Vigil (BBC)

It was the dude in the green poncho outfit. He even removed his visor so we could get a good look at him, just in case he wasn't recogniseble from the focus shots of his face at various dramatic points during the series. 😜

Bingo!

Wow, that's because they don't have LGBT in Russia.

What an absolute mess.

from the repeated establishing shots of the submarine when cutting back, just in case you forgot, you know, it’s set on a submarine.

the constant cuts to yer man through all the episodes.

cutting the suit that was meant for deep sea diving

”you won’t last 15 minutes” nice quick maths.

The truth is out there ...

Rubbish..

The entire story lost me 😏

Was it really gripping and full of tension for the first half?

The drama from the end of the previous episode was resolved in a matter of minutes, it predictably followed the same pattern from the earlier episodes. Afterwards the XO didn't bother to attempt to retrieve the diving suit from the torpedo tube even though he had gone there with the intent to retrieve it. A contrived attempt to add some tension because the plot was done at that point. It became more preposterous when the antagonist dismantled the valves causing the boat to sink when his intention was to force it to the surface. The showdown with the XO was a predictable non-event with gratuitous stabbing after he was killed so that the protagonist could get a head start for the chase through the missile deck. Meanwhile the communications came back online just in time for the captain to order that the baddie be apprehended or killed.

The storyline got more absurd in every episode and it culminated with the antagonist taking the protagonist hostage at knife point and demanding that the captain surface the submarine. However due to his sabotage of the valves, the boat had been taking on more water than the pumps could remove. If he had wanted to surface the submarine all he had to do was blow the ballast tanks. That shouldn't have been a problem for him to do so having seen what he had previously done with the reactor.

It all got wrapped up in 30 minutes and then they dragged out the remainder of the episode but didn't resolve anything because the entire plot was so contrived it made it impossible to do so.

The blurb made Vigil sound intriguing but "predictable, formulaic and dumb" would be a more accurate description of what was delivered. In future when a series is billed as "from the producers of Line of Duty, Bodyguard and Vigil", I will be sure to give it a miss. World Productions created a crime drama about a nuclear submarine without any input from the police or navy. The peace camp at Faslane refused permission to film there because the story was so contrived that the protestors didn't want to give any authenticity to it. They clearly didn't get permission to film near the Chinese consulate either, Murrayfield stadium in the background would have been the highlight of the episode.

Died on its arse in the last EP, no spoilers but had high hopes for this but was disappointed

Why did you watch it so?

Backstory wasn't that complicated.

Suranne Jones character is claustrophobic for obvious reasons. Trapped under water her worst fear. Writers focus on this and put her in this scenario at least once an episode.

As for the rest, she's wrestling with her sexuality, as people do.

If its a simple "man goes on submarine and kicks butt and then gets the woman" type drama maybe look up a Stephen Segal movie or something?

Most people know if a program is going to be sh*te from the first 10 minutes of episode 1, not 5 or 6 hours in. Its funny that you watched 6 hours of it before you decided it was rubbish. Obviously something kept you involved in it. Life is too short to watch 6 hours of bad TV.

Fully agree, the second half was actually so quiet that I was waiting for one more twist or turn to liven it up, instead of the 'happy ever after' scenario.

Was an OK series, no Red October - too much lesbian sub plot crap going on as is the want of many shows

If they'd just stuck to the thriller aspect in a shortened series would have been much better

I know this was only produced by Jed Mercurios team etc...but I think he might have an issue with not knowing how to blooming end anything...that last episode was poor, felt rushed and bizarrely neat.

The last episode of line of duty was also a disaster.

Pretty decent drama, with good acting. The land investigation in parallel with the submarine one helped in developing the sense of puzzle, and very good directing made it very watchable. A few elements in it a bit too convenient, and a few doubts on official procedures etc, but this didn't take away from an enjoyable enough distraction.

Watch it in 2024.

Based on S1, will be giving S2 a miss.

Starts on Sunday December 10th.

Continues on Monday and Tuesday.

And then the following Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.