Lord Brett

Is there just me that thinks this series has failed to live up to its initial promise? Last night's story was just painfully dull, making Lewis look like The Sweeney. It's become a waste of a decent performance by Michael Kitchen.

I'm not really surprised ITV have curtialed the show a year earlier than planned.

orpheum

i did nt see yesterdays episode but i have to agree with your comments.i only watch it to see how carefully the period atrmosphere is observed.they just seem to make the mystery so sonvoluted that you dont care by the time it gets to the unmasking of the murderer.

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Windthrop

The rumour is its coming back. It is well-crafted and old-fashioned and by todays standards slowish but last nights storyline was one of the weaker ones.

Thats the joke that killed the Music Hall !

alan gowdy

Oh dear... I loved it. Don't confuse a slow pace with dullness - leave that misconception to the computer games generation. I prefer to think of it as understated, and I see little wrong with that.

"Don't forget... one of petrol, two of meths"

Lord Brett

I can't deny it's well made, and I like the cast, but it fails to grip for me, and I'm really only watching it now out of a strange sort of loyality. It's interesting to hear from people who like the series, though.

alan gowdy

... and Michael Kitchen's performance is so subtle that the cleverness of it is easy to miss. (No I'm not joking!)

"Don't forget... one of petrol, two of meths"

samkydd

I turned off after about 40 minutes, it was just tedious and the situations were so obvious (ex PoW resents German PoW working on his farm and being friendly with his wife and child) it made Heartbeat look like a tense psychological thriller! Also it mentioned football matches taking place, Charlton v someone, but as I understood it the Football League was suspended until after the end of the war (hence Pompey holding the FA Cup from 1939-45 or 46).

There must be hundreds of fictional exploits/cases that a detective can get involved in during the Second World War, it was quite a big event after all, but the episodes I've seen have been a bit lame to say the least.

The lead Foyle character has little in the way of charisma, and his sidekicks are even more lacklustre, especially the "jolly hockeysticks" female driver! It takes more than period cars and costume to make a period drama, usually good characters and imaginative storylines come first and then fill the backdrop in later!

But it is typical Sunday night fayre, mind numbingly dull and uninspiring, so you go to bed actually looking forward to getting up to go to work the next day!

"...the chairman of Littlewoods stores made a Keynote speech!"

orpheum

i agree with your views on the series.however Football did keep going during the war but on a regional basis eg Football League South.So the reference is quite accurate.The trouble with a long running series is that the actors just seem to be going through the motions.The Foyle character seems to let everything go on around him till the last reel and take monosyllabic replies to new heights.The driver seems to be the eternal virgin.You can imagine her bursting through French doors saying "Anyone for tennis".

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image45

Yes I feel the same as you when it first aired it was very good viewing however I must say I have not watched the last two series due to finding it too painfully dull as you said above

Shame as I really used to love to watch each week too!

"Seya next time!"

Chris OD

I have to agree with Alan Gowdy. In these days of instant gratification, where the plot and cast in most dramas have to move at a racing pace, Foyles War unfolds slowly and subtley and Michael Kitchen is the master of saying everything without words. I think too that Honeysuckle Weeks (Beryl Bainbridge's daughter) is perfect for the part of the driver, injecting just the right amount of naivety and insight into the character. Also, it's good to see Hastings, a town close to where I live, being shown for it's beautiful houses and quaint streets, rather than the thuggish reputation the media apportion to it. Long may the series continue.

Harbottle

I actually thought last night's was one of the better recent episodes. I rather like the slow pace of it, ideal Sunday night telly

bertie

I agree. By the way, think I saw something in the paper to the effect that the new ITV prog chief is casting his eye at this series - poss of reinstating it perhaps? Difficult to understand why the last controller cancelled a series which is well up in the ratings.

daybaker

I think Michael Kitchen's sense of understatement was perfect for Foyle. Certainly much more suited than a TV-movie I saw where he played a sadistic lothario.
Part of his reticence , I've always felt, is that he didn't really want to keep fighting the criminals and the Army establishment, at the same time. But he knew it was his 'duty'. The war machine was usually more trouble than the killers.

With the war abruptly ended to coincide with the cancellation of the show, I don't think a post-war series would work. But I enjoyed it while it lasted.

batman

MK is excellent as the hitman in the Scandinavian film The Last Contract.

Sista kontraktet (1998)

"Boom boom a baby .... Banham Zoo .... Banana pants! Hahahaha"

Arthur Linden-Jones

"Last" episode (All Clear) screened here in Aus tonight.

Brilliant series, every episode, to the very end - the so-called "slow" pace (of both storylines and actors/characters) was the essence of the series!!

This is war Wilson, not Sainsburys!