Hello all, I am TalksTooMuch (but you can call me TTM!) and I will be recapping this season of Broadchurch for your reading pleasure. I LOVED season one but came very close to hating season two, so I hope something marvelous comes out of season three as a tie breaker. Let’s roll S3:E1!

We open very close up on the eyes of a crying woman; she’s surrounded on the periphery by police, though and I think I hear Ellie Miller (Olivia Colman! Love her, but wasn’t a huge fan of watching her cry all through season 2, in between looking like she wanted to throw up. See also: The Night Manager) in the background.

It is Miller! (Mullah as per her partner Alec Hardy); she’s there to investigate a “sexual attack” on Trish (Julie Hesmondhalgh)

Sigh

I know 99.999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999% of things in life are random and purely coincidental, but this is the FOURTH SHOW I’ve recapped in the last week that has to do with rape or consent. And I’ve only recapped SIX SHOWS this week! It’s exhausting.

Miller leads Trish away, she’s bloody around the neck and not talking whatsoever. Alec Hardy (David Tennant) is waiting at their car; he’s put down an evidence sheet in case something falls off but I think the fact that he’s male might be more jarring. Assuming Trish was assaulted by a male or males.

Miller and Hardy have brought Trish to the Sark Crisis Centre where Suhana (Sunetra Sarker) explains that Trish will be in charge all the way.

Some forensic tests later, Miller calls home, where her dad is watching the boys. I wanna see Fred! He must be huge by now. She doesn’t have much patience with her father, you can tell he’s driving her mad.

Alec and Miller chat in the hallway while Trish finishes up; now there is time for questions. Trish is having a very hard time talking. She was knocked unconscious before the attack and doesn’t remember very much but Alec’s noticed the marks on her wrists. Was she tied up? Yes, behind her back and what?? That doesn’t sound like a typical assault. That sounds premeditated. She really can’t remember much beyond that.

More exams; Trish’s clothes are taken as are photographs of her body and evidence collected from her skin. FINALLY she gets to shower.

Alec and Miller discuss what they’re both noticed; the injuries look at least a couple of days old. Neither one can remember when the last stranger rape was, but of course they don’t know if this is one either.

I’m going to do my best not to be shouty; it’s a show! Fiction!

Sahana advises Trish of the rest of her support, thankfully there is quite a lot but Trish is still not speaking. Alec and Ellie come to bring her home, does she have any questions? Two very important ones

YES says Alec emphatically. Then

The first question seemed a little bit odd to me; she’s clearly been beaten bloody and assaulted. I am sorry, but I did relax a little when I saw all the blood and visible injuries on Trish, because that goes a long way towards people believing. Perhaps she meant because of the delay in reporting. Speaking of, Trish’s next door neighbour is the smarmy arsehole image consultant from Apple Tree Yard! Clive Lucas (Sebastian Armesto) is watching the police closely even as his partner takes almost no note.

Trish lives with her daughter Leah who is away; Alec spies several happy photos on the fridge including some with Jim Atwood (Mark Bazeley!! From Home Fires! He’s devastatingly good looking but I just want to throat-punch him all the time on Home Fires so I hope he’s got a better role here, although that one’s probably fun for him) and a young woman. There’s also an invitation to a party and a work schedule. He makes note of everything, including several calls and texts from a “CATH” who had her 50th birthday party on Saturday.

He’s supposed to be making tea; Ellie gives him whatfor when she finds him out back checking out Trish’s light sensors. Tea first then nosing, fella!

Alec starts right in; they think Trish’s injuries are about two days old, which means Saturday, which means Cath’s party. Trish is reluctant to speak once again, I think we can probably infer that she is aware of who attacked her. She remembers the assault being near water and not much else. So. It’s been two days, what has she been up to in that time?

Ellie collects the clothes Trish wore Saturday night and all the bedding; then on to quotidian tasks. Trish is meant to be at work and her mate Cath is there as well, Ellie will make the excuses. There’s no police protection, though and nobody Trish can call. She snaps at Ellie, who hands over her personal cell number as a comfort; Trish doesn’t want anyone she knows to know what happened.

