The first of three feature-length episodes, based on a series of novels about ex-Gard, now private detective, Jack Taylor (Iain Glen). Think 'Single-Handed' with a sozzled, grizzled version of Jack (they're both called Jack!) and you're close. Both are set in and around Galway and Connemara and involve a lone man seeking the truth and justice for the missing and murdered in an area haunted by a long and violent past. The present's not that great either, post-economic crisis.
That's it, really. It's nothing you haven't seen before, and aside from some quips the script is unremarkable either way. Casting, however, is crucial. Iain Glen is so watchable as Jack, a character who seems simultaneously at ease with yet wholly estranged from himself, that your ears will willingly block out the moments when his Irish accent goes south, or rather south-east.
The good thing about watching European series is that the middle-aged people (me) feel 'inside'. Jack Taylor is one of those cases, there are no young people except those who want to follow the old ones, like the boy who aspires to be a detective next to Jack or the policeman who takes him as a friend and reference. Perhaps the very long expectation of European life and low birth rate is the most active type in post-industrial societies in these countries. As if that were not enough, it is a delight to see these long episodes, where half the resolution of the cases occurs in the cozy atmosphere of the pubs between a beer and smoke that permeates the phonemes that must leave the speeches of the actors. And the fights, ah! The fights ... They're not fights of athletic types, people generated after gods fall in love with mortals like we see in Hollywood films, no, but they are fights of those who want to survive ... They beat with what has the hand, be their fists Or a beautiful wrench. This hurt to see, but my hands did not imitate the gesture in exaltation, since already had begun the imitation catching a Heineken. Anyway, whether or not you know that nice country, I recommend: watch Jack Taylor who will be transported to a country of enviable social resilience. Perhaps the drink helps a lot to heal wounds the next day, because really, the morning is a rather difficult time for this type of hero.
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