The plot this series is about human trafficking, and Shetland being used as a stopover from transferring people to the mainland. This seems to, sadly, be a common theme in many series from the U.K. this year. The cinematography keeps getting better each series as well. Just finished epi 2, and so far, it's good writing, and there's no denying the sickening you get in your soul when you put into perspective that this really happens to people in the world.
7 Reviews
Love it
swampy-marsh30 October 2019
Episode 5.1
Prismark1015 February 2019
This is the first time I have watched Shetland since it changed its format from two part stories.
I never realized that the Shetland stories were based on the books by Ann Cleeves, the same writer of the Vera novels.
The first episode of this opening story starts with a smartly dressed young Nigerian man who seems distressed. Later some of his body parts wash up ashore and bits of him might had been dissolved in acid.
The dead man was identified as Daniel Ugara who came to the Shetland Isles looking for a female family member who might had been a victim of sex trafficking.
Jimmy Perez (Douglas Henshall) initially suspects a fisherman who has fallen on hard times, who might now have been tempted by the drugs trade.
Henshall brings a weariness and vulnerability to Perez. The dead man has been a victim of a gruesome crime and it looks like some nasty people linked with organized crime might had been involved.
It was a well paced first episode. Having grown up in a small island, it is hard to swallow that so much crime is going on in a place like Shetlands and the police do not have a whiff of suspicion.
I never realized that the Shetland stories were based on the books by Ann Cleeves, the same writer of the Vera novels.
The first episode of this opening story starts with a smartly dressed young Nigerian man who seems distressed. Later some of his body parts wash up ashore and bits of him might had been dissolved in acid.
The dead man was identified as Daniel Ugara who came to the Shetland Isles looking for a female family member who might had been a victim of sex trafficking.
Jimmy Perez (Douglas Henshall) initially suspects a fisherman who has fallen on hard times, who might now have been tempted by the drugs trade.
Henshall brings a weariness and vulnerability to Perez. The dead man has been a victim of a gruesome crime and it looks like some nasty people linked with organized crime might had been involved.
It was a well paced first episode. Having grown up in a small island, it is hard to swallow that so much crime is going on in a place like Shetlands and the police do not have a whiff of suspicion.
Not good - a departure from past seasons
altereggo12326 May 2019
I've enjoyed seasons 1-4 but the opening to Season 5 is depressingly bad. The villains are cartoonishly cliched. They drive around in black cars and vans and at one point run DI Perez off the road to warn him off. Except in Hollywood (and now Shetland, apparently), when do criminals confirm their criminality by incompetently menacing the officer who suspects them?
The victim is African, which leads us to the stereotypical racism of some of the suspects. So stereotypical that one racist drives a 4x4 pickup with monster tires and a confederate flag. Of course he works in a scrap metal yard. Are we still in Shetland, or is this the American south? It feels like a lame attempt to seem political relevant.
And the international criminal conspiracy that seems to be unfolding is a bit much for Shetland. I guess the writers couldn't come up with a good mystery using local elements, so they imported this mess to Shetland.
The island is still breathtaking. If only the plot, characters and dialogue belonged there.
The victim is African, which leads us to the stereotypical racism of some of the suspects. So stereotypical that one racist drives a 4x4 pickup with monster tires and a confederate flag. Of course he works in a scrap metal yard. Are we still in Shetland, or is this the American south? It feels like a lame attempt to seem political relevant.
And the international criminal conspiracy that seems to be unfolding is a bit much for Shetland. I guess the writers couldn't come up with a good mystery using local elements, so they imported this mess to Shetland.
The island is still breathtaking. If only the plot, characters and dialogue belonged there.
Checklist of Far Left Woke Tropes
stellarcgaming8 February 2022
What was once a showpiece of interesting, developed characters with intriguing and believable motivations, has devolved into a list of politically correct "victims", a shallow police procedural, and paper-thin but permitted "bad guys".
Seriously? Confederate flags on trucks in the Shetland issues? A self-indulgent, wokeist white knight fantasy with no depth anymore.
Seriously? Confederate flags on trucks in the Shetland issues? A self-indulgent, wokeist white knight fantasy with no depth anymore.
Season 5, all 6 parts: poorly written story bloated with clumsy social messaging
jamesrupert20148 August 2023
Warning: Spoilers
The discovery of a human arm on the beach leads Perez and his team into a case involving a missing African girl and ruthless people-traffickers. The overall look of the show and Douglas Henshall's portrayal of D. I. Jimmy Perez remain impressive but otherwise this 6-parter is pretty weak. A couple of key plot-points require unbelievable incompetence on the part of Steven Robertson's character (D. C. Sandy Wilson) that could have easily been avoided if a bit more thought had gone into the script; but, by far the worst part of the series is the incredibly irritating character of Olivia Lennox (Rakie Ayola) and her interactions with Perez. Scenes with her telling Perez that 'No, he can't understand her pain' or how 'Perez doesn't really care about her problems' are repeated several times (just in case we don't recognise it's all a topical allegory the first time we hear them), the scene with her in the tub is painfully predictable despite being painfully ludicrous, and the final message - that since she was a victim at some point, she apparently won't be punished for lying to the police, interfering in a murder investigation, assault, kidnapping, torture, and uttering threats seems to reflect the prevailing liberal acceptance of 'victimhood as an all-purpose excuse'. Embedding social commentary in entertainment programming is fine, maybe laudable, but if you are going to do it, try not to be so ham-fisted that the effort comes off more irritating than inspiring (the producers were so intent on making sure that viewers understand the story's underlying message that they decorated a pickup truck on a wee, remote Scottish Island with a Confederate flag).
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