Three Girls

I don't believe it. I raved at the start of this week about the great TV that was about to be screened, and left out one of the best bits. Three Girls, yet again, sounds appalling but wasn't. I wasn't even sure I'd fit in the time to see it, because there was so much else that I knew I wanted to watch. But then Saturday night arrived and there was nothing on, so I gave it a go - watch for ten minutes, see what it's like. I watched all three epidoes, back to back, over three hours. It's a  painful, patient account of the Rochdale Grooming case, focussing very closely on three girls, who were mates for a time but had very different experiences of and attitudes to what went on. The writing and the acting were stunning, with a heartbreaking analysis of exactly how and why various agencies failed to actually do anything useful to stop this abuse. Very closely based on meticulous research, this showed a police officer getting very close to victims of a crime, falling out with their superiors, and retaining strong links with the victims after they had left the service. Which is also exactly what happened in the final episode of Little Boy Blue, shown on Monday. If I were in the police, that's a coincidence that would worry me.