I once ended up at a Christmas Eve Mass (me! An dyed-in-the-wool atheist. Although I do love the traditional aspects of such Masses and people are just lovely that time of year) because one of the clients at the treatment centre I worked at didn’t want anyone she knew to know she was floundering. Ellie and I are bad with boundaries.

Alec and Ellie leave, him staring at a family photo as he goes; it seems awful to leave Trish alone like that! Even if she wants to be alone, she’s clearly terrified, checking locks and staring out the window. She calls Ellie; interrupting Alec’s moaning about all the time and evidence lost by her late reporting. Alec, when he realises Ellie has given Trish her cell number:

Trish is worried; how can she tell her daughter? Ellie reassures her and then hangs up to a barrage of abuse from Alec. She can’t keep giving out her personal cell number, that’s twice now! Ellie finally shuts him down HARD: “she’s been RAPED.”

They go to the manor house where Cath’s birthday party was held; there is indeed water nearby as Trish reported. Alec and Ellie search the area, Ellie comes up with a bloody rock and part of a condom wrapper. Alec calls it in as the crime scene.

Beth Latimer (Jodie Whittaker) is working as a crisis counselor I think; I wonder if that’s how she’ll be brought back into contact with Ellie again. She questions her affinity for the role, but her boss thinks she is a natural.

And yes, Beth with be Trish’s victim support person, I hope Trish calls her back soon.

Um. Mark Latimer (Andrew Buchan) wrote a book about their son’s death called “Danny: A Father’s Story”?

I’ll just quickly recap the last two seasons of Broadchurch in a few sentences so you know why these two are important. In season one, Beth and Mark’s son Danny was murdered in the small town of Broadchurch. The murderer was the husband of lead detective Ellie Miller, who was dealing with her new partner Alec Hardy who had his own skeletons in the closet. It took a bit to work that out and in the meantime we found out that Mark had been having an affair with the local hotel owner and Beth was pregnant again.

Season two was the prosecution of Ellie’s husband for that murder and it was (to me) equal parts excruciating and awful. Watching them rake all that muck through the courts, essentially undoing all the good work the detectives did in the first round was painful. It did have Phoebe Waller-Bridge from Fleabag (go watch if you haven’t!!) and some other interesting characters but in the end was a bit of a slog. Ellie’s husband was found not guilty and then the whole town banded together to usher him out of town. In the process, Ellie and the Latimers’ tight friendship was decimated and that’s why it will be interesting to see how they work together now.

Mark’s hovering outside a local bookstore where he’s meant to be signing books; biggest mistake he ever made he tells Reverend Coates (Arthur Darvill from Legends of Tomorrow! Veronica used to recap those, they were brilliant). It’s newspaperwoman Maggie Radcliffe (Caroline Pickles) who’s signing them, she interviewed Mark for the book and is furious that he’s leaving it to wither on the vine.

The forensic team has made it to the crime scene; SOCO Brian Young (Peter de Jersey) (who flirted with Ellie before) complains about the sheer size of the investigation. They’ll have to go right up to the manor house since they don’t know where the attack started. I’d almost forgotten about the ligature marks, but a remark by Brian has Alec snapping and Ellie asking for an apology on his behalf. Broadchurch isn’t usually a barrel of laughs, so his exaggerated head wobble between the two detectives was a nice change.

Brian says that’s why they call Alec “shitface”; Alec later asks carefully how long has that been going on? Oh just since the beginning…okay here we are at Trish’s place of work! Cath (Sarah Parrish) doesn’t look anything like I expect; I hope I look that good at 50! Not.a.chance

Cath gets a lot of heat from her boss Ed (Lenny Henry who I know from SOMEWHERE) about leaving for a chat with Alec, he’s a bit aggressive, yes? And why is he hearing that Trish will be off for awhile from Ellie? God add one plus one, dude. I thought Ellie was going to smooth things over!

