bschwanzen

Ripper Street is a triumph on many levels. The acting is superb, the mysteries are riveting, and the narrative from week to week makes you more immersed and vested in the characters. The concept allows us to see how detectives solved crimes way before CSI, DNA, and forensics. But here's the real appeal of the show: There are many strong characters (police, prostitutes, girlfriends, mistresses, wives, criminals), each of whom have very differing motivations and aspirations, that constantly collide with each other. Their secrets, their intentions, and their loyalties add a fantastic backdrop to the "mystery of the week" making for one compelling drama. Bravo!

The premise is appealing, and the series even suggests through its tone and design that it has the aspirations of becoming the "Friends" for the millennium generation, but boy did they miss the mark. The characters are complete caricatures, have adolescent motivations, and seem to have absolutely no level of intelligence whatsoever. Every predicament they find themselves in can be solved by a five year old. But character's shortcomings can easily be forgiven if they are funny...and unfortunately these are not. They feel fake, as does every moment, making it difficult to find anything endearing about the leads. I DVRd the first season and finally watched the first couple of episodes tonight, and I quickly deleted the rest. A bad laugh track does not help either...forcing us to think something is funny, ironically, makes it less funny. I hear it has a new season coming soon. If they removed the bad 70s laugh track, added more realism and believable situations, and toned down the over the top aspect of every character interaction maybe I'll give it another watch...but that's a big "if".