Go-getter DS Stella Gibson, played by The X-Files star Gillian Anderson, leaves stunned audiences in her wake as she has casual affairs with office colleagues, while on the hunt for a ruthless killer in the BBC UK’s cult hit thriller The Fall.
This is not the first TV series to break the boundaries on stereotypical “soft and sexy” female lead roles in a drama. Take Sarah Lund in Danish cop show The Killing, for example. Smart, savvy and supercool, both Stella and Sarah exude confidence and are not afraid to bark out orders or enjoy casual encounters with members of the opposite sex. Does this mean that women’s roles on TV are finally changing?
The Fall is not a whodunit, but an intense cat-and-mouse chase for family man and serial murderer Paul Spector – played by Irish hunk Jamie Dornan (the actor who is set to be appear in the lead role in Fifty Shades of Grey).
Set in present-day Belfast, English detective Stella is called in to solve the cases of several attractive, 30-something women who have been murdered. An intense, skin-crawling, brilliantly constructed hunt ensues, with ice-cold supercop Stella hot on the heels of Spector.
Anderson is elegant, feminine and a force to be reckoned with. Some have argued that the likes of Stella and Sarah are just men dressed up in women’s clothing, but it is refreshing to see such strong, female roles packing a powerful punch on the small screen. Anderson’s performance really is stellar.
With a haunting soundtrack to match how could you not fall for this maddening, moreish show?