SummaryCormoran Strike is a war veteran-turned-private detective in this series based on the novels written by J.K. Rowling under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. It was released in the UK on BBC One under the name Strike.
SummaryCormoran Strike is a war veteran-turned-private detective in this series based on the novels written by J.K. Rowling under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. It was released in the UK on BBC One under the name Strike.
This is superb Sunday night viewing, and has a highly crafted, sinister, intriguing and, at times, Satanic quality that should keep you enthralled. Strike: Troubled Blood, in other words, is the BBC at its best.
The characters could be stereotypes, but as imagined by Rowling, adapted and directed by Tom Edge and Sue Tully, and definitively portrayed by Burke and Grainger, they’re fully dimensional.
Throughout, the disparity between Strike's melancholy disposition and robin's sunnier outlook makes for enjoyable teamwork. C.B. Strike may not break new ground in procedural storytelling, but it stays refreshingly true to character. [28 May - 10 Jun 2018, p.16]
Troubled Blood’s epic runtime only accentuates the artifice of the pair [Cormoran and Robin] circling longingly, and when romantic developments do haltingly come, they too have the air of a throwback, namely the carefree English romcoms of the 90s. But it’s not enough to distract us from the thought that really, Strike is a Sunday-night detective like all the others.
It was all over the place, a meandering, cliché-ridden muddle that sacrificed plot for the protagonists’ thwarted love story. If you had watched it for the first time last night you wouldn’t have had a clue what was going on.
The phrase that recurred in my mind as I watched C.B. Strike was "not enough": not enough plot, not enough characterization, not enough suspense, not enough of its own DNA. But the pang of "not enough" was most keen when it came to the scenes between Burke and his co-star Holliday Grainger, who faultlessly embodies the earnest, thrill-seeking Robin.