True crime dramas can be deeply powerful … if care is taken in the telling of the story, and if the victims are treated with respect. These ten British shows, I believe, fulfill those objectives.
These shows bring some of the most horrific British crimes (and a couple of bloodless ones) to life thanks to the skill of the actors and storytellers.
Appropriate Adult
Janet Leach (Emily Watson) is living the life of an ordinary wife and mother when she’s assigned as an appropriate adult to the serial killer Fred West. Fred (Dominic West) and his wife Rose (Monica Dolan) murdered and dismembered multiple young women, including Fred’s stepdaughter Charmaine and the couple’s firstborn daughter Heather. Slowly, as the investigation unfolds, Leach begins to be drawn into West’s horrific world.
The key cast members of Watson, West (the actor—the shared names are an unfortunate coincidence), and Dolan all picked up well-deserved BAFTA awards for their performances in this glimpse into one of the darkest crime cases to ever come out of Britain.
Des
David Tennant is such a charming, sweet guy in real life, which is why it’s so horrifying when he plays an evil character. And he has never played anyone more evil than Dennis Nilsen, the man who went down in history as one of Scotland’s worst serial killers. He preyed upon vulnerable young men, many of whom were gay, and none of whom were getting the support they needed.
Des was highly praised by critics when it came out in 2018, two years after the real Nilsen’s death. Obviously, David Tennant’s central performance is the standout, but Jason Watkins and Daniel Mays turn in great supporting performances as well.
Five Daughters
Between October and December 2006, five women from Ipswich, Suffolk were found brutally murdered. All of them had been sex workers. Each new discovery of a body struck terror into the hearts of all women in the area, but then finally police found the murderer. It was a man called Steve Wright, who the newspapers dubbed “The Suffolk Strangler.” But this drama isn’t about him.
Five Daughters tells the stories of the women Wright murdered: Tania Nicol, Gemma Adams, Anneli Alderton, Annette Nicholls, and Paula Clennell. (Some of them get more focus than others, as not every family member wanted their loved one’s life to be put on screen.) It’s a highly effective drama that humanizes the victims.
And if you’re wondering why on earth victims of a serial killer would need to be humanized in the first place, here’s a half-forgotten and horrible fact: In December 2006, before Wright was caught and arrested, Daily Mail columnist Richard Littlejohn wrote a piece where he referred to the victims’ “grubby little existences” and called their deaths “no great loss.”
The Lost Honor of Christopher Jefferies
When this drama was announced I admit my first thought was “Why are they making a true crime drama about a man wrongly suspected of killing a woman, rather than the actual woman?” And yet, taken on its own merits, The Lost Honor of Christopher Jefferies is very good and features a career-best performance from Jason Watkins in the title role. It also neatly illustrates how easy it is to suspect people who seem “off”, and how even easier it is for the ghoulish British press to whip people up into a frenzy based on no evidence.
Remember, though—the actual victim in this case was a woman named Joanna Yeates. While what happened to Jefferies was terrible, he went on to tell his story, and that’s something she can never do.
The Moorside
A crime involving the disappearance of a child shook the nation to its core in 2008. A little girl named Shannon Matthews went missing, but then it transpired that her own mother arranged for her kidnapping, with the help of her pedophile boyfriend’s uncle. Karen Matthews soon became the most hated woman in Britain.
The Moorside examines how the case affected the Matthews’ housing estate and the people who lived there. Sheridan Smith plays Julie Busby, Karen’s friend, while Gemma Whelan plays Karen herself. And Whelan puts in an absolute stunning performance—there were times I could barely tell if I was watching an actress or footage of the real woman.
Shannon herself would be an adult now, but no one knows where she’s living or if she’s even kept the same identity. That’s probably for the best. She can speak out if she’s ever ready.
Mr Bates vs the Post Office
If you haven’t heard about the Post Office scandal, sit down for a bit and have a read about it. Hundreds of sub-postmasters were accused of theft after a not-fit-for-purpose accounting system was installed, and it’s truly appalling what they went through. Alan Bates (Toby Jones), the man this drama focuses on, was only one of hundreds of people—and some of the others committed suicide due to the stress and shame.
This drama had one hell of an impact. After it aired, the wheels finally begun turning for the people who allowed such a miscarriage of justice to occur on their watch. Former Post Office CEO Paula Vennells was made to hand back her CBE and new legislation was created to exonerate the sub-postmasters.
“Our stated intent in making this show was simply that the sub-postmasters felt heard, that it might help in some way with the healing process,” producer Patrick Spence told Deadline. “And yet look at what can be achieved when an audience connects with a drama and decides action needs to be taken. The whole country is angry now.”
Quiz
Quiz is a more lighthearted true crime drama—there are no murders here, just fraud. This is the story of how a man called Charles Ingram (Matthew Macfadyen) attempted to cheat on the quiz show Who Wants To Be A Millionaire (via a co-conspirator “subtly” coughing at the right answers) and walk away with a million pounds. Michael Sheen plays the host of WWTBAM, Chris Tarrant.
If you’re wondering why you’ve never heard of this scandal, well, it happened a few days before 9/11, that’s why. Oh, and then Quiz was released just as Britain was going into COVID-19 lockdowns. But that gave it a wider audience than it might otherwise have had and sparked a bit of renewed interest into the case.
The Reckoning
The name “Jimmy Savile” sends a shiver down the spine of Brits. He was a beloved television presenter who hosted shows on the BBC and did lots of charity work … but after his death people started to come forward with stories of sexual abuse. Eventually, Savile was revealed to have been one of the most prolific sex offenders in British history.
This show is a co-creation of BBC and ITV, and Steve Coogan has the unenviable task of playing Saville. He does an excellent, chillingly accurate job of showing the world what a monster Savile was. There were complaints that the show goes too easy on the BBC themselves though—they weren’t asking the questions that should have been asked and Savile’s victims paid the price.
The Thief, His Wife and the Canoe
A story so outlandish you’ll barely believe it. In 2000 John Darwin (here played by Eddie Marsden) decided to fake his own death rather than face bankruptcy and got his wife Anne (Monica Dolan, also seen as Rose West in Appropriate Adult) to play along.
The story would almost be a funny one if not for the fact that Anne Darwin lied to her adult sons and told them their father had been lost while taking a canoe out to sea. They believed completely that he was really dead … until he turned up again faking amnesia, again with Anne’s full knowledge. “How could a mother do that to her own children?” is the central question of this show.
The Walk-In
The Walk-In opens with an attempted murder in a convenience store, where the perpetrator shouts “white power” before attacking a Sikh man. (Yes, this really happened.) Then it cuts to Matthew Collins (Stephen Graham) explaining to a lecture hall how he himself used to be a neo-Nazi. “We have to believe people filled with hate can change,” he says.
But can they? That’s what The Walk-In explores as Collins infiltrates a neo-Nazi group, National Action, via angry young man Robbie (Andrew Ellis). It’s a terrifying look at the current state of Britain and how Brexit empowered racists to spread more bile throughout the country.
(featured image: ITV/BBC)
