Ripper Street Review - Episode 6 (Spoilers for US)

This week's Ripper Street finally reveals a few of Detective Reid's secrets. Here's Jamie-Lee's review...

This review contains spoilers

1.6 Tournament of Shadows

Now three-quarters of the way through this beautifully bloody journey through the streets of Whitechapel in the months after the serials killings of Jack the Ripper, we are finally offered a brief insight into the background and inner workings of Ripper Street's lead character. Master of the bowler hat and sardonic quip, Detective Inspector Edmund Reid is played by Matthew Macfadyen of Spooks, Mr Darcy and husband of voice of Lara Croft fame. He even does those Marks and Spencers adverts, which is why you may find yourself wanting hot chocolate pudding oozing with cream and lashings of, ohhh, anyway... He has used his brooding skills demonstrably when hiding his feelings of pain about his daughter and somewhat awkward marriage in this gritty series and his MI5 training from Spooks has proved useful for authority, particularly when dishing out the dirty work to his right-hand men Drake and Jackson. He’s also shown that he’s not afraid of a rough and tumble himself when putting Jackson in his place, or giving one or two ruffians or embassy staff a swift backhand.

Ripper Street offers a plethora of on-going interesting characters and sub-plots to keeps viewers entertained alongside each week’s main plot, and this week’s episode is once again completely different from anything we’ve seen in the previous five. The H Division are left dealing with the dock strike of ’89 and rather unpleasant anarchists are stirring up trouble. A bomber is killed in an ‘accidental explosion’ revealing a deadly Communist plot, although as this is Whitechapel and prime time BBC One viewing, all is not what is seems. When Reid thinks everything looks a bit circumspect, he faces a backlash from Special Branch. Not heeding his warnings from above, he comes across something more unpleasant and sinister than the criminals roaming the streets, and far closer to home. In addition, we get a taste of what’s to come in the future storyline, when we discover that Jackson may not be who he say he is at all. Not so happily coerced into going undercover for Reid during the strike, he performs brilliantly, saving Drake’s life in the process. However, how far does and can his acting and betrayal go?

READ MORE: http://www.denofgeek.com/tv/ripper-street/24338/ripper-street-episode-6-review-tournament-of-shadows

Ripper Street Will Return News Gruesome hit drama is commissioned for a second series. Posted 29th January 2013, 3:51pm in TV (DIY)

The BBC have confirmed that period police drama Ripper Street will return for a second series next year.

The series, set in the Whitechapel area of Victorian London, has proved to be a hit with viewers,regularly attracting audiences of 7.1 million on average every Sunday night.

Starring Matthew Macfadyen (Pride and Prejudice), Jerome Flynn (Game of Thrones) and Adam Rothenberg (Person of Interest) the series is made by Tiger Aspect Productions and Lookout Point in association with BBC America.

Controller or BBC Drama Commissioning Ben Stephenson said, “quality and ambition run through Ripper Street, from Richard Warlow’s original scripts, the incredible cast and the captivating direction. All combine to create a period series with a modern and gripping edge that will return for a second series in 2014.”

READ MORE: http://www.thisisfakediy.co.uk/articles/television/ripper-street-will-return/

Matthew Macfadyen: Ripper Street to return for second series Gritty detective drama set in Victorian London starring Matthew Macfadyen has been a hit on BBC1 and BBC America (GUARDIAN)

http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/ripper%20street

Maggie Brown
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 29 January 2013 08.57 EST


BBC1 has ordered a second series of Ripper Street, the gritty Sunday night drama starring Matthew Macfadyen.

The BBC confirmed that a second, eight-part series was due for broadcast in 2014.

Ripper Street's first series, set in London's East End after the hunt for Jack the Ripper was called off in 1889, has averaged 7.1 million viewers and a 22.9% audience share so far, according to consolidated ratings including seven-day catchup viewing.

