dangerous activities , and that they shot a couple of teenage boys who they genuinely thought were IRA members , and if after watching this you left unsatisfied by the conclusions the real life The Stalker Inquiry met the same fate as shown on screen here
