Jack Taylor (My Rating: 4)
Excellent Irish Noir
The Jack Taylor series – nine 90 minute episodes aired 2011-16 – is taken from the books of Ken Bruen, described by Wikipedia as “an Irish writer of hard-boiled and noir crime fiction.” I’ve not read the books but the TV versions are certainly hard-boiled and noir. Taylor is a former sergeant in the Irish national police (the Garda Síochána) fired after punching a government minister in the face during a traffic stop and while drunk. Iain Glen plays the role and is just plain excellent in it. Glen – a native Scotsman – is one of my favorite actors and more widely known perhaps as Jorah Mormont in the Game of Thrones. (He apparently also is in the Resident Evil series, which I’ve never watched. Too violent.) I cannot vouch for his Irish accent, which seems to me rather heavy, but maybe that’s Galway. It’s most fun when Jack speaks to us in voice-overs.
Taylor becomes a private eye as the only job left to him utilizing his investigative skills. He continues to have a troubled relationship with alcohol as well as with his mother and her Catholic priest. (There is a back story to the mother thing that in one episode has a kind of – an Irish kind, for sure – happy ending?) Kate Noonan, a young member of the Garda, comes to be a friend and source of help from within the police. Jack also picks up young partners at points. Taylor can be pig headed and falls off the wagon too easily. (But okay, I get it, he’s Irish. My godfather, an Irishman also named Jack, sometimes crashed in my Dad and Mom’s flat after getting falling down pissed.) There’s sometimes more violence and blood than I normally prefer (warning: in one episode, fingers are cut off) and the crimes and criminals can be so twisted as to verge on the operatic. But Taylor is a good if troubled soul and dogged in tracking down the bad guys. He seems also pretty good in recovering from being badly beaten and shot.
A few years passed between seasons 2 and 3, perhaps to give Glen time to do other things, including the Game of Thrones. When the series came back in late 2016, the supporting characters had changed with a new actor playing Kate. He does eventually stop wearing that Garda long coat he refused to give up.
Jack Taylor can be found on Acorn TV. While sometimes a bit drawn out in the middle, good watching.