McCallum

Thanks to the Shazam app, I was finally able to identify the gorgeous intro & closing music to McCallum. It's a song called Country Memories by Guy Fletcher & Rod Williams. I've spent hours trying to ID this instrumental & finally I found it.

I like the series but have always wondered if Brits can recognise accents.

They keep indicating that Zara Truner's character is from Dublin. Now, there is no way that you can miss her Belfast accent, so why bother? Just doesn't make sense.

As with some of the best films and series, I stumbled across this quite by accident. It was late, a storm was in full force outside and I was sitting comfortably on the sofa when I flicked past a channel that was just about to show one of the episodes. I intended merely to watch a couple of minutes while waiting for the commercials to be finished on another channel before switching back to some or other sitcom. About an hour and a half later I remembered my resolve and was so happy that I hadn't done that. Needless to say I made sure I saw all the other episodes.

John Hannah has been brilliant in almost everything I have seen him in and he does not let down here either. All other cast members do a stellar job too. My personal favourite (aside from John Hannah, of course) is Gerard Murphy.

The only negative side to this series are the limited amount of episodes. Only 8 with JH himself and an additional 1 with someone else. I would love to see McCallum back on the screens, though it would have to be with JH!

The first couple of episodes were pretty good, but things went down hill from there. McCallum's personal life became the focus rather than being a background element. I wonder if they didn't change writers: the plots became implausible. The pacing was slow. They appear to have tried to stretch material that suited a one hr. show into 1.5 hrs. Midway through the second season we abandoned the show. My wife and I wouldn't recommend it. There is no way that this show deserves the high rating that it has on IMDB.

I love this series, my only complaint being the brevity of it. I would have liked to see more episodes with this fine ensemble cast, led by John Hannah. The opening credits with the beautiful aerial views of London are stunning. I was prompted to write this to correct what is misleading in the Trivia paragraph about this show. It most definitely is set in London and not my beloved Edinburgh.