Here are a few articles recently published on Ripper Street that haven't been mentioned earlier
CSI Victorian London
Matthew Macfadyen takes on the role of Detective Inspector Edmund Reid, who works in the police precinct H Division. His beat is only 1.4 square miles but it is packed with 67,000 people, some of whom are the most disadvantaged and troubled in London. He has his work cut out for him but, as Macfadyen says, he approaches it all with wit, vim and vigour.
"What I find interesting about him is that there's nothing jaded or on the back foot about him," says the actor. "I wanted to get away from the sort of classic, seen it all, done it all copper and he's definitely not that. He's quite progressive and interested in technology and the innovations of the age, which were enormous, especially in Victorian times."
Macfadyen was impressed by the "vividly written" script and its "fantastic energy".
He thinks it feels cutting edge despite being set in 1889, thanks to Reid's intellect and his use of local maverick doctor Homer Jackson to help him solve crimes, and his ex-army colleague Bennett Drake to keep people in order.
"Things were happening at an alarming rate, technologically. And so I think Reid and his team would think of themselves as very modern and very progressive, which is interesting because this was an age where the amazing advances that we take for granted now hadn't happened: forensics, forensically fingerprinting and DNA," he says.
Macfadyen also loved filming in Belfast, where the world of Victorian London, with its dark alleys and shady doorways, has been lovingly recreated to the point where you can almost smell the smoke in the air.
"It was like a big playground," he says. "We were able to create a big street [inside a studio], it was great."
Radio Times Video Preview
RT TV editor, Alison Graham said: "Richard Warlow’s full-on script, in the first of an eight-part series, and the excellent production design pull us straight into Ripper Street. You can almost smell the stench of a capital groping its way to prosperity after the Industrial Revolution. But it’s a strange thing, a stylised oddity and, oh my, it’s very kinky."
Female First
With Matthew Macfayden and Jerome Flynn at the heart of the show though, the BBC are assured great performances from them, while we can’t wait to see the first UK outing for American actor Adam Rothenberg as the third of our trio of detectives.
