Cardinal

Billy Campbell (John Cardinal) is the Demián Bichir of Canadian TV drama. He looks at the camera and says his lines and you believe every word he says, but more than that, you would give anything to know what he's thinking.

The show may come across as plodding to people expecting an action series with a Hannibal Lector-like serial killer, but the show is a character-driven drama featuring a cast of flawed people very reminiscent of "Nordic Noir" shows such as "Wallander", but very unapologetic Canadian very with very good sense of place. Algonquin Bay on the show, and in the original novels, is quite clearly North Bay, Ontario in all but name (many of the same street names, located between the same lakes, and geographically in the same location), and the show, as with the novels, touches on the mix of English, French, and First Nations groups that form the culture of the area. And anyone who has lived in communities in northern Canada can sympathize with water lines freezing.

Billy Campbell does good work playing the troubled, but very good detective Cardinal, while Karinne Vanasse plays his partner Lise Delorme --also from the novels, lest people think they were casting a French-Canadian actress simply as a token--as equally competent, if not as experienced. The dynamic between is certainly not a copy of the Holmes-Watson relationship that people might be tempted to assume it is, and the pair do a very good job of portraying a detective paired up with a partner who is just as good as he is.

Overall, a very engrossing series again, as long as you aren't expecting shootouts or a serial killer leaving taunting clues.

Following closely the story arcs from the BBC hit HINTERLAND, although with more dollops of sadism, this could be the best Canadian show ever produced in terms of script, direction, casting, and production. The problem is that this specific type of series is so depressing (not really a police procedural at all!) that the day eventually comes when even the most loyal viewer has to choose between jumping to the next episode ... or seeking psychiatric help.

And had no idea after watching the first two seasons of this excellent Canadian police drama that two more seasons were made and available until today. John Cardinal, well played by Billy Campbell, is a haunted homicide cop because of his wife's ongoing mental illness. Each season deals with different homicides as Cardinal works through dealing with a new partner, wonderfully played by French Canadian, Karine Vanasse as Lise Delorme. I think Season 1 is still my favorite, but as each season builds on the relationships and casualties suffered by Cardinal, I never lost interest in any way.

In many ways, Cardinal is my favorite show about cops; the things they experience, the way they are treated and treat each other, and mostly the grief many cops suffer because they are often torn between the job and their responsibilities to their families. This show is raw in portraying the secrets they must keep, the horror of what they witness, the guilt they carry when they cannot solve every crime, the life they choose to try to bring Justice to a populace that many times does not appreciate them. As well as the corruption and inner politics they must muddle through to get their jobs done.

I watch many cop shows and there are other excellent shows: Law&Order, Law&Order Criminal Intent, Prime Suspect, Vera, The Fall, Hinterland, and so many more on Peacock, Acorn and Brit Box. Cardinal is on Hulu! I'm not sure why Cardinal has stayed with me (so has Criminal Intent), and I watch those two over and over. There is something that touches a nerve in me in these shows and when they are well written with great characters and actors perfect for that character, I just wish they would never end. Highly recommend Cardinal if you love really good murder mysteries. As an addendum, we also discovered "Class of '09", an FBI thriller that takes place over 25 years last night and binged it. It is also on Hulu and highly recommended! But Cardinal is still my favorite. If you love a good, complex mystery cop show, watch Cardinal!

I've seen 3 episodes so far. Actually the Algonquins were in this area, which was disputed in a different review. They were and remain very much in the North Bay region, which is where the fictional Algonquin Bay is based on. The role of Lise Delorm played by Karine Vanasse is spot on in my opinion. The Giles Blunt books depict Lise as French Canadian and again to dispute an earlier review, many of the northern Ontario towns are french or half-french - Mattawa near North Bay for instance. So it is not really a stretch as suggested. I've read all the John Cardinal books and I think the casting is excellent. I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of the series before submitting a review, but the landscape captured in the series evokes the mood of the book very well.