The Mire

Had me drawn in, once I started watching I couldn't stop. Well written, and nicely paced, There's nothing dumb or not believable. The acting is outstanding, I'd love to see another season.

My one piece of advice is that you don't leave gaps of more than one day between episodes, especially if your memory isn't brilliant or you're prone to lapses of concentration. You WILL get hopelessly lost (I did). With that qualification out of the way, I thought it was well conceived and executed with no unnecessary gloss, which would have undermined the gritty atmosphere that the series evoked.

Living in Czechoslovakia/The Czech Republic in the 1990s so much of this rang true as far as life in this part of the world at that time. I would say they got the architecture, decore, fashion, and the way people behaved and communicated down very well, it was so much like what was still around and what I was told about (though in a different country), I saw the remenents of it, this, I would guess, was was it was really like. It was also shot and acted very well. As far as the story goes, I don't get how so many reviewers complain of being confused. There were the usual multiple threads, suspects, and gaps in the story for the viewers or protagonists to fill in. People should watch a little more closely and accept the fact that not everything is laid out for you and that things tie up, or sometimes don't, in the end. In general there was nothing flashy, the impressive thing was the everyday detail and convincing human aspect, like I said, they kept it simple in that sense, and got it right. I would hope there will be another series.

If you are watching from Neflix, ensure to watch from the beginning of each episode as for a certain reason Netflix skips the beginning as if it was a Recap and actually it gives key elements of the story. The subtitles are terrible. I usually prefer to watch in original language but I realized there was a lot of flaws, so I switched quickly to English audio and it was better.

This is top notch- not to be faulted on any front. Beautifully shot, wonderfully acted and directed. The storytelling is utterly impressive: each scene builds anticipation and you end up watching actively, with many mysteries, small and large, to solve. What is told and not told, what must be revealed and when- these are the crucial questions that only the best writers know how to convey. And aside from that, the revelation of a moment, a cultural ethos, is outstanding. At this point in tv watching we are spoiled by easy access to fanatstic tv and drama- but this then has ended up raising standards and expectations. There are a lot of very good shows out there - few that are excellent and outstanding. This is one of the outstanding ones.