#58 OOMD*
24/03/21 16:09
Back in 1994, my favourite TV shows were My So-Called Life and Cardiac Arrest. I was in love with Claire Danes and Helen Baxendale, and looking back, they both offered a kind of nervy, disdainful elegance that was particularly alluring to a swotty 16-year-old. Together, they were the evolution of a previous crush, Julia Sawalha in Press Gang. Anyway, I was obsessed with Cardiac Arrest, it was just so fast-paced and heartless, and didn’t pander to your lack of knowledge about the medical profession. I remember Helen as Dr Claire Maitland looking down her nose at wet-behind-the-ears Andrew, drawling ‘we all kill a few people while we’re learning.’ Oof. Jed Mercurio wrote that series under a pseudonym, because he was still working as a doctor at the time, and I guess didn’t want us to draw any dubious conclusions about his abilities. But I think we can assume he’s not working as a doctor anymore, and no one doubts his abilities as an SHS.
We were all waiting for Line of Duty to kick off again, and I suspect I speak for an entire nation when I say I spent the first episode of Series 6 wondering what the hell was going on, trying to remember what happened in previous series, and struggling to decipher the endless acronyms. Also, whenever anything exciting happened I was duty-bound to bellow ‘MOTHER OF GOD’ at the TV screen. All in all, it was an exhausting 60 minutes.
Still, at least we all know what CHIS stands for now. About halfway through, after the 408th reference, I decided it was short for ‘chisel’, i.e. chiselling information out of someone, and TBH that was a fair stab. When the references are coming this thick and fast, it can be tricky to follow when they yell that an ARU is responding to a B&E but the ARV has been derailed by a D&D causing an IRTC and someone’s going to have to inform the NOK. It’s all so rapid-fire and po-faced, that even when there were jokes – Kate’s deadpan ‘what kind of knobby signal was that?’ – I didn’t really notice, because I was still busy processing MoPi from the last scene. I think it’s time to redefine FOMO – anxiety that vital info passed you by, because it’s going like the clappers and you’re not as observant as DCI Davidson.
Talking of the eagle-eyed Joanne, I briefly became convinced Kelly Macdonald had already appeared in LOD a few series ago but maybe I was just getting her confused with MFW Keeley Hawes. Every time Steve Arnott appears on screen, I think he’s going to chalk his cue and attempt to pot the pink. Did you know he lives in Las Vegas in real life? And is proper Scottish? Sorry, I’m getting distracted again. Focus, Morrey. Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep. Let the interrogation begin.
Obviously, I love Line of Duty, and those interviews are utterly extraordinary, laser-sharp television at its best. There’s great tension in every scene, like you’re on a dodgem car and at any moment you might change direction or just get smashed. When they stormed the suspect’s flat at the beginning of the first episode, I was gnawing my fist, prepared for an explosion, a hostage, or some equally horrific derailment. But it was just the reappearance of poor Terry Boyle, the vulnerable man with Down’s Syndrome who was previously exploited by gangs in series 1 and 5. So, if he’s not the baddie, then who is? It could be Carl Banks, whose DNA was also found in the flat – any relation of Lee Banks from Series 5? – we need the CHIS to confirm, but he’s already dead. Then there are references to a missing fridge-freezer, which got me mixed up with Unforgotten because the body was in the freezer in that too, but it’s actually a reference to LOD series 1, when Jackie Laverty’s corpse was crammed in the deep-freeze, and did you know that series featured Neil Morrissey, who was also in Series 3 of Unforgotten?
Oh alright, I’m folding! I’m not sure I liked it, OK? It was too confusing, and I missed Unforgotten’s slower-paced, pen-tapping introspection. I need an interrogation scene that lasts for three days, so I can gather my wits, work out WTF is happening and who is H and where does Kate Fleming get her hair done.
No need to issue a Reg 15 though. Give me a few episodes, and I’ll be wearing a lanyard, settled in my OP with my own DIR, fully embedded in the MIT.
*GLOSSARY OF TERMS
OOMD – out of my depth
SHS – shit hot screenwriter
CHIS – Covert Human Intelligence Source
TBH – to be honest
ARU – Armed Response Unit
B&E - breaking and entering
ARV – Armed Response Vehicle
D&D – drunk and disorderly
IRTC – Injury Road Traffic Collision
NOK – next of kin
MoPi – Management of Police Information
FOMO – fear of missing out
LOD – Line of Duty. Come on.
