Review: Murdered By My Father, Tuesday 29th March, BBC3

C) BBC – Photographer: Des Willie

Twenty-fourteen’s Murdered By My Boyfriend was a harrowing tale based on a real-life story, detailing an abusive relationship that culminated in the brutal murder of a young woman. Not only was it an engrossing, compelling and extremely difficult to watch drama, it was also a necessary watch – it shed light on the kinds of power relationships that exist within an abusive relationship that are rarely reported by the media, and answered that age-old question: why did she ever stay with him? Its star, Georgina Campbell, rightly won a BAFTA for her incredible performance. Now there’s a follow-up – Murdered By My Father – which looks for all the world to be another difficult but vital watch.

NB: This is now online to watch, but many won’t have seen it yet. There are spoilers ahead.

Was Rowan Atkinson’s Maigret too deadpan?

(c) Photographer John Rogers.

We had our first taste of Rowan Atkinson’s Maigret last night, in the feature-length story Sets A Trap. When Atkinson was first announced to play Georges Simenon’s classic early 20th century Parisian detective it divided opinion – surely someone who has made a living from comic characters couldn’t pull off the deadpan Maigret? Fans of classic crime fiction are very strong in their opinions, but for the most part, Atkinson seemed to go down well. While it wasn’t perfect, Sets A Trap was an entertaining enough couple of hours. But there has been a question nagging at me since I saw it a few weeks ago.

Review: Maigret (Sets A Trap), Monday 28th March, ITV

Parisian Chief Inspector Jules Maigret first appeared in 1931 and smoked his thoughtful way through an amazing 75 novels and 28 short stories (often at the rate of three novels a year). His creator Georges Simenon was Belgian rather than French, but moved to Paris in 1922 to further his writing career. Maigret has been portrayed (in English) by Rupert Davies in the 60s and Michael Gambon in the 90s, and now by Rowan Atkinson in a new ITV series. Atkinson’s first two-hour first episode, Maigret Sets a Trap, is based on the 1955 novel of the same name.