Macfadyen features as a police inspector, with Jerome Flynn as his sergeant colleague and Adam Rothenberg an American surgeon and former Pinkerton detective.

The first episode resulted in more than 90 viewers complaining about insensitive scheduling, because of the combination of sex and violence so close to the 9pm watershed.

But critics have praised the production, by Tiger Aspect and Look Out Point, for its authentic depiction of Victorian London, and gritty contrast to traditional costume dramas.

Ripper Street is a BBC Worldwide co-production which airs on BBC America, where it has been the US cable channel's most successful drama apart from Doctor Who.

READ MORE: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/jan/29/ripper-street-second-series

Review of Ripper Street ‘The Weight of One Man’s Heart’ By Neela Debnath (INDEPENDENT)

Charlene McKenna as Rose (BBC)

On this week’s installment of CSI: Whitechapel or “Ripper Street” as it is more commonly referred to, viewers were finally given an insight into Sergeant Drake’s dark past. There was of course the regular dose of sex, violence and anachronisms that come as standard with each episode.

Thus far Drake has been somewhat of a mystery to the audience and there have only been small hints of the man he used to be. During the lockdown at the orphanage in episode 2, Drake spoke about his nightmares and revealed a tattoo of an Egyptian goddess.

For those who may have wondered what lay beneath that cool, uptight and very proper Victorian exterior need wonder no longer. Drake was a former soldier who experienced all the horrors of war and more after slaying his captors when he was taken prisoner.

There is a reason he is Reid’s muscle and essentially tethered to a leash but it is a self-imposed restriction. Jackson may mock him for being too serious but perhaps he would be less cocky if he knew what Drake was capable and what he has done in the past.

It was a great story in terms of character development and the parallels it created between the treatment of veterans returning from the front line in the Victorian era and in 2013. It served as an interesting angle and way in for viewers. Drake’s former brother-in-arms Colonel Madoc Faulkner (Iain Glen) gave a fierce critique of the ‘reward’ former soldiers are given when they return home after serving. He made a compelling argument and raised an issue that applies both then and now.

READ MORE: http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/01/27/review-of-ripper-street-the-weight-of-one-mans-heart/

Matthew Macfadyen and Game of Thrones' Jerome Flynn Talk Ripper Street It’s a bloody good time on Ripper Street. by Roth Cornet JA (IGN)

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“A lot comes out about his past,” Flynn says of Drake. “He's this wounded boy from the lower class who had a broken childhood, and he's got a lot of demons he picked up from then and from fighting in Egypt in the war. So he's in battle with those parts of himself, and yet there's a real heart to the man, which gets melted by women.”

Flynn’s character has a particular affection for Reid that is tested both by Reid’s attachment to the American Jackson (whom Drake has a great disdain for) and the ghosts of his past rearing their less-than-savory heads.

“He had a Colonel from the army who he served and was extremely loyal to who comes back and tries to get him to cross over to the other side of the law,” Flynn says. “Inspector Reid has become a new father figure, so Drake has got really split loyalties. A lot of the soldiers, as they are now, come back having fought for their Kingdom and risking their lives and are not being looked after, and many end up on the street. A lot of the homeless, as today, come from the army, so that falls on him. He has to face these things that have been festering in him, and what he saw and what he went through in Egypt. As well as the fact that he's fallen in love with this prostitute and he's putting all of his eggs in that basket and setting himself up for a big fall. She kind of plays him along and uses him a bit. It's sad.”

All of the characters will be dealing with unfolding tales of woe, it seems.

“Reid has a painful journey,” Macfadyen says. “He has a lot of anger and sadness that he's bottled up to do with his family, and that's sort of revealed.” Reid has made a “huge error” with his daughter, who has gone missing, and must play that out over the series. There are hints that her disappearance may have something to do with the Ripper, but Macfadyen promises that the series will never offer a trite and manufactured “Ripper reveal.” Jack was never caught, and the premise of the show is to explore how his specter haunts the police and the East End community.

