'The Long Call': Episode 1 Recap
The Long Call, Britbox’s newest four-part police procedural, has an impressive lineage, is based on a new series from mystery writer Ann Cleeves, whose Vera and Shetland series are longtime audience favorites among Anglophiles. With a great cast, ascreenplay by Kelly Jones (Death In Paradise, Baptiste, Des), and directed by Lee Haven Jones (The Bay), The Long Call is complex, thoughtful, and gorgeous to look at, filmed mostly in north Devon, and set in Ilfracombe.
(It is also, amazingly, the first series of its sort to feature a gay lead character in DI Matthew Venn, played by Fleabag's Ben Aldridge.)
The Long Call is dense and intense, and the first episode is crammed with characters, hints, and questions. If you didn’t quite grasp the relationships and details, you’ll learn more as the series goes on. As it is, this first installment drops you straight into the lives of the characters. The opening montage is of early morning awakenings in quick succession which includes: Matthew, setting off to attend his father’s funeral, and promising husband Jonathan (Declan Bennett) he’ll keep on his wedding ring; Matthew’s mother Dorothy (Juliet Stevenson, Riveria) mourns at the bedside of her dead husband; and DC Jen Rafferty (former Doctor Who companion Pearl Mackie) learns in the chaos of a school morning with two teenagers that her ex-husband may be back in their lives.
