Engrenages/Spiral

I did a search, but couldn't find previous comments on this TV series.

This French drama series is about the police and judicial system in France, the title Engrenages means 'cogs' or 'wheels within wheels', but the BBC chose to call it Spiral, which is much less evocative than the original title.

I watched the third season on the BBC, and ordered the DVD box with all three seasons from Amazon. Amazing series, very well acted.

Each series has an arc story and every episode [8 in the first and second series, 12 in the third series] has different smaller cases making the lives of the main characters difficult.

The visuals are not for the faint at heart, the production team seems to enjoy lingering in loving detail over corpses of beautiful young women with their faces pulped by hammers or their breasts cut off, but the acting is stellar and the story lines continually change direction, making the series addictive.

The DVDs are French spoken with English subtitles [good to work on your Broken French]. Production values are high and the setting is a Paris rarely seen by tourists.

For more, check:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_(TV_series)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B004V98NX2/?tag=absowrit-21

The third series inspired me to find and buy the first two series. Luckily there was a box set with all three series. I like the fact that the camera doesn't shy away from the blood and gore, but I'm not terribly sensitive in that area - realism before modesty.

mirandashell said:

Do you maybe the fact that I'm female made a difference? I'm not saying women are wussy, just the fact that the victims were female and brutally murdered hit me harder than it did you?

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I think you're more sensitive than I am on this issue, but I'm not sure your gender is a factor. My wife watched the series with me, and she wasn't bothered by the graphic visuals. There are also several male victims. In the second series, a stabbed male lying for a few days in the summer heat is turned on his back. That was a pretty disgusting visual, but it was more the damage to the body than the fact that it was a male or female victim.

I do feel, on the whole, that women tend to emphatize more than men. I can also see how some women would feel attracted to the Pierre Clement character, while I think Roban is much more interesting, just as Berthaud is less interesting to me than Karlsson. On that note, did you think Karlsson was a bitch or did you admire her fortitude?

What was your reaction to the graphic visuals of the autopsy of the murder victim? Too much, not enough, or just enough?