Loch Ness is a Scottish TV show set in a fictional village on the shores of the infamous Loch Ness. It stars Laura Fraser, Siobhan Finneran (whom you may know from Downton Abbey or Happy Valley), and Don Gilet. If you loved Broadchurch (mourn its demise), you may also enjoy Loch Ness. This is a suspenseful, Scottish crime drama spanning six episodes.
Detective Sergeant Annie Redford is cleaning up the gory aftermath of a prank on the shores of Loch Ness by morning and by day’s end she’s attended the scene of a possible accidental death, probable homicide when the body of a local man and piano teacher is discovered at the foot of a cliff. Detective Chief Inspector Lauren Quigley is sent to the village to lead the murder inquiry and soon further discoveries of pieces of other victims lead to the unsettling realization that a serial murderer stalks this tiny town.
When a local teen boy goes missing tensions and pressure mount. After news of the serial murderer breaks the town explodes with fear and panic. Anxiety continues to escalate as the investigation develops, more bodies drop, secrets are exposed, and likely suspects emerge. Adding to the viewers’ frustration is the fact that the investigation is regularly stymied by borderline incompetence and hotshot consultants cowboying for their next best selling book (I’m looking at you Blake Albrighton). Detective Inspector Frank Smilie, the local police head honcho, resents the outsider sent to solve the murders and obstructs/drags his feet as much as he can particularly when it comes to protecting his buddies in the old boys’ club.
This is a town full of people with dodgy secrets. And I have a list. The town general practitioner is mega dodgy and possibly inappropriately handsy with underage patients. The local abattoir proprietor is more concerned with his business possibly tanking than his missing, mentally ill son. Even Redford’s own teenage daughter keeps secrets from her mother despite her friend’s urging her to come clean! Farmers McGrellish are especially squirrelly when DS Redford insists on investigating the sound of a slamming door in a supposedly empty house. What or who are they afraid she’ll find? What shadiness are these farmers up to? And what sketchiness is Keiran’s ma hiding? Why is she keeping his brother in a medically induced coma while everyone believes he has locked in syndrome? Let’s be clear: this show is not above throwing some disturbing, dysfunctional twists previously seen only on soap operas.
While Loch Ness is in the same vein as Broadchurch, it’s not in the same class. The two shows share similar, insular settings in small towns harboring citizens hiding secrety secrets as well as similarities in that they are both mystery/thriller dramas. However, Broadchurch is the better quality drama in terms of story telling.
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