“Also, Jackson's background is fascinatingly dense; there are things that he's hiding from Reid,” The actor says. “Reid really likes him and wants him on his side. He doesn't really care that he's a whoring, untrustworthy American. He just thinks him brilliant. Drake and Jackson, on the other hand, hate each other from the get go. It becomes extremely problematic as the series goes on.”

READ MORE: http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/01/26/matthew-macfadyen-and-game-of-thrones-jerome-flynn-talk-ripper-street?abthid=51033677da590bf35100001b

Ripper Street: BBC gets it right again with this ripping good unsettling yarn JOHN DOYLE The Globe and Mail Published Friday, Jan. 25 2013, 5:00 PM EST Last updated Friday, Jan. 25 2013, 7:23 PM EST

The good, gruesome new Brit drama Ripper Street (Saturday, Space, 9 p.m.) is set in 1889 and yet feels both contemporary and very familiar.

For the umpteenth time in movies and TV, we’re taken back to the era of Jack the Ripper – the filthy, teeming streets of London, brothels, bodices and earnest police officers trying to use new technology and forensic evidence to solve crimes.


The sense of the contemporary was emphatic in the opening episode. The setting was the period when Jack the Ripper seemed to have stopped his killing spree, and viewers first saw a ghoulish bit of tourism unfold – people were being led around East London to see the exact spots where the Ripper’s victims were found. At the same time, there was an avid tabloid press competing for new information about the serial killer.

A body was found. It looked like the Ripper’s work, but was it? It was the task of Police Inspector Edmund Reid (Matthew Macfadyen), his Detective Sergeant Drake (Jerome Flynn from Game of Thrones) and Captain Homer Jackson (Adam Rothenberg), a former Pinkerton detective and U.S. Army surgeon, to determine what was going on.

The seediness and depravity of London during the period was on full display (in the U.K., where Ripper Street has been airing recently on the BBC, there were many complaints from viewers about some gory, blood-soaked scenes), and the series continues to be unafraid to disturb.

The second episode airs on Saturday – you can find the pilot on demand – and it becomes clear that each episode is both an excellent mystery and highlights a key aspect of the period in which it is set. The first episode dwelt much on the arrival of commercial pornography. This one deals with the role of children in the late Victorian period.

READ MORE:  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/television/ripper-street-a-ripping-good-unsettling-yarn/article7861512/

Ripper Street - Episode 2 Preview (BBC AMERICA)

http://www.bbcamerica.com/ripper-street/videos/the-dead-room/

Matthew Macfadyen plays it straight on 'Ripper Street' on BBC America (Philly.com)

Ellen Gray, Daily News TV Critic
POSTED: Wednesday, January 23, 2013, 3:01 AM
* RIPPER STREET. 9 p.m. Saturdays, BBC America.

PASADENA, Calif. - You might not guess it to see him as Mr. Darcy to Keira Knightley's Elizabeth Bennet in "Pride & Prejudice" or the somber Victorian London police Inspector Edmund Reid in BBC America's new "Ripper Street," but Matthew Macfadyen sometimes has trouble keeping a straight face.
In fact, Jerome Flynn ("Game of Thrones"), who plays Reid's sergeant in "Ripper Street," says Macfadyen and co-star Adam Rothenberg ("Alcatraz") are "the two biggest gigglers I've worked with."

"Adam's terrible. He's terrible!" said Macfadyen in an interview earlier this month during the Television Critics Association's winter meetings. "We . . . got to a stage where we couldn't look at each other."

Given how many of their scenes involve dead bodies - Rothenberg plays a former U.S. Army surgeon with a murky past and a few forensics tricks up his sleeve - some gallows humor is understandable.

But then there was "Frost/Nixon," the 2008 film in which Macfadyen played David Frost producer John Birt.

