24 Frames of Dreaming

N.B. This post contains spoilers for Broadchurch Season 2 Episode 2. If you haven't seen Season 1, click here.

Well, Broadchurch Season 2 is kicking into gear for real now. Episode 2 was a bit of a mixed bag for me - the good, the great, and the slightly over-the-top - but I enjoyed it for sure. Let's see if I can put down some of my thoughts on the episode and also speculate on where we might be headed from here.

Episode 2 spent a lot of time on Joe Miller's trial, showing us how the Latimers are dealing with it and giving us more insight into Joe's brutally ruthless legal team - and culminating in the gasp-inducing (though not unexpected) judicial decision to exclude poor Hardy's evidence from the trial. (For just a moment there, I thought the honourable soul might be about to take the rap for Ellie). It's a bitter blow for the detective, but he took it on the chin and got back to his work on Sandbrook, arranging for Claire to meet her ex-husband Lee Ashworth in secret. Unfortunately, that particular meeting went sour very quickly. Now Claire is gone, either absconding with or kidnapped by the murder-accused, and Hardy's back to square one.

If we learned anything from this episode, it's that Lee Ashworth, accused and acquitted of the Sandbrook murders, is one creepy guy. And very resourceful, too - we know now who stole Alec Hardy's NHS letter. On top of that, he seems to be a magnet for the ladies, a character twist which I found very unnerving, if slightly clichéd. I'm guessing that Claire won't be coming to her senses any time soon, and to be honest I'd be surprised if she makes it out of this season alive. But that all depends on exactly who Lee Ashworth is and what he's capable of - something the writers are making sure to cast into doubt.

Do I believe Ashworth killed the girls? I'm not sure. Honestly, all the dramatic signposts at this stage are pointing to "he didn't do it". There are a million different explanations. Perhaps, like Joe, he's simply delusional enough to believe he's innocent when he is in fact guilty. Maybe, just maybe, he's truly innocent. Perhaps he was guilty in intent but not in action. Perhaps he shares the guilt with someone else. Perhaps he just took the fall for it. Who knows. If the finale of Season 1 is anything to go by, the exact nature of guilt is going to be complicated, and the line between innocent and guilty become uncomfortably blurry.

The stand-out scene for me was Ellie's beachside conversation with Claire. Olivia Colman goes from strength to strength in this episode - it's an underrated gift to be able to play an ordinary, good-hearted, honourable person without becoming trite or cliched. Colman absolutely nails it. One gets the impression that she's very much a Method actor and that her performance comes from the heart.

I know most people will hate the idea of this (or will they?) but is something more than acrimonious friendship on the horizon for Miller and Hardy? He's definitely become more protective of her this season, in his own clumsy way; his body language around her has changed, and his overjoyed declaration that he "could kiss her" in this episode didn't seem to disgust her entirely. I can't say I wouldn't ship them, but really I hope the story doesn't go down that road - some on-screen relationships lose their spice when romance is added, and I think Miller+Hardy is one of them. They're at their best when they're hating-but-not-really-hating each other, and although I'd love to see them become less belligerent, I think that's as far as it should go.

Again, I'm not overly keen on the courtroom-drama side of things. Sure, it's gripping and well done (although some of the technicalities of the court proceedings might not be too accurate), but on a character and story level it's bound to involve a lot of re-hashing of the Season 1 angst - who has secrets, when will they be revealed, what heartbreak will it cause - etc, etc. If Season 2 is to have a fresh new angle and not feel like a laboured run-on from Season 1, it's going to have to focus on Sandbrook and use Joe's trial as a backdrop only. The highlight here was David Tennant's performance when Alec Hardy takes the stand. Tennant excels at emotionally intense characters and underdogs, and those big brown eyes practically blazed with a sort of desperate, compelling integrity as Hardy tried unsuccessfully to persuade the court of his side.

And as for future episodes...I can't resist making predictions, so here's mine. Claire is now totally under the spell of her magnetic maybe-killer husband and their chemical attraction. Despite what he says, Lee is in fact the killer, but not the only guilty party. His conviction of his own innocence is only true insofar as he shares the guilt of the murder(s) to some extent with Claire, and that's how he justifies what he's done. (Sound like Joe Miller in the previous episode, maybe?) I hope I'm wrong, but I think Lee's relationship with the older victim - the 19 year old Lisa- was something more than just murderer and victim. This episode has established that he has a certain kind of fatal attractiveness, and it's just possible that Lee was actually having an affair with Lisa, something Claire likely knew nothing about. The bluebell wood, I think, is the site the girl's body was found, or a place that Lee met with one or both of his victims, or both. We know the two girls played there, and that Alec Hardy knows where it is.

The bluebells are intriguing. Since they came up in the season's teaser trailer, I knew they would be an important symbol this season (much like the all-pervasive sea was in Season 1). So I did a bit of digging as to what bluebells traditionally symbolise. And some of it was very interesting:

[The bluebell symbolises] humility, constancy, gratitude, and everlasting love in Scotland. It is also associated with death in Britain and is often planted on graves. [...] [...]it was considered unlucky to walk through a field of bluebells. [...] According to others, fairies used the bluebell to trap passersby, especially children.[x]
Bluebells have long been symbolic of humility and gratitude. They are associated with constancy, gratitude and everlasting love. Bluebells are also closely linked to the realm of fairies and are sometimes referred to as "fairy thimbles." [...] Another name for bluebells is Dead Man's bells. This is due to the fact that fairies were believed to cast spells on those who dare to pick or damage the beautiful, delicate flowers.[x]

Now there's an obvious connection here because Alec Hardy is Scottish, but I don't think that means anything. No, whoever picked the bluebells - whether it was Claire or Lee, or someone else - is guilty of something pretty terrible, and they're going to reap the consequences eventually. It's not hard to see that the bluebells are symbolic of the girls themselves - and the price that must be paid by anyone who destroys innocent life. All of which could well indicate that Lee is the killer, and that Claire has been more involved than she's told Hardy.
Bluebells are also a symbol of constancy and undying love. Which, if relevant, means either that Claire kept the flowers as a symbol of love (presumably love for Lee?) or that Lee kept the flowers because he had a romantic attachment to one or both of his victims (if he is the killer).
And we know something else. The killer kept the pendant, and he (or she) may have kept the bluebells too. So we know he's a magpie - he likes to hang on to keepsakes of his crime. What else has he hidden?

The episode ended with not one but two big cliffhangers, and I'm not sure how I feel about it. It felt like a bit too much drama all at once to be credible - Beth's waters breaking, really!? I hope the less-is-more approach of Season 1 is allowed to continue - it's one of Broadchurch's strongest assets, and the series is gripping enough without piling on pointless dramatic turns. The most realistic part of the final scene, I felt, was when we realise that Claire has run off with Lee. I always thought she was harbouring some loyalty toward him. It feels good to be right, although I'm aware that only fools rush in to guess where Broadchurch is headed. That doesn't seem to stop me, though.

A question that keeps lurking in the back of my head is: what secrets is Hardy keeping about Sandbrook? Chris Chibnall commented that Hardy's little house hides "lots, if not all" of the secrets of this season, so I'm guessing Hardy has a few big bombshells that we won't see coming. Exciting!

Until next week...


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