Hard Sun

The British are great at writing crime, this serie is another proof of that. While crime is not usually my favorite genre, I do like Luther and that series comes from the hand of Neil Cross. Since this mini-serie is written by him too I decided to give it a go, and I wasn't disappointed.

Agyness Deyn, who plays the role of Elaine Renko, was originally a model before she got into acting. When I read that I almost couldn't believe it, because she puts down a very convincing performance, that seems to come natural to her. Her character is a tough cookie and it's definitely not one you'd like to pick a fight with. As we get further into the series we do see more depth added to her character, which makes her all the more interesting.

The other lead role is played by Jim Sturgess. He portrays the character of Charlie Hicks, a cop with a rogue edge but otherwise a good man. Or at least, he thinks he is, but the story itself leaves the viewer to make up their own mind about that.

And that is not the only issue on which the viewer gets to fill in the blanks. A lot is left unanswered, but not in an annoying way. Or at least to me it wasn't irritating, but some people may not like it. I however, think it was done in a good way and with a satisfying ending.

The writer, Neil Cross, has said he was interested in doing a fiver year story arc, but to the best of my knowledge the series hasn't be renewed. It's a shame, because it's rare to see doomsday genres combined with crime, and it's even more rare to see it being done with this level of quality.

My hope is that if one makes the effort to look past the action (a spectacular choreography, by the way) and this genre-specific plot clichés, one's going to find a fresh and an interesting take on the age old dilemma that entertains the question whether people as a whole (as a society; as a global collective, if you wish) ought - let alone deserve - to be made aware of all the details and parameters of an impending extinction-level event.

Or, in other words - will we succumb to our most primal and atavistic impulses and instincts? Or maybe human spirituality's evolution has had finally caught up with the technological one? Are we all remaining to be simply cavemen (and "cavewomen", lets not be sexist ;) with cell phones and lap tops, or at last we've crossed over some kind of a mental - or a spiritual - threshold, thus becoming something... more? The thing is, we won't be sure which is it until we actually find ourselves on the precipice of some catastrophic, cataclysmic event. Once we had been reduced to creatures that act solely on their instincts and nothing else, then it will become clear whether the human nature has had evolved beyond that of cavemen (and cavewomen - I would hate to find this review dismissed on grounds of sexism and misogyny, hehe).

I think that the series have the real potential to gain "a must-watch" status. It all depends on whether the show's creators have dedicated more screen time and a stronger accent to the question has the humanity's mentality's evolution reached the point where we had finally become mentally fit enough to survive a global cataclysm.

If not, at least the show's entertaining, if nothing else.

I hope there will be a second season because there are several questions left open. I really liked the characters and I liked especially that within the main story there are several smaller stories around the main characters. I can only recommend this series and I hope for a sequel.

Granted, it isn't a whole lotta sci-fi... but it does do what good sci-fi does best which is explore humanity.

Really liked it, probably a bit too much cliche in there to go above 8 though.

The premise for the show is set up very early on, there is a problem with the sun and the experts give us 5 yrs to live.

Two detectives played by Agyness Deyn and Jim Sturgess come across this information on a flash drive.

The premise for the show is an interesting one, when faced with futility how do these two detectives continue with their jobs while also knowing that many crimes they are solving, they are partly responsible for !!

Its an interesting question that has been encapsulated by this show and I think its the first time I have seen such an idea in television. The pyscholgoical ideologies that are set up for the show are great although I felt that they could have been taken further. I understand why the writers didn't take the show deeper as it would have made it very dark indeed.

Its comes in 6 episodes that are fast paced and for the most part well acted especially by the two leads. There are flaws to the show, they seemed to want to include as many liberal or politically correct influences as possible and while I am pretty liberal it did get a bit annoying and distracting. Other than that this was a great bit of BBC television drama.

8/10 Well done Auntie