"There's a lot of giggling with Sam Rockwell, Oliver Platt and I, because for much of it we were kind of in the back of shots . . . so there was a lot of naughtiness. And the more serious Frank [Langella, who played Richard Nixon] and Michael [Sheen, who played Frost] were, the more hysterical" the three became, Macfadyen recalled.

READ MORE: http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/television/187997591.html

'I Tried Generally Not F***ing Up': Matthew Macfadyen Talks About Ripper Street (E.)

With the success of British period drama Downton Abbey, the US audience are set for another treat from our fair isles in the form of Ripper Street.

With his role in the show an important part, actor Matthew Macfadyen has spoken to The Hollywood Reporter about his role, admitting that he "tried generally not f***ing up", on the show which is set in Victorian London.

Speaking of his role playing Inspector Edmund Reid, the actor revealed that Reid is "very free-thinking and forward-thinking.

"He was a very moral man. At the time, it was a different kind of morality."

READ MORE;  http://www.entertainmentwise.com/news/102070/I-Tried-Generally-Not-Fing-Up-Matthew-Macfadyen-Talks-About-Ripper-Street

Matthew Macfadyen - Ripper Street Offers Brand New Challenges for Matthew Macfadyen 20 January 2013 (CONTACT MUSIC)

Ripper Street Offers Brand New Challenges for Matthew Macfadyen

BBC America’s Ripper Street – a period series about a cop, tasked with solving crimes in 19th century London, post Jack the Ripper – premiered last night on BBC America.

Marking the occasion, Ripper Street star Matthew Macfadyen discussed the experience of working on the show and getting under the skin of his character and choosing to do a long-term project like the series. For New York Daily News Macfadyen explained that as an actor, he often feels the stress of not being offered work, and then at some point the scripts simply start to pour: “[W]hen the phone doesn’t ring for three weeks, you start thinking, ‘My God, I’ll never work again.’” For him, a long-term contract for a series offered some security in a profession, where stability is inherently lacking.

READ MORE: http://www.contactmusic.com/news/ripper-street-offers-brand-new-challenges-for-matthew-macfadyen_3459775

Ripper Street episode 4 review: The Good Of This City Review Jamie-Lee Nardone (DEN OF GEEK)

The Eighth Doctor, aka Paul McGann, tips up on Ripper Street this week. Here's Jamie-Lee's review...

This review contains spoilers.

1.4 The Good Of This City

Our bloody and brutal Ripper Street has made its way across the pond to BBC America, where it's been the subject of much hype and media attention. Matthew Macfadyen, who plays the lead role of Detective Inspector Reid, has been cited in the papers defending the gore and smut, while Jerome Flynn who plays his right-hand man, Detective Sergeant Drake, has come out with some prime material guaranteed to give the readers of middle-England a touch of the vapours: what was he up to for those lost eight years of his career between Badger and Tommy Cooper and before Game of Thrones and Ripper Street? Well, he was in a sort of religious cult, run by the son of the actor who plays Ken Barlow in Coronation Street. Obviously.

And yes, there's also been the predictable backlash to the BBC's new series. Is it too violent to be shown at 9pm? Is the gore unnecessary? Is it sexist? Quite frankly I bite my thumb at these articles. Ripper Street is offering something new and exciting to our Sunday night rituals of cosy period drama TV viewings. Is it disrupting it? Oh yes.  Happily so. And each episode so far has been unique, pushing boundaries with very different storylines and enticing us with enriched understanding of the interesting lead characters and dazzling us with shiny cameos.

The Good of This City is no different. This week’s episode focuses on various scientific and social developments that were extremely experimental at the time; psychiatry and electricity on the underground. Of course, these are merely backdrops for some gothic and grisly murders and a young girl named Lucy perturbed by her ‘darkness’.

