Line of Duty (BBC) **Spoilers**

MoonUnit75

HiGlo wrote: »

H isn’t necessarily the person orchestrating all the criminal activity. Is it not that Buckles is just enabling them and covering for them and stuff? (And getting paid a tasty sum for it....) Not that he’s the one in charge or anything.
So Lakewell being killed in front of him was a warning from the criminals to keep his mouth shut. Hense his asking for witness protection.

But it was the 'H' character who was ordering the OCG around, like the killing of Kate and Maneet.

ShineOn7

Who forged Kate and Lomax’s signatures if Buckles was in prison?

Lomax?

Why wasn't he arrested then?


Via the Guardian thread




edit:

LOD Reddit

Chloe says it came from prison governor, Steve says it's being looked into

Wanderer2010

How did someone who cant even spell definitely rise to such a high rank in the police? From 2003 to 2019, he didnt spell such a basic word correctly. 16 YEARS!!!??

Hercule Poirot

HiGlo wrote: »

H isn’t necessarily the person orchestrating all the criminal activity. Is it not that Buckles is just enabling them and covering for them and stuff? (And getting paid a tasty sum for it....) Not that he’s the one in charge or anything.
So Lakewell being killed in front of him was a warning from the criminals to keep his mouth shut. Hense his asking for witness protection.

But Buckells ordered Jo to "get rid" of Kate did he not?

And it's heavily implied he ordered Ryan's OCG group to kill Gail Vella?

Not exactly the actions of a middle man who is just passing on information

He said himself that Thurwell and Fairbanks started it before Cotton and Hunter took over

Unless it wasn't his stuff, he wasn't sending those messages but allowed himself to be incriminated - which in turn leads to the assumption he was told by Osbourne he would be protected by a lack of investigation, hence his cocky attitude in the interview this evening?

An awful lot of assumptions I know, but that's all we're left with after that shambles

I think the chance of there being a satisfactory ending died when John Corbett was killed, there was a "good" cop inside the OCG, getting closer and closer to the truth. AC-12 through Steve had him onside, if you'd kept that character alive longer that could have been the route to tying things up in a meaningful manner. Once he was gone they didn't introduce a plausible alternative.

I had clung to the hope that Steph Corbett and whatever Lakewell told Steve was going to be key to something, but her character was ignored the last few episodes, and I don't think we ever found out if Lakewell did pass something useful onto Steve.

Vestiapx

Johnny0Toole wrote: »

I think the chance of there being a satisfactory ending died when John Corbett was killed, there was a "good" cop inside the OCG, getting closer and closer to the truth. AC-12 through Steve had him onside, if you'd kept that character alive longer that could have been the route to tying things up in a meaningful manner. Once he was gone they didn't introduce a plausible alternative.

I had clung to the hope that Steph Corbett and whatever Lakewell told Steve was going to be key to something, but her character was ignored the last few episodes, and I don't think we ever found out if Lakewell did pass something useful onto Steve.

You think Corbett was a good cop?

Vestiapx

Vestiapx wrote: »

You think Corbett was a good cop?

His motivation was. Did some terrible things though.

Hercule Poirot

[Deleted User] wrote: »

I think the chance of there being a satisfactory ending died when John Corbett was killed, there was a "good" cop inside the OCG, getting closer and closer to the truth. AC-12 through Steve had him onside, if you'd kept that character alive longer that could have been the route to tying things up in a meaningful manner. Once he was gone they didn't introduce a plausible alternative.

I had clung to the hope that Steph Corbett and whatever Lakewell told Steve was going to be key to something, but her character was ignored the last few episodes, and I don't think we ever found out if Lakewell did pass something useful onto Steve.

Lakewell told Steve that Gail Vella was investigating the Stephen Lawrence case from twenty years ago, which led them to Thurwell

Vestiapx

Johnny0Toole wrote: »

His motivation was. Did some terrible things though.

Was his motivation not to get Ted?

Loafing Oaf

ShineOn7 wrote: »

Buckles was threatened with "that's what happens to a rat" when Lakewell was murdered on front of him

How is he H if Banks threatened him like this?

Hyzepher wrote: »

From that episode it looks like Buckells just took over from those that had been caught. He mentioned it in the interview. Most of the ocg work was based on communication with an unknown person. Someone who may have been more ruthless in the past - Buckells was merely riding on those coattails.

The main question is how he kept it all together once he was imprisoned. How did he get he phone/laptop etc into prison without reveling his identity.

Also, with the number of OCG he was allegedly in communication with, I would have like to see logs of other chats he had via the laptop that we were not already privy to. Like info relating to Lakewell, Denton etc

When you're dealing with a show that's jumped the shark, these sorts of 'commonsense' questions have an air of

Goldengirl

DrumSteve wrote: »

Why didn't they just cut to Osborne sitting in his office laughing maniacally.

All they had to do was that... And all would have been forgiven.

Well they sort of did really , with that speech he gave on TV, giving no credit to AC 12 for catching Gail Vella's killer and completely denying the existence of institutionalised corruption within the police force .
Proved by Carmichael's lack of response to Ted's confession..He knew that nothing would happen because she literally could not give a sxxx!
An anticlimax , but I think that was the point , and that's the end
At least Ted tied up the loose ends of last season , I suppose .

Very disappointing, kept waiting for a guns blazing finish .

HiGlo

MoonUnit75 wrote: »

But it was the 'H' character who was ordering the OCG around, like the killing of Kate and Maneet.

Ah yes. Fair point!

I feel like they left it open enough to come back with another series and reveal that there’s others / more senior figures involved in stuff.... But at the same time it’s relatively wrapped up that they could leave it at that....

Hercule Poirot

[Deleted User] wrote: »

His motivation was. Did some terrible things though.

