LINE OF DUTY

BBC2 5 PART DRAMA

FEATURING Martin Compston (D.S. Arnott) 
      Lennie James (DCI Tony Gates) Hung, Columbiana, Jericho and The Prisoner remake
       Neil Morrissey (DC Nigel Morton) Men Behaving Badly, Waterloo Road
      Craig Parkinson (Cottan) Misfits, Whitechapel
      Adrian Dunbar (Superintendant Ted Hastings) Ashes to Ashes
          Vicky McClure (D.C. Kate Fleming) This Is England

It's about time there was some new drama on TV, we don't seem to get much for our license fee these days. I was drawn to this because it stars Lenny James, an excellent actor and I have to say he does not disappoint in Line of Duty. In fact the main cast are all excellent and the writing is for the most part of high standard and the plot is credible.

The basic story centres on an internal investigation in to the arrest record of one Tony Gates, Officer of the year winner, who has been "Laddering". This is a method of adding charges to a suspects arrest charges thus making it look like crimes are eliminated from the list of unsolved cases and in return the police speak well of the accused in court. The department of Internal investigation headed by Superintendant Hastings (Dunbar) believe that Gates won his award by acting dishonestly.

The story begins with D.S.Arnot, who is in the armed response team. There is a mix up during a raid and an innocent man is shot. Arnot resigns from his unit because he does not want to adhere to the official account of events that his entire team have been told to adhere to for the official hearing into the incident. Hastings offers Arnot (Martin Compston) a spot in his team that is being set up to investigate Gates. He is joined by D.C. Kate Fleming (McClure) who has talked her way into Gates's team to gather evidence from the inside. Gates's team has three other members, D.C. Morton (Morrissey), D.C. Cottan (Craig Parkinson) and D.C. Kapoor (Faraz Ayub).

We next meet Gates in a cafe with his "bit on the side". He witnesses and intervenes in a robbery and in return the cafe give him his breakfast for free. This presents an opening for the anti corruption team to start an investigation.Then it gets interesting. As Gates picks up his award he gets a phone call from his girlfriend Jackie (Gina McKee) who has been involved in a hit and run whilst under the influence of alcohol. He helps feign a burglary and the theft of her car to cover it up. Unfortunately it turns out that she has knocked down and killed her accountant (deliberately) .Before he knows this Gates handles the case himself to bury it. Of course it comes back to haunt him.

The team are working on a gang/ drugs related investigation. Jackie turns up at the police station to give an interview about her "burglary". Gates lets her know he has found out what she did. He decides to end the relationship. The evidence against him is mounting and as it does Gates's personal life is going into freefall. Arnott visits the Cafe Gates and Jackie were at and finds out Gates was not alone, which gives him someone else to investigate. He learns about the hit and run.

 In the drugs case there is a take over going on which is the reason for the deaths that they are looking into. It transpires that Jackie launders money for the drug dealer. At the end of episode two Gates goes to Jackies house to arrest her, but ends up doing other things with her instead, then sees her murdered. He is knocked out and his fingerprints are put on the knife.

By the time Arnot gets there the body is gone and Gates is searching the premises, covering any tracks of having been there and claiming that he came to arrest her. It becomes impossible for him to deny that he was involved romantically with Jacky so he has to keep making up new stories as new evidence is presented to him. In a stroke of brilliance Gates turns the drugs investigation in to a terrorist plot. This creates a big distraction but unfortunately for Gates the Drug Baron that had Jackie murdered is keeping the body and knife with Gates's fingerprints on it to force him to work for the gang. He is expected to bring Arnot to a location where they will deal with him. He does this but has a change of heart. He then arranges for the gang leader, referred to as Tommy to be brought in. Gates goes rogue and gets Tommy in his car to tape a full confession. Once he has it he pulls over. When Arnot and Fleming get there he pleads with Arnot to ensure his family are taken care of then walks in front of a lorry. Arnot reports that Gates died in the line of duty.

The story ends with Cottan preparing to take Gates place and we see him talking to Tommy, an old friend, it appears. Corruption wins.

This is the second drama that I have seen on the BBC in the same month that deals with corruption, the other being Blackout. Our society, it appears, is corrupt throughout.

There are a few stereotypes evident in the writing. Arnot most definitely has small man syndrome being defensive, unable to control his temper and at times is hostile towards authority. There is also a boy, Ryan, from a council estate who is drawn in to crime because his single parent mother is a slag and neglects him. A good example of this is when he is arrested his mother won't go to the police station because he "has social workers for that sort of thing". When he is brought home all she says to the police is "You better have fed him". Being a working class person who knows some single mums that work hard for their children I have to say I hate this representation of single parents.

I did, however, like the way in which the hysteria that surrounds terrorism was shown. The threat of terrorism is being used to increase surveillance of the public, limit the internet and to make public searches acceptable even without evidence of a crime being committed. The drama also shows how crime does pay and that our institutions are infiltrated by criminals who pervert the course of justice. Cottan's promotion is the end result of years of planning, sending out the message that the fight against crime is now futile. I mean to say who are the good guys and who are the baddies?

There is also an interesting contradiction in Arnot's behavior: he will not lie in the shooting case yet he lies for Gates, perhaps because he identifies with him being singled out, or maybe because he states earlier on that resources ought to be used to get criminals off the street, not to investigate the police.

In conclusion, Line of duty was well acted by a great cast, particularly James and Dunbar, the storyline was for the most part credible ( the bolt-cropper incident with Arnot aside - he really would have lost some fingers) and the direction was spot on. If anyone at the BBC is reading this: more like this please.