Episode four opens with Long Susan (MyAnna Buring) welcoming a new ‘tart’ to her remarkably salubrious whorehouse, making it sound as though she’s about to enter the Shangri-La. We’ve seen a tough side to Susan’s character through her brief appearances, but are waiting to scratch beneath the surface. Then in walks Lucy, once renowned for being the prettiest prostitute in Tenter Street, who goes to the pint-sized Madame seeking a job. For reasons unknown, she is refused and proclaims that she knows not what will become of her. It’s a fairly bleak and hypocritical moment, with Susan reminding them both (and the audience) that men have created a world in which women are designed for their pleasure from which they can profit. All the while, Susan is there running a brothel at a sixty percent cut. However, in this episode we see how far she really will go to protect her girls.


READ MORE: http://www.denofgeek.com/tv/ripper-street/24163/ripper-street-episode-4-review-the-good-of-this-city

Matthew Macfadyen talks 'Ripper Street' and 'Anna Karenina' New BBC America drama premieres on Saturday night BY DANIEL FIENBERG SATURDAY, JAN 19, 2013 3:33 AM (HIT FIX)

Like many a British thespian, Matthew Macfadyen has reliably bounced back and forth between the big screen and television, whether wooing Elizabeth Bennett in "Pride & Prejudice" or battling international intrigue in "MI-5."

Fresh off a well-received supporting turn as Oblonsky in Joe Wright's "Anna Karenina" this winter, Macfadyen is back on TV on Saturday (January 19) night fighting crime in Victorian England in BBC America's "Ripper Street."

During the Television Critics Association press tour this month, I sat down with MacFadyen to talk about his role as Detective Inspector Edmund Reid on "Ripper Street," which was created by Richard Warlow and co-stars Jerome Flynn and Adam Rothenberg. We also talked a bit about Wright's highly theatrical Tolstoy adaptation, as well as his creative process.

Click through...

HitFix: I know you said on the panel that it was the script that attracted you, but what was the kernel that piqued your interest?

Matthew Macfadyen: It's the whole thing, I think. I wasn't a kernel. It was the writing, the character, the idea of doing a series sorta appealed and it took me by surprise, because it wasn't my plan to do another series. I wasn't looking for a series to do and it just sorta ticked a lot of boxes and it was... yeah.


HitFix: How much was it that you didn't want to do a series and you were surprised to find one that appealed to you and how much was it just that you weren't specifically looking to do another series?

Matthew Macfadyen: I just read it like this [he mimes flipping through the pages swiftly] and thought, "This is fabulous." That's the acid test, whether you want to read it and want to be in it.


HitFix: It seems like there are these rules that America actors often seem to stick to, like "I don't want to do television, I want to do..." And British actors seem not to feel bound by that same restrictions. And that always seen a little odd.

Matthew Macfadyen: Yeah. I feel like an actor. I'm not a movie actor or a theater actor. I'd like to work in all three mediums.


HitFix: But when you have a pile of scripts, does your eye go to what medium an individual project is destined for?

Matthew Macfadyen: No. A little bit. You sorta factor it in. It's a combination of practicalities and the script and also how much it's going to stretch you or how different it is to the thing you've done most recently. Those kinds of things.


HitFix: So tell me about how the character here, about how Reid stretched you from the thing you did previously?

Matthew Macfadyen: Well, what was the last thing I did? I'd played this buffoon in a movie before that, so it was a very different kind of character. He's quite a solid detective part. I just wanted to be part of the show.


HitFix: Is this a time period that you have an interest in? Or does that factor into your decision?

Matthew Macfadyen: Sure. Yeah. More and more I found it fascinating and I looked at a lot of... I spent hours looking at photographs before we started shooting and during the shoot, which I found endlessly fascinating. You're sorta looking to see how different it is, because I know the streets, I know the area where we were shooting, so it's fascinating life. They had these big pictures of London life in the period. So... ummm... Yeah. It's all interesting stuff.


HitFix: Where were you doing this research?

Matthew Macfadyen: At home on my computer.


HitFix: Just Googling...

