Strike Out the Backstories!
You’ve most likely seen several book reviews pop up on my blog that are written by Robert Galbraith (AKA J.K. Rowling). These murder mystery novels have now been turned into a British TV series called CB Strike; the title referrers to the main character, detective Cormoran Strike. Because this was made for British television, there are 2-3 episodes per season/book, and they are an hour in length.
I felt a rollercoaster of emotions while watching this show. There are a lot of things that I think came to the screen perfectly (or nearly so), while other issues became very disappointing to the bibliophile in me. Let me break it down a little further for you. Strike, the main character, is described as a large war veteran with a missing leg from his deployment. He is quite, not particularly handsome, but somehow does well with the ladies. I don’t think they could have picked a better actor for this role. Tom Burke is not your quintessential version of handsome, but he is charming and has about the cutest smirk. He was spot on for his character. I also felt the other actors (for the most part) were well chosen.
My biggest disappointment came with the compact amount of episodes and the sheer amount of back-story that was left out. I’ve dealt with movie adaptations of novels for a long time now, so I’m used to little tid-bits being left off the screen, but I thought these seasons were so short in length that some really prime pieces of information end up being left out. I asked my husband (who hasn’t read any of the books) if he thought the storyline was smooth or if there seamed to be parts missing. He said that the mystery is solved quite nicely, but the character development of the reoccurring characters seemed to be lacking. These are the exact portions that I hate being left out. With even just ONE MORE hour long episode, they would be able to have so much more depth.
I still think this series is worth the watch, and you may not know what you’re missing if you haven’t read the novels. If you like the extra morsels, I highly recommend this book series first so you can fill in the missing slices.