For this series I am making mostly comments on each episode as I watched it. I was more noticing details from each episode as I watched – but these details were not unique just to those parts of that episode, or even that series but were, rather, characteristics that helped make the whole sweep of the drama so brilliant.
1; This epitomized the gripping acting with demanding long slow close-ups that was such a feature of the aeries. And I loved the (pitch) black humour with opening scene regarding sheep rustling
2: I was unsure about the Vicky killing at the end; over-egging I wondered at the time, but subsequently in the next and succeeding eoisodes, it more than worked and added another strand to the richness pf the experience
3: The opening therapist scenes were superb. Gripping – and yet very little sort of said.
4: All the Royce/Charlotte scenes were stunningly tense. Those incredibly tight close-ups and hushed whispering. The writing superbly showed Royce’s manipulativeness.
5: The Daryl and mother Aliss scenes were really almost tragically powerful, particularly at the end as they discussed some of the dreams that they might share. Likewise, and equally moving, was Ryan’s bafflement regarding his father and his struggling bewilderment to understand the situation and have a relationship. This was all through the writing but the quality of the performances matched up to this as they have done since the start..
6: Well, it was as superb as the first one -and this episode brought a (partially) cathartic solution - to a degree. The final scene with Catherine and family walking in the hills gave both a warm picture of people who were now more 'together' than they had been for a very long time; the gradually improving relationship between Catherine and son Daniel was wonderfully, sensitively and plausibly portrayed over the two series.
But as previously mentioned, it was the subtleties of the show that remain, with the final shot of Catherine looking at Ryan as he runs up the hill and clearly wondering what the future holds for him - particularly given the similarity of the situation between her and Ryan and Aliss and her 'son'.