Line of Duty Series 2 Episode 3 Review

Line of Duty Series 2 Episode 3 Review

*This review contains spoilers*

We're halfway through the series now, and I'm just as hooked as ever. Though it felt slightly more muted this week (literally because there was no jaw dropping moment towards the end), Line of Duty remains incredibly gripping, with sterling performances throughout.

I'm writing this review a week or so after watching the episode (damn university assignments taking precedence), so my memory is starting to get a little sketchy, but there were several things that stood out to me with this episode. Firstly is Denton's slow descent into that of a beaten and downtrodden woman. It's looking increasingly more likely that she is innocent, as her situation worsens with a spell in jail under the care of two corrupt prison wardens (for whom torture with scalding water seems a natural course of action) eliciting more and more sympathy for the character. It's fairly difficult seeing someone who is obviously a hardened (too hardened in some respects) person looking like they are reaching the depths of despair. It doesn't need saying how brilliant Keeley Hawes is in all of this. It's great for the story that at the very end, Arnott tells her that he believes her story.

With respect of the rest of the police, they all look like getting into trouble themselves. Arnott clearly made a mistake getting into a relationship with one of the key witnesses (a nurse) to the death of the key witness from the opening episode. Hastings does the right thing in going to Dryden to confess his financial woes, but I doubt that's the last we've heard of it. Fleming tells Arnott that she is having an affair with the deceased DS Akers' husband, and DS Akers was apparently receiving large amounts of money from somewhere, putting her firmly under suspicion. So many secrets starting to come out, all of which are obviously going to end badly. Having not seen Series 1, and only getting a vague indication of the character from wikipedia, the introduction of Craig Parkinson's DI Cottan ruffles plenty of feathers (never has a character been referred to in so sweary a way so frequently) without me really knowing much about his character, but anything I've seen Parkinson in has delivered a fantastic performance, so I'm glad to see him in the show.

I'm definitely wishing that I'd been able to watch Series 1 first at this stage, but due to a very long wait at the library this isn't possible. It's little things like learning the witness who dies in Episode 1 is a main character from Series 1, thus making the shock discovery at the end of Episode 2 actually shocking, that I feel I'm missing out on, so I'm hoping that this isn't going to continue too much for the rest of this series. Whether Cottan's past is going to play a big part of not I don't know, but I suspect it will.

Denton's suggestion to Fleming that Dryden might have something to do with all this because of their affair a few years back gives us another suspect to throw into the mix, and it certainly seems to be the main catalyst for getting Arnott (and presumably soon, Fleming) on her side. If the rest of this series is as entertaining as the first half, I'm in for a huge treat.