Some laugh out loud moments; the scene where their boss, on sick leave, spotted their relationship; the scene in the police interview room with the suitcase; the morally upright boss and his dodgy desk. I hope there is more to come next year

By the way my domiciled town played host on Friday night to a big crew filming Exile, a forthcoming BBC drama about a London based journalist going home in an attempt to revive his career. It has a heavyweight cast including John Simm, Jim Broadbent, Claire Goose. It pissed down all weekend, and I was left wondering whether they'd have to do a quick rewrite with John Simm saying "why does it always bloody rain when I come to visit?" Saturday and Sunday's filming seemed to be cancelled altogether

See http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/zen-and-art-quality-sunday-night-t...

even if the ending was pants. I also hope for more to come.

No dodgy Italian accents - in fact very few italian accents and italian words.

The producer seems to have decided to have brought in english looking people with regional accents - why ?

Have enjoyed it because its a) its not American, b) Italy is chic and c) most of the women in the programme are pretty fit!

...but I thought this was a big disappointment.

I only watched the second one the whole way through. I thought the pace was funereal and the plot unengaging. The murderer wasn't discovered because of any detective work, he just happened to appear without warning at the end.

And the idea of the supposedly scary cabal, in the shape of some purple-frocked priest, made me laugh out loud.

Even Rufus Sewell didn't look interested - his eyes darted around while people were speaking to him. He looked like Ian McShane doing an impression of John Le Mesurier. Or is this his Zen look?

We also had to be told he's a maverick and honest before he actually proved it.

I saw the last half-hour of Silent Witness this week and it was far more engaging, even though I hadn't watched it in years.

well acted, stylish and witty. I was a bit wary at first, having read and liked the books, but they did a good job and Rufus Sewell did a good job of portraying the complexity of Zen as he appeared in the books, mum seemed a bit too young and glamorous though, or is that my age talking ! I liked the way it portayed the glamorous corruption which Italy continues to do so well. To anyone who hasn't, do read the books though - even non-Zen stuff- though there are one or two clunkers in the series.

I really enjoyed the series, once I’d got used to the idea that they’d just taken the bare bones of Michael Dibdin’s (superb) original novels and used them as the basis for a set of vaguely related dramas.

For starters, last night’s episode, Ratking, is actually the first book in the series, and I don’t think he even meets Tania in that one - it’s mostly set in Perugia. Similarly, Vendetta is set in Sardinia, though you wouldn’t know it from the TV adaptation. I assume they based all three plots in Rome so that they could keep a consistent supporting cast of characters and subsidiary plot lines (eg the pool on who would be first to bed the secretary).

As for Cabal, the opening death takes place inside a church in the Vatican, not by the Tiber, and I seem to remember Zen spends most of his time dealing with dodgy ecclesiastical types (something that was merely alluded to in one of the final scenes of the BBC version).

I wonder what Dibdin would have thought of such liberties being taken with his books? (That’s a rhetorical question, since he died in 2007.)

when Zen returns to his Mother's appartment she had fallen asleep in front of the TV which was burbling away in Italian - which seemed strange in an English speaking world.
Once I got past the accent issue I quite enjoyed the series.

to having no Italian accents would be to go down the Year In Provence route where John Thaw was surrounded by the entire cast doing Inspector Clouseau.

Doesn't bear thinking about, does it?