Even before I read the episode plots or the cast list I suspected that if book one (Dissolution) was portrayed they would probably ditch Shardlake's first assistant and immediately have Barak as Shardlake's aide. As the first assistant only appears in book one, I saw some sense in this probable change. And since I thought that the first assistant was an ungrateful, selfish hypocrite I wasn't unhappy to see him go.
The actor playing Shardlake is excellent, he portrays Shardlake pretty much as he is in the book, an intelligent man of honour with a decent sense of the ridiculous. He even possesses the delicate sensitive features one imagined when reading the of the lawyers trials. And he has the right kind of energy and physicality to make you believe that despite not being some macho giant he is up to the kind of things that Shardlake has to face.
Unfortunately, apart from Sean Bean and the actor who plays Guy Malton and the occasional well played humour, he's the only thing I like in this. Some of the costumes are definitely a bit iffy! There's a deal too much leather and some fabrics that look very obviously modern fabrics. The actual clothing styles look more like somebody's general idea of Tudor clothing,rather than actually historically accurate Tudor clothing.
The imagery of the monastery looks so fake and CGI. It looks more like something from a game than a TV series.
Now I come to the head being cut off! The way the blow is directed to the first victim at the beginning of the show is just not a way you should handle a sword and expect to get maximum benefit. Your more likely to get maximum injury to your shoulder. Without going into detail the person that is the killer really is somebody that needs to strike a blow in such a way as they can achieve maximum power from that blow, because they are not Arnold Schwarzenegger. I'm not a sword expert but even I knew that blow was just totally wrong.
None of the other actors are particularly convincing. I was very disappointed in the actor they've chosen to play Jack Barak. I found him wooden and frankly miscast. He just doesn't come across as tough enough. He hasn't got that street cred, tough-guy-without-trying look, that you just know Jack Barak would have.
The actor playing Guy Malton is far more convincing but because of the decision to go for diversity over historical accuracy the difficulties that Guy faced as a person of colour in a largely homogeneous religious community and when he had to face an equally homogenous outside world and set up a medical practice, are I made a mockery of here, because the series shows multiple black people in all manner of roles and positions of authority. Yet it's a key plot point in the books that Guy has to face this kind of prejudice and that he is unusual and different (hence his affinity with Shardlake) and that very few people have seen anyone like him. So much so, that in one of the books a young man suffering from mental health issue is shocked enough at the sight of Guy's skin to briefly come out of the kind of trance like stupor he's gone into. 50 years later James the first had black people in his court as a curiosity. Guy would have stood out and in the books he did.
Some of the lines in the show are funny, but if you were expecting the historical accuracy of the books you will be deeply disappointed. If you were expecting a Jack Barack that has the feel of a tough cockney wide boy, displaced into the 16th century, forget it. That's not what you're going to see.
It's a pity that the lead actor etc have been so badly let down by poor choices in relation to dialogue, costuming, poorly realised cgi locations and casting.