Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Hinterland’ On Acorn TV, A Police Procedural About A Troubled Cop And Murders In Small-Town Wales

When you watch shows like Hinterland, you come to appreciate how well-made police procedurals from the UK are. Their American counterparts, whether they’re on network or basic cable, have too many clues spoon-fed to the detectives, too many clunky lines, too many one-dimensional killers and witnesses; at a certain point, the shows blend together. But even though some of the tropes British, Scottish, Irish and Welsh detective shows use are similar, there are enough complexity and twists and turns to each weekly mystery to keep people watching. Read on for more…

HINTERLAND: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: A man is breathing heavily. We then see a close-up of that man, who is intensely running through the town of Aberystwyth, Wales.

The Gist: DCI Tom Mathias (Richard Harrington) is new to this mountainous, ancient region of Wales, and he’s called in on a case on a Sunday, before he’s even met the team or any of the town’s bigwigs. He’s called into the home of Helen Jenkins, a woman in her late sixties who seemed to keep to herself most of the time. There’s blood everywhere, and Matias and his new partner, DI Mared Rhys (Mali Harries), find a tooth in the carnage. Jenkins is nowhere to be found.

He’s introduced to the rest of his team by Chief Superintendent Brian Posser (Aneirin Hughes): DC Lloyd Ellis (Alex Harries) and DC Sian Owen (Hannah Daniel). As he investigates, Mathias is guided through the ins and outs of the town by Rhys, who has lived there her entire life. She tells her about the legend behind Devil’s Bridge, where the orphanage that Jenkins used to run was located. He goes out on the bridge looking for the house’s owner, who converted it to a B&B; when he’s there, he sees blood smears, and follows it down to an ancient ravine. He climbs down and eventually finds Jenkins’ body; her teeth have been removed.

As he and Rhys continue to investigate, the focus shifts to the adults who came under her care when they were kids. It turns out that Jenkins was a cruel headmaster, sending “bad” kids to “hard rooms” and getting her handyman to help her yank out bad teeth, which Jenkins kept in a tin. But, while some of her charges have grown up to be bitter about being under her care, there were other things going on in that house that made them want to kill Jenkins and anyone else who covered those things up.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The whole “troubled big-city detective goes to a small shore town to forget” trope came up recently in the series The Beast Must Die. But it’s not like the “troubled cop solves crimes in a small town” trope is rare on British detective shows.

Our Take: Hinterland ran on the BBC from 2014-16, and even though the first episode is in English, it’s supposed to be in both English and Welsh. Either way, it’s a well-acted series whose mysteries aren’t really whodunits but they take some dark twists and turns nevertheless.

Hinterland shows that a tidy but heavy story can be told in an episodic format, albeit one whose episodes are over 100 minutes each. The format — which people stateside got used to with Sherlock — allows the writers to go a bit deeper with their one-off characters, so that they’re not just cardboard suspects. And there’s time to delve a little into the detectives’ private lives, so there’s a continuing arc that ties the cases together.

We only get slight hints about Mathias’ troubles; he longingly looks at children, and examines the films he finds in the orphanage files. Rhys finds a picture of two little girls when a photo falls out of his wallet. Finally he tells Rhys that he’s not in this new job by choice. So we know that there’s something that Mathias is running away from, and that the cases will likely continue to remind him of what he’s trying to escape. But the first episode seemed to be better for an introduction that shows just how good Mathias is at his job.

Sex and Skin: None.

Parting Shot: Mathias continues to look at the orphanage films, even after the case has been closed. We then see him jogging intensely again.

Sleeper Star: Mali Harries is a steadying force as Rhys, keeping Mathias at least in a little bit of check by giving him the local scuttlebutt he needs to help his investigations.

Most Pilot-y Line: When DS Owen mutters that she doesn’t blame people for wanting to move far away from the town, Rhys dresses her down and tells her to keep her opinion to herself. Is there a history between the two or is Rhys just that protective of her hometown?

Our Call: STREAM IT. Hinterland has sharp writing and complex episodic mysteries that only enhance the continuing storyline about the troubled cop at the show’s center.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.

Stream Hinterland On Acorn TV