Critic Reviews

The Bay is what it is and you can’t fault it. It’s a satisfying knotty, plotty hour. You believe in everyone and everything just enough to get by.

The Lancashire scenery is shot to show the odd moment of gruff beauty, with the soundtrack adding to the general sense of anxiety. None of it is enough to redeem the police-drama tropes. The Bay has texture, but the machinery is knackered. When a child washes up on the beach our reaction ought to be more than boredom.

At least The Bay was like Broadchurch in several good ways, too, including the most vital component of any good TV drama – I wanted to know what happens next.

Hopefully, the next five episodes will ditch the show’s overdone formula and delve deeper into Jenn’s inner world. If they manage that, there’s no reason it can’t live up to the Christie era.

I was never mad on this drama to be honest, but this was a well-written episode and Thomason has made a strong start. How many viewers will last the full six episodes remains to be seen.

It all promises to be very twisty and knotty as the mystery of who ordered Stephen Marshbrook's murder unfolds; after the first episode, I reckon we're in for an engaging – if not particularly original – ITV crime drama. After all, writer Daragh Carville certainly delivered with his strong characters and brainteasing plot in The Bay season one – and it already looks like he's building on those foundations for a very solid season two.

I’m not exactly gagging for more, but I am intrigued to see a lead heroine being quite so hard-faced.

This was certainly an improvement on the last series – more settled at least – but there’s a distance to go before it can truly deserve the accolade of “Broadchurch North”

The actors playing his children also put in good performances, and the central mysteries of who started the fire and what Dean is hiding are sufficiently engaging – just – to bring me back next week.

It’s a decent whodunit to get you through a long January, but it won’t be joining any lists of great detective dramas.