Shetland - help!!!

we do put on subtitles!

I don't know how old Tosh is supposed to be but if I said to DD Your dress sense/lifestyle should be maturing in line with your age/career IMO^ she would roll her eyes and say 'Mum!!!'.

They have made certain changes to the storyline for the TV series compared to the books
- in the books Cassie is very little - around 6 or 7 - but the TV series made her about 15-16 at the start
- in the books Duncan is a rather selfish character - he doesn't want fulltime custody of Cassie as he likes his freedom so he does the alternate weekends
- in the books the "Tosh" character doesn't exist - it is just Jimmy and Sandy at first - although after Fran's death they write in a Willow - a detective from the Mainland - but she is Jimmy's boss.
- in the books Fran, Cassie and later Jimmy live in a house that she converted in Ravenswick

However I'm sure that the changes were made to make the story run more easily without having to stop and explain things - for example in the books Jimmy often has to work around childcare constraints/school times - whereas TV's late teen Cassie can be left when he has to go out

I've decided to rewatch the Shetland series from the beginning and then listen to the audio books. The first story was based on Red Bones which is book three. I have just heard:

Perez was what the locals called a Black Shetlander. His ancestor had been washed up from a sunken Spanish Armada ship. He’d inherited the name, the dark hair and the Mediterranean skin.

I like Dougie Henshall in the part but thinking that Dougray Scott would have been much closer to this description. I wonder who was originally in the frame for the role?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7Z3mcqWk20

As much as I ahem appreciate Douglas's charms
It is annoying that the character has been white washed because his "other" spanish armada heritage is central to the books and how the character has a way of relating to outsiders.

Sometimes to the point of being a bit over invested in cases involving outsiders and darker skinned victims etc

Im not sure how much that rings true however given that the armada genes are so integral to a lot of coastal areas (e.g. the Galway Girl song: "her hair was black and her eyes were blue" etc) - his spanish looks wouldnt have been that unusual around the coast, and certainly wouldnt have made him an outsider..... but with his dark looks and heritage referred to so much in the books it is jarring to not have that in the show.

Tosh fits in with the books in that she was new to the station in the series, and the series are set a bit later in Perez's personal life.

His boss is a totally different character but I prefer the TV series boss

I just wish that Vera filled the Shetland hole when Shetland isnt on but it doesnt

Trapped is quite good though

You sound an expert in the Shetland stories, notanan2.

Irrespective of what he looks like, and I imagine 300 years of breeding since the Armada might have diluted some of the dark features, it sounds like Cleeves emphasises his outsider status in each book. Maybe I should be viewing/listening to the books in order.

Any thoughts on why they made Red Bones first? I am only hour or so in to the audio. There are so many differences between the TV and the book not least that the action is on Bressay not Whalsay. Closer to Lerwick I suppose so easier for Perez to nip back and forth. No mention of the Shetland Bus yet!

No the genes remain quite noticeable (jet black hair etc) but at the same time are considered native at this point IYKWIM (see above reference to the Galway Girl song) at least they are in other areas with high density of Armada genes I dont know specifically about Shetland.

notanan2 - Trapped is quite good though

Am loving Trapped although like the last series I cannot decide whether it is going to turn out to be a family drama or a political conspiracy - or both!

I am also enjoying place spotting as I was in Northern Iceland last summer and visited the two villages where Trapped is filmed

I loved the books but Dougie Henshall is miscast and that does spoil the TV series for me a little. Having said that I don't like the storyline this time so I've stopped watching this series.

I think Dougie Henshall is fine but I haven't read the books. I think if you have, the actor - at least initially - isn't the person you had imagined and therefore seems wrong.

I think it's very good. The storyline is a bit grim but unfortunately probably quite true to life. It's similar to the story in the new series Baptiste.

I enjoy Trapped too. What a cheery, friendly lot of people in Iceland.

Just started watching Trapped and realise that the landscape of Shetland is far better IMO than Iceland that looks cold wet and miserable. So I take back all the negative comments about Shetland. I think I have become a southern softie ?

Cold I am enjoying "Trapped" too because I've been to Iceland and it's great to see the scenery again. I am glad they are showing the weather as it really is, and not always with the sun shining which some series do. Since a holiday in Iceland, I have never complained about changeable weather in the UK .

Lully I'm not sure if you're saying tongue-in-cheek that Icelandic people are cheery because in "Trapped" they clearly aren't shown that way. IRL they are lovely and very friendly.

I just caught up with Trapped on iplayer. I will keep watching, but can I just say how much I would like to slap his snippy teenage daughter?

I'm with you Greyduster but you would be thrown in some cold dank prison I suspect !

Re the teen in Trapped: "Cool aunt" isnt helping matters.

Oh god there cant be any sort of resolution/happy ending to this series can they!

What was Perez thinking? Intercepting smugglers is not a job for the local bobby... "that ending" with duncan on the beach was inevitable if you go into intercepting organised cack handed like that...

[Sad]

I also dont understand why Zezi was considered so "valuable" to the ring? Her family arent wealthy. Surely they would have sold her on long ago?

I always enjoy an Ann Cleeves book, but I find the dramatisations start off well but become too drawn out, can't help feeling this latest one could have been encapsulated into about four episodes.

I think its being drawn out because its one of the last if not the last one IYKWIM.

They are shoe-horning in lots of character loose ends (which is annoying): Tosh gets her man, Perez loves again, the tensions between Duncan & Perez come to the surface & Cassie is an adult who doesnt need her dads any more yada yada yada

They are neatening it all up which is irritating, time consuming and unrealistic.

Wheeler dealers like Duncan dont get their come uppance

Adult children arent necessarily less needy

Rape victims do get on with their lives but dont necessarily "recover" with no issues etc

Some people are happier alone not everyone needs to be neatly paired off