[TV] Copper

[kronovan]

This just started airing on the Showcase channel in my Canadian city. It's produced by BBC America so now doubt it's being carried in the US. Unfortunately I only caught the last 20 minutes due to the network being incorrect in their ads about their PST time slot,    but what I caught looked quite good. It's main protagonist (played by Tom Weston-Jones) is an Irish Immigrant policeman named Kevin Corcoran, who uses state of the art 19th century forensics to solve crimes. It's the same 5 Points New York neighborhood of the 1860's that was also the setting for Scorcese's Gangs of New York.

The subject matter of the episode was very dark and the whole style and presentation of the setting echo'd that - heck it made Gangs of New York look almost cheery. Corcoran uses hardline tactics very much like law enforcers in Gangs of NY did, and some of them seemed pretty damn brutal. I'm not sold too much on the lead actor, but what little I saw of the rest of the cast was good. I loved Gangs of NY, so I'm looking forward to catching more of this.

[hepcat]

I had posted something about it earlier this year I believe, but I'm too tired to go looking for it, so I'll just add my two cents here. 

While I liked it, it just felt a bit rushed.  I hope they slow the pacing down a bit so we're not getting hit with a bunch of info that should have been given more attention.  I'm going to stick with it as it is a really cool premise for a show.  And the fact that he's not exactly a beacon of morality only makes it better considering the time and place. 

[kronovan]

Yup, the writing for this series has me concerned a bit. Kyle Bradsteet and Kevin Dieboldt are fresh off of Borgio which is a series I wasn't at all impressed with for writing or acting. I was hoping Tom Fontana and Will Rokos would be more involved with the scripts as they've both written some great stuff, but they both look to be more involved with the production. Still they're both credited with writing for the series, so I'm thinking at least some of the episodes are going to be good. I really didn't see enough of the last epsiode to guage the pacing, but at least some of the dialog was decent.

[hepcat]

I actually like The Borgias on showtime quite a bit.  It had a shaky start but they soon dived into the political intrigue and backstabbing that I love in my period pieces and I felt it improved dramatically.

edit:  whoops, you must be talking about a different incarnation of that famous family's story.  my mistake.

[CeeKay]

I can't wait for the spinoff series Bronze.

[raydude]

The wife and I watched the first episode via On Demand. We like it! 

[hepcat]

Just watched episode 2 last night.  Jeebus, this show can be dark.

[hepcat]

I'm still watching and it's getting better, but it still could use some better editing.  Scenes will suddenly jump without any explanation, and sometimes I swear characters will act differently than they did in previous episodes for inexplicable reasons. 

The little girl who plays Annie is an amazing actress and I can't believe someone that young can deliver the lines she does (both in terms of talent AND the legal sense).  Also, I was surprised to find out that Corky's main squeeze at the brothel is none other than Franka Potente.  I knew she looked familiar but I couldn't quite figure out why until I read the imdb page on the show.

[kronovan]

According to the Wiki, the series was renewed for a 2nd season:

The series was renewed for a second season of 13 episodes on October 17, 2012.

I'm very glad for it, because I felt it's one of the better shows I've followed on TV in a while. Nice that they've also increased the episode count from 10 to 13 for the 2nd.