He was only remorseful about killing Hargreaves because he purposely aimed for his legs but hit the femoral artery, he had no issue killing bent officers but there is definitely a scene where he prevented a (presumably) clean officer being killed by a member of the OCG in one of their heists

I think John was taking the "eye for an eye" approach to justice but he did conduct himself to a moral code of some sort

Vestiapx

Hercule Poirot wrote: »

He was only remorseful about killing Hargreaves because he purposely aimed for his legs but hit the femoral artery, he had no issue killing bent officers but there is definitely a scene where he prevented a (presumably) clean officer being killed by a member of the OCG in one of their heists

I think John was taking the "eye for an eye" approach to justice but he did conduct himself to a moral code of some sort

He was not a good cop. He was a vigalante at best.

joe40

I wonder how do the Irish cops feel watching that show. A lot of the AC12 police vehicles were BMWs and mercs. No Hyundai's there.

MoonUnit75

What a total mess, plot-wise. All that build up to a ring of corrupt high-level police officers involved in covering a paedophile ring but that whole story arc went absolutely nowhere in the end.

Vestiapx

joe40 wrote: »

I wonder how do the Irish cops feel watching that show. A lot of the AC12 police vehicles were BMWs and mercs. No Hyundai's there.

Gsoc probably drive BMW and merc

ShineOn7

Somebody edited Mercurio's Wiki


It was since restored

dodzy

jojofizzio wrote: »

Love her doggie

Dempo1 wrote: »

Loved her woolly jumper

Loved her red-head.

Vestiapx

dodzy wrote: »

Loved her red-head.

Who was the actress

Loafing Oaf

dodzy wrote: »

Loved her red-head.

As Gay Byrne used to say, no hair, just a red head...

qwabercd

qwabercd wrote: »

My (definitely wrong, and full of holes) theory is that Buckells is H, in a Keyser soze type turn.

Called it last week but actually had the hunch since around episode 2/3 of this season. Still thought it was very poor though, the last 2 series have been a serious nosedive and at this stage I'd rather they just left it at that.

Hollyworth

A lot of people saying this had a political message about the bumbling fool turning out to be a sinister criminal mastermind. And institutional corruption being an unsolvable problem.

But I also saw another message in there... That the straight, white, religious man can still be a hero in 2021. Many doubted him, but his intentions were honourable and he truly was the hero of the story.

Compare that to a lot of films and shows in America and UK today, and they usually cast the straight, white, religious man as the villains.

What a refreshing change. Good for Jed Mercurio.

Kassandra Easy Preschool

Kassandra Easy Preschool wrote: »

Currently facing a conundrum here. No work 2m...do I have wine or do I stay off it to keep my wits about me for the finale

I hope you went with the wine.

ShineOn7

Mercurio's first Tweet since it aired

He has replies to it switched off



https://twitter.com/jed_mercurio/status/1388990688826638336

Wanderer2010

Wanderer2010 wrote: »

How did someone who cant even spell definitely rise to such a high rank in the police? From 2003 to 2019, he didnt spell such a basic word correctly. 16 YEARS!!!??

I see all manner of grammatical, syntactical and etiquette-based errors in senior people all the time. That actually made it believable to me.

ejmaztec

I think Jed Mercurio is definately the real "H", and he's led us all up the garden path, and around the houses, just to cover himself. :eek:

I agree with many that the finale as disappointing. I suspect, the reason for this was the rigid formatting of the BBC.



The finale could have been wrapped up in 6 episodes, 5 of which were an hour long and the 6th, one hour, twenty minutes.


Mercurio: The last episode needs to be 80 minutes long.
BBC: Tough. You have a one hour slot.
Mercurio: I can't chop it down.
BBC: Great! Extend the final to two episodes.
Mercurio: Errr..... I need just 20 minutes more to complete the story
BBC: Grand, find some filler for the other 40 minutes.



And that is why in the finale we have Kate and Steve having pints when nothing is confirmed and the story isn't finished.

The first 20 minutes of the finale were absolutely terrific. The rest, really was filler.


I've heard it said in other areas, this is why production companies like NetFlix. No-one of us viewers cares whether an episode of a good TV show is 53 minutes, or 68 minutes. If you look at the runtime of House of Cards, it varies quite a bit. However broadcasters do care, because they need to fit them into the schedule.

ShineOn7

https://twitter.com/jessbrammar/status/1388961378086506497

MoonUnit75

Hollyworth wrote: »

A lot of people saying this had a political message about the bumbling fool turning out to be a sinister criminal mastermind. And institutional corruption being an unsolvable problem.

But I also saw another message in there... That the straight, white, religious man can still be a hero in 2021. Many doubted him, but his intentions were honourable and he truly was the hero of the story.

Compare that to a lot of films and shows in America and UK today, and they usually cast the straight, white, religious man as the villains.

What a refreshing change. Good for Jed Mercurio.

I think that was their problem. Ted was the hero, completely straight and honest, doing everything 'to the letter of the law, the letter'. Not the ideal hero for 2021 so Ted had to be tainted with the silly 50K story and the John Corbett 'leak' that did nothing and went nowhere.

Gill Biggaloe went into witness protection and is shown with her scrap metal car and dingy flat in a dilapidated seaside ghost town. Couple of years later and Jo's witness protection involves a stunning house, stunning girlfriend, stunning dog and she walks off into the sunset. As far as I can make out, every straight relationships in the entire series ended up down the plughole.

I suppose the paedophile ring was a very in-vogue cause several years ago but it seems to have been completely abandoned with no resolution or understanding of how it tied the corruption together as hinted in earlier series. The take-away from this series was that the only straight, diligent officer with integrity in AC-12 was the woman of colour yet the main trio seem to get the payoff and exclude Chloe from their wrap-up drinks.