Alec doesn’t handle Cath very well either, she thinks it’s about a fight “Jim” had with “Ed” and he just barges in with the allegation of rape. So of course she now knows who, who’s missing and not answering calls? Come on, Alec, surely you could have finessed that a little better. I will say watching Cath shout about figuring out that it was Trish was jarring; you don’t get a prize, Cath, whomever was attacked was a friend.

Now for the worser news: there were 70 or 80 people at the party, 50 being men. Jaysus.

Alec is briefing the rest of the detectives about what they know so far; the crime scene is called the Axehampton House. New detective DC Katie Harford (Georgina Campbell) notes the reporting delay immediately: are they sure she’s genuine? Ellie explains that the police always start from a position of believing and yay! Katie will find that out once she completes her training.

Ellie gets a call that blows her up, her son Tom (Adam Wilson) has been caught with porn on his phone, AND supplying files and links to other students. He’s being excluded for a week along with a pal; Ellie just about spits she’s so angry. Especially when the teacher suggests that perhaps the difficulties…she storms out and this shot tore at my cold, black heart.

She’s so sad and so angry and so determined that Tom not be like his father, she wants so much for him.

Alec’s daughter Daisy (Hannah Rae) is waiting outside the station when he comes out, but it’s a quick driveby on her way to hang out with friends. He warns her to stay in a group and not go walking after dark without telling her why, she’s off with a cheek kiss and “thanks for freaking me out.” I’m surprised he didn’t go over and talk to her friends, too, that’s not hover-y, is it?

Cath calls her hubs, Jim. I don’t think anyone was supposed to know that Trish was raped, right? He has an oddly muted response.

Chloe (Charlotte Beaumont) is over for supper, playing with the baby! Beth had her baby during the trial in season two, let’s have a look! She’s a little girl now, though, Lizzie (Emily Alison) is around 3 and looks just like Chloe. I am finding it hard to believe Beth and Mark are still married; affair aside their relationship was extremely fraught.

Beth talks about her day a little, which she can’t really do. Everyone tenses when she says her new client doesn’t live far away, someone around there got hurt? Unspoken is “again?”

Ah they aren’t still together, Mark just “comes ’round” now and again and Beth’s “we don’t need YOU looking after us!” sends him packing. He goes home to a posh apartment to drink a beer alone and stare out the window.

Well. This is odd. There’s a tense staredown between Jim and Cath when he pulls into the driveway; he opens his glove compartment and we see an open pack of condoms that look the same as the part pack that was found at the crime scene. So it appears I’m not going to like Mark Bazeley on this show either. Cath’s sulkiness and lack of sadness / fear for her friend is confusing me.

Ellie gets a call from Trish in the middle of the night; she’s remembered something about the attack. She was gagged and almost choked, then he covered her eyes with his forearm so she must have known her attacker.

Ellie runs over to see Alec at 2 am; of course he’s awake and still working on the case. Forensics bears out what Trish has said and between the twine and the condom it’s clear that they are dealing with a premeditated attack. So who is the sexual predator in their midst?

A lone policeman surveys the crime scene, their flashlight picking out a plastic bag filled with blue twine from a store that I can’t pick out immediately and we’re out.

So. Well. It’s nice to see Olivia Colman do almost anything, but I’m really glad things are slightly more settled for Ellie right now and she can hold normal conversations and everything. David Tennant as Alec Hardy is his usual brusque self but he has a great energy that moves things along and just that hint of humour to soften things. He was dealing with a serious heart condition last time so while it’s lovely to see him looking so fit, I am a little surprised.

It was a difficult episode to watch, as I’ve mentioned there are several shows I am recapping currently that deal with sexual assault and it can get..exhausting, but I like the level of detail they’re going into as far as support goes. People might not be aware of how much help there is for reporters of sexual assault, and I canea even say how awesome it is that they the police are trained to start right from belief. Let’s just say that has not always been the case; remember The Fall?

Until next time, cheers.