- Fox
- Rainn Wilson plays a dick on Backstrom.
Over the weekend, I finished watching the second season of The Fall, a BBC2 crime drama that was picked up by Netflix. As I wrote when the first season became available back in 2013, the series is unusual for the murder-mystery genre in that the killer’s identity isn’t, nor has it ever been, a mystery. Viewers become reluctant voyeurs as Paul Spector (played by objectively handsome person Jamie Dornan) stalks and kills a series of women (and one unfortunate man) in Northern Ireland. Also uncommon is that it’s anchored by a decently complex female character, Detective Superintendent Stella Gibson (Gillian Anderson).
Like the doctor before him, Backstrom doesn’t even have to be sexy (or even remotely not disgusting). He can say things that are racist and sexist. He can be a slob and sleep till noon. He can offend witnesses. It’s practically encouraged by everyone around him except his female partner and foil, who has to play it arrow straight just to keep her partner in line.
