New Tricks
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Detective
Superintendent Sandra Pullman’s (Amanda Redman) career is completely upended
when she makes a snap decision during a raid.
A laughingstock, Sandra is forced to head a new police unit, one that
specializes in solving unsolved crimes.
The people she will be working with are not the usual police
officers. They are all former officers
who have now retired. Stuck in their
old-fashioned thoughts and ways of doing things, these three men cause a lot of
problems for Sandra. As the only
official police officer, and their supervisor, Sandra knows that if things are
not done by the book, she will be the one in the most trouble if anything goes
wrong.
Unfortunately
for Sandra, no matter how many times she tells the men to do things officially
and in the proper police manner, they still wander off and do things their own
way. Brian (Alun Armstrong) and Gerry
(Dennis Waterman) are the worst at this.
With a tendency to get obsessive, Brian acts nearly completely on whims
and impulses. If he wants to investigate
something, he goes and does it. There is
zero thought about how his methods may hurt the case or whether or not his
actions could lead to legal ramifications.
His mind is set on doing something, and he’s going to do it, no matter
the consequences. The thing is, Brian
does not behave this way just to be difficult.
He has a condition that leads him to act the way he does. The condition is so severe that Brian has to
take medication for it. When he doesn’t,
nobody, not even his poor wife, Esther (Susan Jameson), knows what he’ll end up
doing.
Gerry,
on the other hand, acts on the edge of things because he wants to. A smoker, a gambler, and a huge flirt, Gerry
likes being seen as a rebel. He’ll bend,
or flat out break, the rules if he feels like doing so. If there’s a woman to charm, this rule
bending is even more likely to happen.
The funny thing is, underneath the rough exterior, Gerry has the biggest
heart of the group. He has three
ex-wives and three daughters who he regularly brings together for a family
meal, which he cooks. They all get along
and act as one big happy family. Yes,
Gerry may grumble about any one of these women, but in the end he will always
be there when one of them needs him. The
same is true for his friends. When a
friend is in trouble, he’s often the first on the scene to help out. In truth, Gerry is a good man. Just don’t tell him that. He likes the rough-and-tumble image he tries
to portray far too much.
Jack
(James Bolam) is the one least likely to break protocol. He’s also not one who will usually act on his
impulses. Instead, Jack is a deep
thinker. When something is bothering
him, he will sit quietly and think things through. He ponders bits of information and tries to
put them together. When he struggles
with this, Jack turns to his deceased wife for help. He’ll go into his backyard and talk to her,
sorting his thoughts out loud. There
have been many conclusions Jack has come to with this method, and he is rarely
wrong. It also makes Jack a great
balance to Brian and Gerry. Unlike the
other two, Jack is someone Sandra can always rely on. She knows he’ll get the job done properly,
and with thought.
While
Sandra struggles with how to deal with the three men (even Jack sometimes),
they have a hard time figuring out how to work with her. Jack has the advantage of having worked with
Sandra before, but that does not make everything smooth. For the most part, the men are very open
about their personal lives. Sandra is
not. She very much tries to keep work
about work, and that’s it. This leads to
a lot of curiosity from the men, especially Gerry, about what Sandra is up to
when she is not with them. Their need to
know inevitably leads to trouble as they follow Sandra places in order to see
what she’s up to. This drives Sandra
absolutely crazy, yet still, she eventually ends up seeing these men as
friends. Once this happens, the really
good episodes begin.
I
must say, that had I originally started this show at the beginning as I have
now, I don’t think I would have kept going with it. The comments about females and people of
different races would have been too much for me. Fortunately I did see other episodes first
and I know these greatly lessen as the show goes on, if they don’t disappear
entirely. Recently I finished season
three and I can only think of one episode where any of these comments appeared. This is also the season where I feel the four
team members really become a good group of friends. There is far more respect for each other by
this point, and they are always there when someone needs them.
Sadly, this show ended after twelve seasons. That is a long run, but it means that once I’m finished with that season there won’t be anything else left to explore. Fortunately I’m only on season four so I have quite awhile to go. There’s a lot more story to learn and many more cases to solve. I can only hope that, in the process, none of the characters get themselves into too much trouble.
Image added April 21, 2016.
Image added April 21, 2016.
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