Latest news with #DublinMurderSquad
Daily Record
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Record
Complex murder mystery series hailed as 'breathless whodunnit' comes to Disney+
Described as a "breathless whodunit," the 2019 series Dublin Murders arrives on Disney+ giving viewers a new opportunity to watch into the complex mysterious murder series. Disney+ has just added the highly praised BBC crime drama Dublin Murders to its streaming platform, giving viewers in the UK a new opportunity to dive into the gripping eight-part series that previously left fans hooked. Starring Killian Scott and Sarah Greene, the series is based on the first two novels of Tana French's Dublin Murder Squad series, In the Woods and The Likeness. Described as a "breathless whodunnit," the story follows detectives Rob Reilly (Scott) and Cassie Maddox (Greene) as they investigate the disturbing murder of a young girl on the outskirts of Dublin. The case proves to be extremely close to home for Rob, who as a child was the lone survivor of a mysterious incident in the same woods, where two other children vanished and were never found . As the investigation progresses, Rob is forced to confront repressed memories and a potential link between the current case and his own traumatic past, building intense psychological tension throughout the series. Meanwhile, Cassie is pulled into a chillingly personal twist when the body of Lexie Madison is discovered, a woman who not only looks identical to her, but who had been living under an alias Cassie once used in a past undercover mission. Cassie is then told to go undercover as the deceased Lexie in a dangerous operation where she has to infiltrate a group of enigmatic university students to uncover the truth behind her death. The official synopsis reads: "Set during the height of the Celtic Tiger financial boom of the millennium, follow two murder investigations led by ambitious and charismatic Detectives Rob Reilly and Cassie Maddox. The victims are seemingly unrelated, but are knitted together by powerful shared themes." Originally released in 2019 on BBC One and Starz, Dublin Murders was created and written by Sarah Phelps. It received widespread critical acclaim and holds a high 79% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Viewers can now stream all eight episodes on Disney+ with a subscription as well as BBC iPlayer for free. Critics praise the drama for its suspenseful storytelling and complex characters. The Daily Telegraph wrote: "After eight episodes, countless plot twists and even more anxiously puffed cigarettes, the knotty Irish crime thriller reached its compelling conclusion." While The Independent called the series "unusually inventive," and the London Evening Standard stated it was better than most, writing: "Murders are bad everywhere. Dublin Murders, though, the new BBC crime drama by Sarah Phelps? Very good. In fact, better than many crime dramas." Additionally The Guardian described it as a "tasty slice of cut-and-come-again cake." Fans have also shared their own reviews on the show on Rotten Tomatoes. One viewer wrote: "Liked all the main characters and the quirky characters they were. People with different agendas are trying to solve a murder mystery." "Interpersonal entanglements abound. I want to know when the next season will start filming!!!! The ending was a complete shock with some unfinished stories," they concluded. As another simply stated: "Love this show. It has great acting and is very suspenseful, a very good show I highly recommend."
Daily Mirror
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mirror
Bad Sisters star's 'breathless whodunnit' that had fans 'hooked' now streaming on Disney Plus
Bad Sisters star Sarah Greene's beloved 2019 crime drama Dublin Murders has just landed on the streamer Bad Sisters star Sarah Greene's "breathless whodunnit" that had fans "hooked" is now streaming on Disney Plus. Sarah gained acclaim as Bibi Garvey in Sharon Horgan's hit Apple TV+ show, and is also celebrated for her role in another intense Irish drama. Adapted from Tana French's acclaimed Dublin Murder Squad books, the show sees Sarah's character, Cassie Maddox, and her partner Rob Reilly (Killian Scott) delve into the chilling murder of a young girl on the outskirts of Dublin. For Rob, the investigation dredges up haunting memories, as he was the only child to emerge from a harrowing event in same woods, where two of his friends disappeared without a trace. As Rob battles with his buried traumas, the tension mounts, casting shadows over their quest for truth, reports Belfast Live. Alongside Sarah and Killian, the series also stars Michael D'Arcy, Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, Eugene O'Hare, Moe Dunford, Ellie O'Halloran, Niall Jordan, and Ian Kenny. Game of Thrones star Conleth Hill also appears in a guest role. Initially broadcast on BBC One, RTÉ One, and Starz back in 2019, Dublin Murders found its first streaming home on BBC iPlayer. Now, Disney+ has acquired all eight episodes for UK viewers to binge-watch. If you haven't got a subscription to the streamer yet, there are three different plans to choose from, including with ads, standard and premium