MFW – my future wife
DNA - deoxyribonucleic acid
WTF – what the fuck
H – Dot, or Derek Hilton, or Gill Biggeloe or even Hastings, or all of them or none of them.
Reg 15 – notice telling officers that a complaint has been made against them.
OP – Observation Point
DIR – Digital Interview Recorder
MIT – Murder Investigation Team or Major Incident Team. I’m not sure. Whatever.
We were all waiting for Line of Duty to kick off again, and I suspect I speak for an entire nation when I say I spent the first episode of Series 6 wondering what the hell was going on, trying to remember what happened in previous series, and struggling to decipher the endless acronyms. Also, whenever anything exciting happened I was duty-bound to bellow ‘MOTHER OF GOD’ at the TV screen. All in all, it was an exhausting 60 minutes.
Still, at least we all know what CHIS stands for now. About halfway through, after the 408th reference, I decided it was short for ‘chisel’, i.e. chiselling information out of someone, and TBH that was a fair stab. When the references are coming this thick and fast, it can be tricky to follow when they yell that an ARU is responding to a B&E but the ARV has been derailed by a D&D causing an IRTC and someone’s going to have to inform the NOK. It’s all so rapid-fire and po-faced, that even when there were jokes – Kate’s deadpan ‘what kind of knobby signal was that?’ – I didn’t really notice, because I was still busy processing MoPi from the last scene. I think it’s time to redefine FOMO – anxiety that vital info passed you by, because it’s going like the clappers and you’re not as observant as DCI Davidson.
Talking of the eagle-eyed Joanne, I briefly became convinced Kelly Macdonald had already appeared in LOD a few series ago but maybe I was just getting her confused with MFW Keeley Hawes. Every time Steve Arnott appears on screen, I think he’s going to chalk his cue and attempt to pot the pink. Did you know he lives in Las Vegas in real life? And is proper Scottish? Sorry, I’m getting distracted again. Focus, Morrey. Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep. Let the interrogation begin.
Obviously, I love Line of Duty, and those interviews are utterly extraordinary, laser-sharp television at its best. There’s great tension in every scene, like you’re on a dodgem car and at any moment you might change direction or just get smashed. When they stormed the suspect’s flat at the beginning of the first episode, I was gnawing my fist, prepared for an explosion, a hostage, or some equally horrific derailment. But it was just the reappearance of poor Terry Boyle, the vulnerable man with Down’s Syndrome who was previously exploited by gangs in series 1 and 5. So, if he’s not the baddie, then who is? It could be Carl Banks, whose DNA was also found in the flat – any relation of Lee Banks from Series 5? – we need the CHIS to confirm, but he’s already dead. Then there are references to a missing fridge-freezer, which got me mixed up with Unforgotten because the body was in the freezer in that too, but it’s actually a reference to LOD series 1, when Jackie Laverty’s corpse was crammed in the deep-freeze, and did you know that series featured Neil Morrissey, who was also in Series 3 of Unforgotten?
Oh alright, I’m folding! I’m not sure I liked it, OK? It was too confusing, and I missed Unforgotten’s slower-paced, pen-tapping introspection. I need an interrogation scene that lasts for three days, so I can gather my wits, work out WTF is happening and who is H and where does Kate Fleming get her hair done.
No need to issue a Reg 15 though. Give me a few episodes, and I’ll be wearing a lanyard, settled in my OP with my own DIR, fully embedded in the MIT.
- Line of Duty, Series 6, 7 episodes, BBC One
- Unforgotten, Series 4, 6 episodes, ITV
*GLOSSARY OF TERMS
OOMD – out of my depth
SHS – shit hot screenwriter
CHIS – Covert Human Intelligence Source
TBH – to be honest
ARU – Armed Response Unit
B&E - breaking and entering
ARV – Armed Response Vehicle
D&D – drunk and disorderly
IRTC – Injury Road Traffic Collision
NOK – next of kin
MoPi – Management of Police Information
FOMO – fear of missing out
LOD – Line of Duty. Come on.
MFW – my future wife
DNA - deoxyribonucleic acid
WTF – what the fuck
H – Dot, or Derek Hilton, or Gill Biggeloe or even Hastings, or all of them or none of them.
Reg 15 – notice telling officers that a complaint has been made against them.
OP – Observation Point
DIR – Digital Interview Recorder
MIT – Murder Investigation Team or Major Incident Team. I’m not sure. Whatever.
