Fallen Angels

This is a quality episode that could have been drawn out by another half hour.

The apparent suicide and murder of a family gives our characters opportunity to show case their acting skills. Although Alex Norton still feels the need to grind out every thought.

The producers should have given thought to creating three or four feature length episodes per year. Taggart wasn't broken. It just needed to pace itself.

In the end this episode is a winner. If the series is to end after nearly three decades I'm glad its going out on a high.

'Taggart' "Fallen Angels" (2010)

Opening thoughts: 'Taggart' had declined quite a bit by this point. There was a feel of it having run out of ideas and had completely lost its spark. Especially in the later Burke period episodes, that suffered further from the shorter lengths. "Fallen Angels" was one of the Burke period episodes that somehow was seen later on after the show had ended, shortly before getting into the Taggart and Jardine eras (and much preferring them on the whole in all honesty).

"Fallen Angels" however was proof that 'Taggart' did still have some mileage in it and worth sticking with. Will admit to not remembering that much about it on first watch, but rewatching it recently "Fallen Angels" has grown on me quite a lot. While there are a couple of the things that brought the latter Burke episodes down that were common throughout his period, it is still very good. Not quite on great level like "Compensation", "Judgement Day", "A Death Foretold" and "Pinnacle" but much better than "Genesis" and "Law" at any rate.

Bad things: It is too short in length, the latter Burke episodes really did suffer from the lengths being significantly shorter (over half as long) which was a hindrance when having stories that leant themselves much better to two hours.

Like all the later episodes of 'Taggart', what does distract is now rather out of date and not very well fitting music. It was fine in the 80s and 90s and fitted then, at this point it was at odds with the action and like 10 plus years too late.

Good things: Other than that, "Fallen Angels" has a huge amount to like and even love. The photography is both gritty yet moody, very well suited to the story's style, and the location is striking yet suitably unforgiving. The theme tune is hard to forget and still works, it's the background music that doesn't work and there has been nothing held against the theme tune.

From a writing point of view, "Fallen Angels" has the right amount of entertainment value (the banter) and grit (in the crime solving it doesn't shy away). The story is never too simple, with it being very twisty, or too complicated, neither does it come over as too rushed too much (considering the length that's amazing). The truth wasn't a shock but it wasn't too obvious either.

The team work really well together and the acting is very good all round.

Closing thoughts: All in all, very good.

8/10.