I haven't watched yet but sounds like it needs a thread so spoilers can go here.

R_Webb, you will love it, fairly sure of it.

Two notable things to get people started:

1. All scripts were written by the same two guys.
2. All episodes were directed by the same guy.

Shankland suffers from none of the 8 episode fatigue that Fukanaga did with True Detective. It's completely internally consistent visually, despite having three different editors for the show. It's not visually stunning like True Detective, but it does a fantastic job with what it's going for. Because of the difficulty of sticking a landing like this show did, it absolutely deserves to be in comparison with True Detective. Those who focused more on the case in True Detective will find this show much more fulfilling than TD. This show is highly recommended.

Oh, it also has a fairly great dialog mix throughout much of it.

I just finished it today. Loved every minute of it. Incredible.

Loved it. Wife was so hot. Looking forward to discussing the finale itt.

I almost started watching broadchuch next but was too similar and felt a bit step down in quality. Probably will someday

I don't get why parents freak out when their child goes missing. If you already have kids or the baby maker still works then what's the big deal?

OLLIE. OLLIE. You shut up you stupid Brit. Your wife hasn't dried up yet.

What tilts me most about the disappearance is that the brit dad doesn't give a **** about the world cup game going on at that time. what a douche

Why would he care about France's World Cup team...lol? (don't watch soccer, or the footballs as this show would probably say)

who's your nfl/nba/whatever team and do you only watch the finals when they are playing in it

Good point...served.

The real heart of the actual show is that if Ollie's stupid parents hadn't bought him a fox doll, maybe he would be alive today.

If we've already seen the ending (spoilered on another programme), is it still worth watching, or is a lot of the story built around the mystery of the kid's disappearance?

eh, if you know what happened it'll probably ruin the suspense .... but on the other hand.... it might be cool with that knowledge going backward

I'm not reading this thread yet in case there are spoilers. i just finished episode 6. episode 6 was great!!!! after the first episode i was just kinda like meh. but i think it's gotten steadily better each episode.

the bearded journalist is a great sleazebag!! man he is hatable!

Loved it. Have had trouble getting into shows lately but this one gripped be from beginning to end.

Great show but so depressing

The ending was very much like Stephen King's The Long Walk.

just finished it. meh. episode 7 was a let down, and so was episode 8.

it's better than the garbage on the networks, but compared to the good stuff it's just ok.

I don't have access to this right now, but I'll watch it when I do.

Grunching to avoid potential spoilers

I'm 3 episodes in, and I'm not gonna lie, i'm really bored thus far. Surprising because I usually like this kind of show. Does it get better ? Or am I just doing it wrong?

Stick with it. It starts off as a very slow build, but by the end of one of the episodes (maybe episode 4?), they start throwing in cliffhangers at the end of every episode that will make you want to go to the next one. You might not end up liking the series overall, but it had a satisfying end and was a very well planned out show. filthyvermin just ended up panning the show, if that gives you any indication of how it might end for you.

I've already sung this show's praise in the best of 2013 and 2014 thread, but I'll do it again here. The way I describe it to folks is gut-punchingly amazing. The two lead actors are superb. If you think Harrelson and McConaghey melted into their roles on True Detective, just watch Nesbitt and Karyo in this.

And without being spoily, what I also really liked is that the stuff which turned out to be red herrings in terms of the mystery also had their own takeaways in and of themselves.

For what it's worth, it's also a great marathon show that you can easily watch in the space of a day or two.

For me, I also really enjoyed the locales and cinematography (reminded me, but not everyone, of Top of the Lake). And I also thought the music was eerie but not overwhelming, ala Revenants.

The only other show this season that I've liked the sound mix more of is Brooklyn Nine-Nine (the best sounding show on TV, in my opinion). I think it should be an EMMY contender for sound mixing and sound editing, though it's much more subtle than most shows out there these days.

Yeah the music was great.

Creepy and subtle. Both good words. I like how the creepy scenes used hard ominous music.

Doesn't really get any better than the end of the first episode.

I understand what you're getting at, and it's a fair point. But one shouldn't read this and think it goes downhill from there, as that's nowhere near the case. What I'll say in order to avoid spoiling is I felt the show did a great job with twists and turns plus mixing in subtly and not so subtly shocking moments, as well as being a great watch even when uneventful things were going on. For me, just watching Nesbitt mannerisms or seeing and hearing Karyo made it a worthwhile viewing experience, with the rest icing on the proverbial cake.

Of course not everyone will end up thinking it's as outstanding as myself and others have said, but I advise most everyone to stick with it unless you feel you cannot connect with the characters. After all, some have posted in OOTV that they did enjoy it more as they went along. Plus, we're talking about 8 hours total, not something on the order of slogging through all seasons of Lost or Dexter.