The Killing Times Top 20 Crime Dramas Of The Year 2020: Part one, 20-16

The countdown begins…

BOXSET REVIEW: Big Little Lies (Series 2)

The Monterrey Five is back.

Big Little Lies gets first trailer and transmission date for series two

Hot on the heels of mega-smash, US cable giant HBO, will be wheeling out another of its big guns – Big Little Lies.

The show, whose first series came in at number five in our end-of-year-chart in 2017, stars the likes of Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon and, this year, Meryl Streep.

Based on the same-titled best-seller by Liane Moriarty, series one of Big Little Lies weaved a darkly comedic tale of murder and mischief in the tranquil beachfront town of Monterey, California. Amid doting moms, successful husbands, beautiful children, and stunning homes existed a community fueled by rumours and divided into haves and have-nots, exposing fractured relationships between husbands and wives, parents and children, and friends and neighbours. Told through the eyes of three mothers – Madeline, Celeste and Jane – the series’ narrative explores society’s myths regarding perfection and its romanticization of marriage, sex, parenting and friendship. 

Now we not only know when series two will be broadcast in the US – which usally means a day-after date for us in the UK on Sky Atlantic – but we also have a trailer.

Series two of Big Little Lies will broadcast on HBO in the US from Sunday 9th June.

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Donald Sutherland joins cast of HBO’s The Undoing

Our interest was piqued when it was announced that Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant were to star in a new HBO thriller, The Undoing. Now we’re hearing that the venerable Donald Sutherland, who has been fantastic in Truth, has joined the cast.

An adaptation of Jean Hanff Korelitz’s book You Should Have Known, The Undoing centres on Grace Sachs (Kidman), who is living the only life she ever wanted for herself. She’s a successful therapist, has a devoted husband (Grant) and young son who attends an elite private school in New York City. Overnight a chasm opens in her life: a violent death, a missing husband, and, in the place of a man Grace thought she knew, only a chain of terrible revelations. Left behind in the wake of a spreading and very public disaster, and horrified by the ways in which she has failed to heed her own advice, Grace must dismantle one life and create another for her child and herself.

Sutherland will play Franklin Renner, Grace’s father, a retired financier and loving grandfather, who is tasked with protecting his family when turbulent revelations come to light.

More news as we get it.

Nicole Kidman to star in HBO thriller

Nicole Kidman is really getting stuck into television these days. And not just any-old television – crime drama television. First came Big Little Lies and then Top Of The Lake: China Girl, and now there’s a new HBO thriller in the works: The Undoing.

Based on Jean Hanff Korelitz‘s novel, You Should Have Known, The Undoing tells the story of Grace Reinhart Sachs, who is living the only life she ever wanted for herself, devoted to her husband, a pediatric oncologist at a major cancer hospital, their young son, Henry, and the patients she sees in her therapy practice. Grace is also the author of the forthcoming “You Should Have Known,” a book in which she castigates women for not valuing their intuition and calls upon them to pay attention to their first impressions of men. But weeks before the book is published, a chasm opens in her own life: a violent death, a missing husband, and, in the place of a man Grace thought she knew, only a chain of terrible revelations. Left behind in the wake of a spreading and very public disaster, and horrified by the ways in which she has failed to heed her own advice, Grace must dismantle one life and create another for her child and herself.

More news as we get it.

Nicole Kidman shares first image of Meryl Streep in Big Little Lies II

It’s a new world these days, where social media rules and news and information is communicated to the outside world through these different channels. These channels also allow for people who we once thought were untouchable to communicate directly with fans. Take Oscar-winning actress Nicole Kidman, for instance. She’s posted the first image of Meryl Streep from the set of series two of Big Little Lies on her instagram account. Which is nice for everyone.

Big Little Lies recommissioned for second series; Reese Witherspoon and Nicole onboard

HBO’s Big Little Lies (it was shown on Sky Atlantic in the UK), has been one of the crime dramas of the year so far. The tale of affluent, Californian women in meltdown was a brilliant whodunit with each episode unpeeling the layers of feuds, insecurities and strained family relationships. It boasted a stellar cast (Reese Witherspoon, Nicole Kidman and Laura Dern among them), and the news is this: it’s coming back for a second series.

Why Big Little Lies won big at the Emmys

HBO’s Big Little Lies – shown in the UK on Sky Atlantic – won big at the Emmys on Sunday night. It won Outstanding Limited Series, Outstanding Lead Actress In A Limited Series Or Movie (Nicole Kidman), Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Limited Series Or Movie (Alexander Skarsgard), Outstanding Directing For A Limited Series, Movie Or Dramatic Special (Jean-Marc Vallée), and Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Limited Series Or TV Movie (Laura Dern). That’s quite an impressive haul, and there’s no doubt the buzz around it and subsequent reviews of the show were very good. However, it was one of those shows that slipped through our net a bit – it premiered back at the start of the year, one of the busiest times in crime drama land. With that in mind, we thought now would be a good time to doff our cap and pay tribute to one of the starriest and unlikeliest crime drama hits of the year.

Review: Top Of The Lake: China Girl (S2 E5/6), Thursday 24th August, BBC Two

And so this head-scratching, sometimes infuriating, sometimes brilliant drama continued this week with another perplexing episode. There was so much good stuff in there, as usual, but there were more inconsistencies and scenes and character arcs where you just sat there and said to yourself, “Say what, now?”

NB: Spoilers ahoy!

Review: Top Of The Lake: China Girl (S2 E2/6), Thursday 3rd August, BBC2

There’s no doubt about it, Top Of The Lake: China Girl is an extraordinary examination of femininity and motherhood (more on that later), as well as a graphic and explicit indictment of the way men view and treat women, both in the workplace and in society as a whole. I’ve read some reviews of the first episode that stated that it was preposterously pretentious and yawnsome, but I just didn’t see that – I thought it was beautifully paced, often beautiful to look at, superbly and uniformly well performed, and featuring a story that was brimming with quirky, interesting characters and supreme darkness. Yes, Robin Griffin is the type of tortured female detective that we’ve seen a lot of in crime drama during the past five years, but I don’t mind watching another one go on her journey – as long as her reasons for being traumatised are believable and not just tacked on for effect, I’m fine with it because these are stories that still need to be told.

NB. Spoilers inside