In the Dark
The world of the TV detective is never a happy one. Take DI Helen Weeks (Myanna Buring), the heroine of In The Dark (Tuesday, BBC1, 9pm). Several weeks into her pregnancy,
not for her the ordinary joys and anxieties of the coming of motherhood. Instead, first she has to fend off a violent criminal attack – which, happily, leaves the baby unscathed – and then there’s the question of the father, which you might think should simply be the fellow copper she lives with, Paul (Ben Batt), but, in dramaland, you just never know. All of which is the emotive backdrop to a reasonably good potboiler of a mystery thriller, written by Danny Brocklehurst. Two teenage girls have gone missing in rainy derbyshire and whether they’ve been abducted or murdered, no one knows. The rural community where the girls live isn’t Weeks’s current beat, but it’s the place where she grew up, and the chief suspect just so happens to be married to her school friend, the eccentrically ethereal Linda Bates (Emma Fryer). Cue any number of pensive glances between the women, and a tale that starts out as muddied as the waters that stream through the countryside and seems destined only to get murkier as the weeks go on. Truth be told, this isn’t absolute top-notch quality, but the promise of secrets to be revealed is enough to suck us in, not least finding out the truth about the moment in childhood that has left a dark shadow over Weeks and Bates ever since.
NOT TO BE MISSED...
BECOMING A LIED SINGER: Thomas Quasthoff and the Art of German Song (Friday, BBC4, 8pm)
Brilliant bass-baritone Thomas Quasthoff is our guide to the sublime lieder of Franz Schubert and his successors.
THE ROYAL BALLET: Woolf Works (Sunday, BBc4, 7pm)
Mrs Dalloway, Orlando and The Waves are brought to life by choreographer Wayne Mcgregor in this dance celebration of the work of Virginia Woolf.
WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE? (Thursday, BBc1, 9pm)
Strictly come Dancing judge Craig Revel Horwood traces his roots back to Australia.