A BBC Film Noir mini-series which aired in 2017. Gabriel Markham (Richard Dormer) survives an acid attack perpetrated by the serial killer he and his partner, Elaine (Jodi Balfour) are hunting. The story unravels in reverse as they try to find the killer, digging into suspects as diverse as Psycho Psychologist Isaac (Paterson Joseph) and fellow acid attack survivor Christine (Rosalind Eleazar).
Contains examples of:
- Back to Front: The whole premise is this.
- Black-and-Gray Morality: Gabriel's a vicious Cowboy Cop who is cheating on his wife with his partner. His wife covered up the fact that he might not be their daughter's father. Almost all of the other characters are rapists, murderers, or both.
- Contrived Coincidence:
- Elaine becoming Gabriel's partner, given that she's been in love with him since he saved her as a child from a rape plot in a hospital.
- Christine's vicious burn marks and injuries. A brief line implies she gave them to herself so she could be like her mother.
- Cowboy Cop: Gabriel is a vicious sociopath who will bully, intimidate, and at times physically harm suspects, while Elaine is a Yandere who is also a serial killer.
- Crime After Crime: Played with. The killer is fairly good at sticking to their intended target/s, but the investigation and interventions from other killers often mean that more people end up dead than they intended.
- Evil Counterpart: Patrick to Gabriel. Both are respected men who in Gabriel's case, probably raised girls who were not their own daughters. However, while Patrick ended up sleeping with and, it seems, grooming his young-if-legal daughter, Gabriel's daughter Hannah is his Morality Pet who he genuinely loves.
- Love Makes You Evil and Love Makes You Crazy: All over the place.
- Elaine has been obsessed with Gabriel since their meeting when she was a child, and it led to the acid attack on him.
- Sally kills her mother to disguise her affair with her husband, and Sally's
''own stepfather''.
- Mama's Baby, Papa's Maybe: Gabriel's wife isn't sure if their daughter Hannah is his or his boss's, Benton's.
- May–December Romance:
- Gabriel and Elaine. She's been obsessed with him since she was a child.
- Patrick and Sally. Made even more disturbing by the fact that she is his stepdaughter, who he raised and probably groomed.
- Plot Hole: How did Elaine ever become a police officer in the first place, with her extremely traumatic past and horrific link to Gabriel?
- Rape Leads to Insanity: It's Elaine's whole motivation.
- Scary Black Man: Isaac, who starts off being a Neat Freak oddball before it's revealed that he was part of a pedophile plot in a children's hospital.
- Scary Black Woman: Christine, a psychopath who is also accused of murder.
- Significant Anagram: Elaine Shepard is an anagram for Helena, a young girl that Gabriel saved while still a newbie police officer.
- Wife Husbandry: This seems to be what Patrick has done to Sally. He's married to her mother, who is not pleased when she finds out.
