Great Film overall

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

The story-telling is good with flashbacks.The film is both funny and heartbreaking. You smile in a scene and get a soulcrushing revelation in the next.

Disappointing. No real plot twists until the end and even the end doesn't make sense. Lots of zig-zagging with background details throughout the four episodes but details like the laptop with the "help desk" information and the death of Gina's lawyer parents don't get connected in the end to vindicate Harry with the authorities. Lots of points are lost for instance: the cell phone with the text message about "Cogburn". If Gina's phone was traced and Styles was directed to trace the cell phone that sent the text message, why was Gina's phone the only one they showed being discarded so they wouldn't be located. Granted, Harry's brother called and said get rid of Gina's phone. But, Styles still had been directed to locate the other phone.

Someone asked what the murder 20 years earlier had to do with the events in this series. I think it was just one of many hits by the "Help Desk", and it got Venn and his brother into the story. Mark and Hillman hadn't been sitting around waiting for these events. Hillman told Venn that he had been kept around to do jobs for the Help Desk, and was well taken care of for it. I suspect the same was true for Mark (who I also suspect killed Hillman before Hillman killed Venn). Now they were called out to deal with Gina because she wouldn't let her parents' deaths go, and maybe they were after Venn because he wouldn't let his brother's purported death go. Then they were to assassinate Wentworth, maybe to open a way for Morpeth to move in. That part's a bit murky. But Mark took out Morpeth and Styles to, once again, protect his brother. I suspect that Venn went back into the prison at the end because he didn't want to be on the run for the rest of his life, but it would have wrapped things up nicely if he'd turned in that direction.The length of this was good (four episodes); plenty of time to build a story and build tension, but not so long that it dragged out (like the French series Spiral that carries one case through about a dozen episodes).

Having recently enjoyed one fairly convoluted but excellent thriller in the BBC; Namely 'The Shadow Line' I thought I'd give this one ago too. As things stared I was quickly drawn into the story; Solicitor Harry Venn is approached by a lawyer, Gina Hawkes, claiming to represent a man who has information about his brother and another man, Harry is understandably curious as his brother died twenty years previously! Flashback show that Harry wasn't always on the right side of the law. He had once been the driver for an apparent armed robbery where the householder was killed along with two policemen. Intertwined with Harry's story we see that things aren't going well in the country; there are riots in the capital, the government is on the brink of collapse and there are allegations that the Prime Minister has been involved in some sort of financial irregularity. Of course as this is a thriller the two events aren't entirely unconnected. Over the course of the series Harry and Gina must try to find out what is going on and stop the villains from achieving their ultimate goal without being killed.For the most part I really enjoyed this series; Philip 'Gene Hunt' Glenister and Thekla Reuten where great as Harry and Gina and the rest of the often well known cast did well in their roles… the problem however was the ending; far too much was left unexplained; we learn that various people were killed twenty years before and others we thought were dead aren't but there is no explanation about why; maybe I missed something but twenty years seems an awfully long time to plan a coup! Still there was enough good stuff before the end to mean I didn't regret watching it.

I was looking forward to this, some reasonably good write ups in the paper, probably by critics who never watched it. David Suchet, Philip Glenister are usually very good, not in this. I thought it would be something on par with 'Shadow Line'.Unfortunately it didn't live up to expectations. Glenister is no babe magnet, so his attempt to be a Bond type in pursuit of Thekla Reuten was pathetic.I lost interest after two episodes, the script being patchy, with the usual flashbacks keeping you wondering why the hell they need so many of these. They are great if they are done properly as in 'Shadow Line', in 'Hidden' I couldn't see the need for any. The acting was hammish and as it went on it just became more boring. I guess it might be enjoyed by Glenister fans, but it really isn't very good.It was too long after two episodes so be prepared for a marathon.