Matthew Macfadyen: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.


HitFix: How does that kind of research inform you when you're actually putting together the character, what you can learn from looking at pictures?

Matthew Macfadyen: I don't know. I don't know how my performance would have been any different had I not looked at the photographs, but it's just interesting. You can't play "research." You can kind of have ideas, but it was just sort of interesting and allows your imagination to work, I suppose.

Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/the-fien-print/matthew-macfadyen-talks-ripper-street-and-anna-karenina#5GpDdYDQ06hqVFrM.99 

Ripper Street British Import With Sex and Sleuths By MIKE HALE (NEW YORK TIMES)

Setting a cop show in the slums of East London in 1889 gives you several advantages. Violence, for one: Among the first things we see in “Ripper Street,” a new British drama beginning on Saturday night on BBC America, is an undercover policeman pausing during a bare-knuckle fight to pull an opponent’s tooth out of his hand.


Sex, for another: the two most prominent female characters in the show are prostitutes, or tarts (“taaarts”), in the language of the time. The first episode predictably joins these elements by making a tart the target of violence.

This is not to condemn “Ripper Street,” which has its satisfactions, but to indicate the mind-set at work. As a period police procedural, it’s more successful than “Copper,” set in 1860s New York and also shown on BBC America. But it’s not that much more imaginative; someone wanted a late-Victorian “Law & Order,” and that’s what was delivered.

“Ripper Street” is, however, reasonably clever and sometimes even witty in its depictions of forward-thinking detectives pioneering the forensic methods and investigative procedures that will eventually become the grist for a thousand television shows. And in Jerome Flynn, Adam Rothenberg and particularly Matthew Macfadyen, it has a sharp and appealing group of actors to play its central cop triangle.

The undisputed star of the show is Mr. Macfadyen as Edmund Reid, a detective inspector with crusading instincts who wants both to modernize and to humanize the police force. But he’s not the all-seeing, Holmesian genius so prevalent in current shows, who acts out for 45 minutes before single-handedly solving the mystery.

In a moderately interesting twist, “Ripper Street” splits the glory between Reid and Homer Jackson (Mr. Rothenberg), an American and former Pinkerton agent who has come to London, fleeing some dark secret in his past. Deputized by Reid, Jackson supplies most of the close analysis of fibers, skin and gaping wounds (typically on the bodies of young women, of course) while tweaking the more old-fashioned sensibilities of Reid’s stalwart sergeant, Drake (Mr. Flynn, known here for playing the warrior Bronn in “Game of Thrones”).

The fun of the show comes partly from the interplay among these actors, and partly from the way it juxtaposes the muck and murderousness of the East End shortly after the days of Jack the Ripper (hence the title) with the onset of the modern world.


READ MORE: http://tv.nytimes.com/2013/01/19/arts/television/ripper-street-with-matthew-macfadyen-on-bbc-america.html

Adam Rothenberg Fights Crime On Ripper Street (Access Hollywood)

ACCESS HOLLYWOOD

Ripper Street - Matthew Macfadyen interview (premieres January 19 at 9:00 ET - BBC America)

http://www.bbcamerica.com/ripper-street/videos/inspector-reid/

'Ripper Street' review: Complex characters David Wiegand Updated 4:34 pm, Wednesday, January 16, 2013 (SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE)

As in the original BBC America production "Copper," which is set in New York in the 1860s, early forensic science plays a key role in helping Reid and his team solve crimes. In "Copper," Kevin Corcoran (Tom Weston-Jones) enlists the help of a free slave who is also a doctor, Matthew Freeman (Ato Asandoh), to solve crimes, just as Reid dragoons Jackson here to work on murder cases with him.

The similarities between the two shows don't end there. Corcoran is haunted by the murder of his young daughter, while Reid and his wife, Emily (Amanda Hale), have lost their young daughter as well. Each show also features a cooperative brothel owner, grittily detailed production values and florid, penny-dreadful dialogue.

