Tag Archives: plot

Death in Paradise – Review

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I don’t know if you are all familiar with Death in Paradise – if you aren’t I’m afraid this might not be the post for you.

It’s average. The setting, a Caribbean Island, is outstanding, the cast is strong and they work well together, and the lead actors have all been good. Some of the plots have been as good as anything you will find anywhere, others have been weak. Last night’s, I felt, was weak, far-fetched and was on shaky ground ballistically. In these days we have all been trained by  CSI we all expect good science.

The plots are also formulaic, with a set-up, a moment where the Inspector has a revelation, and  gathering of suspects for a Christie style denouement. Unfortunately they often fail to develop character in the suspects and I’m not really bothered who did it, or if there are consequences.

That’s not to say I don’t like the series, I do. It’s pleasant and easy to watch, the plots are mostly acceptable and there are plenty of secondary stories to keep me pleasantly involved.

Regarding the main actors – the Detective Inspectors from London – they have all been slightly quirky and have all been played by decent actors. I like Ben Miller and I like Kris Marshall, and they both played the part well. I was a little concerned over Ardal O’Hanlon as he was a bigger name than the other two, and could well have overpowered it, but he didn’t. I had no worries with Ralf Little coming in because he’s done some good stuff over the years. And I was wrong.

I have no problem with Ralf Little as an actor, and from what I’ve seen and read think he seems like a good bloke, but he has been saddled with such an unbelievable and dislikeable character that it isn’t working for me. And as the formulaic quirky DI begins to creak the whole nature of the programme starts to fail.

This, of course, is just my opinion. I’m not a drama critic, and I set out to write a blog post about medallions, so have been side-tracked again. Did anyone else see it, and if you did, what did you think?

Sorry about the photos – it’s the best I can do, as photos of the Caribbean aren’t really a feature of my work.

Banknote from Suriname

Banknote from Suriname

A Dream with an Unlikely Plot

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I normally find dreams difficult to remember, and find most of them, including my own, to be incomprehensible and dull.

On the other hand, I need a subject to write about before going to work and packing 3,000 sixpences. It’s going to be a tedious morning and I may not feel like posting after a morning sorting obsolete small change.

Last night, having already slept for five hours in the afternoon/evening, I went to bed and slept deeply again. This wasn’t unexpected as I still have the last stages of a cold, have spent two nights from the last four sitting up until 4 am wrestling poetry submissions into shape, and got up earlier than was ideal yesterday.

The dream started with me in the middle of the action, eavesdropping on Nigel Farage on the eve of his wedding in a Scottish Castle, as he outlined his cunning plan to usurp the British Royal Family using the pedigree of his new wife (who was, it seems, connected to royalty in the distant past).

As plots go, it has a few holes, as I’m not sure what Farage’s current marital status is, how succession to the royal family works and, more importantly, how you go about usurping something.

I’m guessing, with his political history, that he’d take whatever steps were needed to marry, that the lady must have been of Stuart stock, and that you don’t just go down to Buckingham Palace, knock on the door and tell the House of Windsor to sling their hooks. There would, I assume be a protocol to usurpation, which Farage, being privately educated, and having worked in the City, would know about. Otherwise there would be a definite danger that Prince Harry, egged on by his grandfather, would take a horsewhip to the oily oik and cut his dreams of grandeur down to size.

Jacobites have never done well in their attempts to retrieve the throne.

The second part of this unlikely dream centred round my attempts to buy a compass late at night in the Scottish Highlands, pinning most of my hopes on finding a late night TESCO. I’m fairly sure that late night superstores are thin on the ground in the Highlands.

I needed the compass, and a torch, in order to navigate a microlight through the night to London to alert the Royal Family to the danger they were in.

Yes, I realise there are holes in this plot too, including the danger, when knocking on the door of Buckingham Palace with my warning, of Prince Harry etc…

I’m also pretty sure, as I write, that this dream is loosely based on a John Buchan novel.

Why, you may ask, would you need a compass when a mobile phone holds enough technology to land me on the moon, not just London? That’s similar to a plot point in Iron Sky, though I would like to point out I’ve never actually seen it, just read about it.

Anyway, even if I had a compass, and access to a microlight, why would they send a fat man who is scared of heights on an important mission like that.

Come to think of it, why not just phone and tell people.

It’s a good thing I woke up, as there was obviously going to be a point where the whole thing just became very silly.

Microlight over Sandsend