OUR GAL IN THE FOG (3#) -

Couch Potato Notes - Last Night on TV . . .

Maybe I would miss much of the colorful pageantry in the PBS Sally Lockhart Mysteries because I watch on a B&W mini-TV, but I impulsively tuned in anyway without reading up on these dramas ahead of time. I knew beforehand only that one Philip Pullman wrote the stories.

I had never read any of his writings, although I had come across mention of him, and, from what I remembered, he's been accused of being anti-church or anti-Christian. Thus, I had some small reservations about what I would see.

The Sally Lockhart Mysteries turned out to be in the style of the by-now classic Victorian penny-dreadful, but with the new twist of a female protagonist: a plucky ingenue detective.

First, I wish the two mysteries had been presented on separate evenings. While I enjoyed both, I would have much preferred watching each of them on different occasions.

Having said that, there was enough of the ambiance of the Victorian Era and some recognizable stock characters to make the stories seem somehow familiar, yet with sufficiently intricate puzzle plots to maintain interest through to the end.

Any cautionary notes? Yes, I'm afraid so.

Somewhere in the middle of the first story, The Ruby in the Smoke, Pullman interjected an exposition about England's part in the historical issue of The Opium Wars which was gratuitous, I thought. It seemed almost like a lecture. And I could have gotten along without it. He then interjected a little lecture in the second story, The Shadow in the North, as well.

Apart from these small flaws,
I found the stories quite entertaining.

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