By the second episode, show creator Richard Warlow ("Mistresses") is borrowing a bit of Charles Dickens in the story of a street urchin convicted of murdering an elderly toy maker and sentenced to die on the gallows in three days. The boy is one of a group of street kids in the employ of a Fagin-like character, who's really much more of a Bill Sikes and out to spring the boy so he can shut him up before he tells the authorities too much. Meanwhile, Reid and his team have to keep the rabid citizen Whitechapel Vigilance Committee from shortstopping the kid's trip to the gallows themselves.

Although each episode focuses on a particular crime, we're hooked as much by the characters and what we still don't know about them. Edmund and Emily have a strained marriage, although they both seem to love each other. He buries the grief over the loss of his daughter in his work, while she spends every waking hour in church. Homer and Long Susan have both turned up in London after escaping some yet-to-be-defined incident back in the United States, which may have involved a name and identity change for Jackson. He can be an invaluable asset to Reid on a murder case, but he's not to be trusted.

"Ripper Street" boasts superb performances, cast and production values, and, beyond the copycat elements, thoughtfully written scripts loaded with surprises and a compellingly complicated moral base: Virtually all the characters are a credible mix of strengths and flaws.

READ MORE: http://www.sfgate.com/tv/article/Ripper-Street-review-Complex-characters-4199509.php#photo-4036998

Matthew Macfadyen & CSI: Victoriana comes alive in ‘Ripper Street’

An abundance of evil permeates “Ripper Street.” The latest British crime drama on BBC America is a mixture of the grittier of Charles Dickens’ novels, bloody fisticuffs, beatings, occasionally explicit sex, profanity and Victorian-period CSI-style investigation.  (NEWS TRIBUNE)
TISH WELLS; MCCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS

 Ripper Street" on BBC America, 9 p.m. January 19th, Detective Sergeant Bennet Drake (Jerome Flynn) and Detective Inspector Edmund Reid (Matthew Macfadyen) pursue crime on the streets of 1889 London with the help of Captain Homer Jackson (Adam Rothenberg), an American. (TIGER ASPECT/BBC/MCT)

An abundance of evil permeates “Ripper Street.”

The latest British crime drama on BBC America is a mixture of the grittier of Charles Dickens’ novels, bloody fisticuffs, beatings, occasionally explicit sex, profanity and Victorian-period CSI-style investigation.

Oh, and it has an American as well. He smokes a lot.

Straight-laced Detective Inspector Edmund Reid (Matthew Macfadyen), and his assistant Detective Sergeant Bennet Drake (Jerome Flynn from “Game of Thrones”) patrol the East End of London in 1889 — a year after serial killer Jack the Ripper vanished.

The police deal with the constant pervasive fear that the Ripper might return, as well as with prostitution, child gangs, theft and murder.

A guide leading a tour of the places where the Ripper slaughtered his victims stumbles across a dead woman whose body is mutilated a la Ripper. Terror once again grips London, aided and abetted by the questionable journalistic practices of the popular press of the period, when fear and curiosity, not facts, sold newspapers.

It comes down to: Was the woman’s killer really the Ripper or someone else?

Read more here:http://www.thenewstribune.com/2013/01/15/2436241/csi-victoriana-comes-alive-in.html#storylink=cpy 

'Ripper Street' episode three 'The King Came Calling' review Season 1, episode 3 Published Sunday, Jan 13 2013, 5:00pm EST | By Morgan Jeffery Follow us: @digitalspy on Twitter | digitalspyuk on Facebook

If you've previously found yourself offended by the grisly tone of BBC One's Ripper Street then we hope you've located the remote control by now. If not, episode three's opening sequence - which featured vomit, butchery and a gruesome death - would be more than enough to put you off your Sunday roast.

The sickness and gore continues apace this week, as Whitechapel is hit by a cholera scare, with the ever level-headed Detective Inspector Reid (Matthew Macfadyen) determined to contain the chaos.

