Miss Sherlock

I had all but given up on watching this show having found nothing but a low quality version of episode two on a streaming site which wasn’t exactly easy to watch. But with subs on d-addicts, I was able to sit down last night with the first episode.

While I can’t call myself a fan, I do enjoy a good Sherlock, whether it be true to the original or a reinvention and this one, produced by the TV Channel Hulu, is apparently the first in which both main roles have been changed to women. I can’t see how this has changed anything but setting the story in modern day Japan seems to have caused a few minor rewrites. Wato-san, the doctor, is just back from voluntary work in Syria instead of Waston’s recent time in the army in Afghanistan.

The story is not a rewrite of a Conan Doyle story, but is a brand new mystery: two totally unconnected people die by a small bomb in their stomach going off. How did it get in there, and why were they targetted?

Episode one seemed a bit rushed. The clues were clearly signposted and there were few opportunities for clever Sherlockian deduction and even those were pretty uninspiring. Also, there was no attempt at slowly introducing an evil genius orchestrating everything: instead, Sherlock just started shouting “Who’s behind all this?” once the mystery had been solved. And then, right at the end, the two lead characters have to move in together because Wato-san’s hears that her hotel has just burnt down. How convenient.

So, a clunky start, but still quite enjoyable.

In The Endless Zanhyang, We Are (Mother's Ruin, Bristol, 9 May 2018)

During the two years or so when I wasn't writing for this blog, I found a YouTube channel called "C Lippe" which regurarly posts live gigs from various South Korean bands. In The Endless Zanhyang We Are were one of those bands and the only one to really take a hold of me. I thought they were amazing and for the past eighteen months my mp3 player has always had something of theirs on it, whether it was the LP, EP or some live mp3s I ripped from YouTube.

Recently, I learnt through Facebook that they were playing their first gigs in the UK. Such is my love for this band, that I would've happily travelled hundreds of miles to see their first gig on British soil. As it was, it was only a twenty minute walk from my flat. How convenient.

The best bit about reviewing music on the Internet is that instead of describing the sound, you can post a handy link that would tell the reader all they need. Here’s a link to some live stuff from earlier this year.

Suffice to say, I find it both elegiac and immense, fragile and over-powering. The set itself was only half an hour long, held in a room over a pub that might hold fifty people at a pinch, but the smallness of the venue mattered little once they started playing. The lead vocalist went from gentle crooning to banshee wailing, arching her back and throwing out emotions far bigger than the room could comfortably contain.

The drums powered through, driving each song forward and I remember thinking how much more rhythmic and raw it felt compared to the studio album. The bass guitar added melody to the drums while the guitar acted as a counterpoint to the vocals and keyboard before heading off on its own into wild pounding chords, sending the song further and further away from its starting point before bringing it all back round again.

A stunning performance and, by itself, was worth the entrance fee. They were actually fourth on the bill. Astonishing. Their name should be tattooed on every shoulder blade and down every calf muscle in the Western world, in my opinion.

But, yeah. Incredible. If you need someone to restore your faith in music, then give them a try.

Track listing for the night
1. 5.41
2. Greensleeves
3. And So It Goes
4. Nightglow Sea
5. What If

Signal – Chouki Mikaiketsu Jiken Sousahan

In this series, two police officers communicate solely by walkie-talkie in order to solve cold cases. The twist being that one is living in the past. As well as these two individuals is a third officer who worked with the first as a trainee and now works with the other one as a detective.

In this kind of story it can be difficult to maintain a logic guiding the time anomaly. This is especially the case in Signal, since the communications from the past aren’t even in chronological order: the first two transmissions are from a particular year and then the next (which doesn’t happen until eight years later) is from three years previously.

If I’ve made it look complicated then don’t be put off. This all happens over the course of the first two episodes and the phenomena is introduced slowly, so there’s plenty of time to understand what’s going on.

As a police drama, it works well. The stories are interesting, the procedures seem realistic and it’s played straight. The acting is fine, with Kitamura Kazuki putting in by far the most compelling performance as Ouyama, the police officer from the 1990s.

Everyone else is good, but a little bit typical for the genre: there's the gruff career cop, the US-trained profiler with his new-fangled ways, the female detective who is basically The Sensible One in the team and, of course, an evil police commissioner. But I suppose you need a few archetypes in a police drama. It certainly saves time in introducing characters.

I’ve already seen the original Korean drama so, if it stays true to that storyline, I know it’ll be a strong drama with a satisfying conclusion. And so far it seems to be doing just that. This is a great example of how to do a drama that links two different timelines without it getting messy or unrealistic.