There a lot of British crime dramas out there to watch. So something that offers a different hook - a show about the town's people and a journalist returning home - is enticing. On its face that's what Southcliffe offers. Small town life not as kind as it seems, a guy on the fringe, a soldier coming home, a cocky Lothario pub owner - it mixes together nicely. The first two episodes show us the events leading up to the mass shooting from different points of view and a little of the back story of the reporter coming home to cover the shooting.
Then the wheels come off. Episodes three and four drag us through the aftermath of the shootings and offer up the possibility that perhaps the shooter is still at large. The reporter - disgraced for a Youtube captured tirade against the town - returns a year later to tie up loose ends. And, NOTHING happens. Long,, painful, extended scenes of survivors demeaning themselves. A sort of dead end on the "he's still alive" theory. Similar to The Leftovers, the overall feeling is "what a waste of time."
Then the wheels come off. Episodes three and four drag us through the aftermath of the shootings and offer up the possibility that perhaps the shooter is still at large. The reporter - disgraced for a Youtube captured tirade against the town - returns a year later to tie up loose ends. And, NOTHING happens. Long,, painful, extended scenes of survivors demeaning themselves. A sort of dead end on the "he's still alive" theory. Similar to The Leftovers, the overall feeling is "what a waste of time."