A scene early in the episode, in which Captain Jackson (Adam Rothenberg) takes apparent pleasure in watching his apprentice Hobbs (Jonathan Barnwell) squirm at the autopsy he is helping to perform, almost feels like Ripper Street setting out its stall. The message is clear - if you can't handle the bloodshed, get out of the dead room.

/Don't be fooled by the period setting and impressive production design, this show is far from classy fare, but it remains rollicking good fun nevertheless. "Who are you?" a lady of the night asks our heroes at one point. "The police, wench!" Jerome Flynn's Bennet Drake barks back. Yes, Ripper Street is fast becoming The Sweeney 1889.


Read more: http://www.digitalspy.com/british-tv/s213/ripper-street/recaps/a449704/ripper-street-episode-three-the-king-came-calling-review.html#ixzz2HzPEa6S9 
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Matthew Macfadyen and GOT’s Jerome Flynn Talk BBC America’s Ripper Street Leave a Comment Posted by gamenews123

BBC America is set to premiere their period procedural crime drama Ripper Street beginning on January 19 (the show is already airing in the U.K.).

Set in Victorian London, the series focuses on Inspector Edmund Reid (Matthew Macfadyen), who is haunted by the failure to catch the notorious Jack the Ripper. Reid heads up H Division, the toughest district in London’s East End, as new murder investigations bring the fear that Jack could be back. Ripper Street also stars Jerome Flynn (Game of Thrones), Adam Rothenberg (Alcatraz), Myanna Buring (The Twilight Saga, White Heat) and David Dawson (Luther, Secret Diary of a Call Girl).

Series creator Richard Warlow, Executive producer Will Gould, Macfadyen, Flynn and Rothenberg were all present at today’s TCA (Television Critics Association) tour to talk about the show.


Ripper Street is structured as a procedural crime drama set against London’s East End, shaken in the wake of the still-at-large Jack the Ripper.

"The whole point of the show is that its about what it was like for the police at the time, the confusion and loss," said series creator Richard Warlow.

The show does not plan to create a manufactured "reveal" of who the Ripper is at its conclusion. The intent is to focus on what the failure to capture him did to do the officers who hunted the killer, and to a community that felt the need to raise civilian forces to do the work that, some felt, the officials either would not, or could not accomplish.

The idea isn’t to solve the legend, but rather to, "do a period drama that delved into the bloodier/darker side of our past, rather than just people sitting around drinking tea," Warlow says.

"We will explore the aftermath into the second series, and the Ripper’s presence will always be a part of our characters lives," executive producer Will Gould added.

Though it is period, what interested the creators and the cast is that the characters would actually consider themselves, "quite modern," Macfadyen says.

Adding: "They would have felt incredibly cutting edge."

"I found Reid fascinating because he’s not a stock detective character, he’s a modern and forward looking man rather than a jaded copper," Macfayden says.


READ MORE: https://gamenews123.wordpress.com/2013/01/06/matthew-macfadyen-and-gots-jerome-flynn-talk-bbc-americas-ripper-street/

'Ripper Street' promotional photos and spoilers of 'The King Came Calling' (Photos) RIPPER STREETJANUARY 8, 2013BY: JAMI MCDONALD (EXAMINER)

Spoiler TV released promotional photos of the new BBC eight episode mini series Jan. 8, 2013 and they are extremely entertaining both in period clothing and the action in the photos. You can check out the photos in the slideshow above. You can also check out a 3 minute spoiler scene from this upcoming episode here. In this video preview you see the Reid discussing the Ripper tactics and how convenient the river is to the disposal of bodies. It also reveals the rumors of a possible cholera outbreak that could put a crimp in Reid's investigation to find "The Ripper"

READ MORE: http://www.examiner.com/article/ripper-street-promotional-photos-and-spoilers-of-the-king-came-calling