options. The Disney+ standard with ads plan is usually £4.99 per month, whereas the standard plan removes the ads and costs £8.99 a month, or £89.90 for the entire year. If you'd prefer to go down the premium route, it would set you back £12.99 a month or £129.90 a year, and allows users to stream on up to four devices at the same time. Dublin Murders was met with critical acclaim following its debut, with The Guardian hailing it "a breathless whodunnit" and praising its "sophisticated and slickly satisfying" storyline. The show's viewers also shared their praise on various social media platforms. "I absolutely loved this mind-twisting psychological thriller. The characters are flawed and have dark pasts which interweave beautifully with the main plot. Well worth the binge-watch," one person wrote on IMDb. Another added: "This gets you hooked from the first episode. One of the best shows on TV in a long time. Brilliant cast." A third fan similarly said: "I found this show to not only be a gripping mystery, but also a realistic study on PTSD and a detective crumbling under the pressure of working in such a traumatising field. One of the best crime shows out there." Dublin Murders is available to stream on Disney+
The Hindu
5 days ago
- The Hindu
Review of Rudraneil Sengupta's The Beast Within
Of late, publishers worldwide have been guilty of a singular crime: if there's a body in the book, be it the victim of a gruesome murder, or a series of quiet, mysterious deaths (I'm looking at you, Butter), the marketing material will zoom into the detail and pitch it as a 'crime' novel. It sells a few books, certainly, but more often than not, it leaves the genre aficionados wondering what just happened. There's space, of course, for re-evaluating the category and injecting fresh ideas and perspectives but the trend has ended up shortchanging the crime-fiction fan. Not The Beast Within by Rudraneil Sengupta (disclaimer: the author is a former colleague of this reviewer). This is the crime fiction long sought by English-reading Indians who grew up on Poirot and Superintendent Battle, moved on to Montalbano and Banks and Zen and the Dublin Murder Squad, and wondered why, for all the gory crimes that make headlines in our newspapers, there was no local equivalent of policemen driven as much by their dark past as their passion for justice. Such good crime fiction as has emerged in the past few years has largely steered clear of officialdom (Samyukta Bhowmick's A Fatal Distraction comes to mind). Salil Desai's five-book-old Inspector Saralkar series, on the other extreme, edges too close to pulp to be taken seriously as crime fiction. One of the major reasons why the effective police procedural is a rare breed in the country's bookscape lies in the systemic opacity of the law and order machinery. Mostly viewed as an organ of torment, the police are also regarded as hopelessly corrupt, ill-equipped and understaffed. To then go beyond these indisputable truths and delve into the many layers that comprise policing in this country is a moment that deserves applause. Sengupta's weary and damaged Inspector Prashant Kumar is a credible protagonist who works the many planes of NCR's realities without either diminishing inequities or ignoring power structures. Intriguing characters Interestingly, The Beast Within works less as an archetypal whodunnit than as a how-the-whodidit-was-nailed. When Jyoti Dhurwa, a 15-year-old tribal house help, falls to her death in posh Panchsheel, a section of the police force is ready to close the case as an accident after quick inquiries. But Kumar, lately posted to Hauz Khas after the successful apprehension of a cop-killer in the Bawana badlands, is having none of it. The way Sengupta captures Kumar's delicate relational networks within the force — convincing his superiors to give him the case, building his team, earning the newbies' trust — is worthy of savouring. It also allows Sengupta to create a host of intriguing support characters, led by the wrestler-turned-cop Meera, and chief aide Zeeshan. As important as Sengupta's understanding of the workings of the police system (he spent two years embedded with the Delhi police for a series of investigative reports for his newspaper) is his familiarity with the multiple terrains of the national capital region, from swish drawing rooms to wretched slums. The sense of place, so important in any crime fiction, permeates the novel like the fogs that descend on Delhi every winter: bleak, clammy, almost claustrophobic. It weighs down the investigating team in peak summer, becoming ever more dense and forbidding till Kumar — adopting unorthodox ways that would be alien to a Brunetti or a Banks, but would be entirely relatable for an Indian — fights it off to reveal a series of crimes hinged to Jyoti's death. Tightly plotted, with spare yet realistic portrayals of Delhi's peoples and places, peppered with earthy humour, unforgettable characters, and a perceptible love for the city's indomitable hustle, The Beast Within is the kind of novel that sets up a hit series. Maybe it'll dissuade the marketers from using the 'crime' label too freely as well. The reviewer is a Bengaluru-based writer and editor.
