WHITECHAPEL Series 3

Davis, Penry-Jones and Pemberton

WHITECHAPEL Series 3. 2012.

The third season of the British crime drama which has cops in Whitechapel solving unusual and gruesome cases consists of six episodes and three separate storylines.  Ripperologist Edward Buchan (Steve Pemberton) gets a job at the police station when Deputy Inspector Joe Chandler (Rupert Penry-Jones) hires him as researcher over the objections of grizzled, pit bull-like Deputy Sergeant Ray Miles (Philip Davis). The first case has to do with multiple murders in homes and businesses where the sole survivor is always a self-absorbed female. The second story has to do with the murder and dismemberment of several women, which may be tied in to a very strange lady who lives in a cluttered, ramshackle house with her husband's preserved body in it. In the third story a "Bogey man" terrorizes the neighborhood and may be an escaped madman who has the only copy of the silent Lon Chaney film London After Midnight*. Miles keeps trying to match Chandler up with women, but it never works out. The performances are excellent, including Hannah Walters as DC Riley. The stories are quite interesting, but this business of a black cop being superstitious and so terrified of a suspect that he lets him out of jail smacks of Stepin Fetchit and is ridiculous. You can read about season one here, and season two here. *[I believe the script refers to this lost silent movie as London After Dark for some reason.]

Verdict: One hopes there will be future seasons of this show/mini-series -- perhaps with some positive black and gay characters. ***. 

WHITECHAPEL: THE RIPPER RETURNS

Davis, Penry-Jones and Pemberton

WHITECHAPEL: THE RIPPER RETURNS (2009). Director: S. J. Clarkson.

"He's like a wife who wants to change all your bad habits."

Whitechapel is a British television series, with each of three seasons consisting of three or four episodes. The premise has modern-day London police officers investigating crimes that have ties to the past. The first season focused on a series of murders in Whitechapel in which the unknown killer is recreating the ghastly crimes of Jack the Ripper. Heading the investigation is the comparatively young and inexperienced DI [Deputy Investigator] David Chandler (Rupert Penry-Jones), who gets the men under his command to clean up their act and clothing [making them stupidly assume that he must be gay], and his chief assistant is grizzled Deputy Sergeant Ray Miles (Philip Davis). Both helping and hindering the investigation is one Edward Buchan (Steve Pemberton), a "ripperologist" who first comes to the police with his theory that recent murders are copycat crimes of the original Ripper. Chandler has quite a time convincing his superiors -- let alone his men -- that a new Jack the Ripper is at work in Whitechapel, but before long there's plenty of horrific evidence that his theory is correct. [Hint: don't watch this while you're eating.] Each episode of The Ripper Returns is only 45 minutes long making the full mini-series only two hours and a quarter, so it can be watched on DVD in one sitting. While the story lacks that certain gritty veracity and takes certain liberties, the series is entertaining, creepy, and has good performances, with Penry-Jones making an appealing and attractive protagonist.

Verdict: Watch out for that Ripper! ***.