Notice that the female forensic scientists in Waking the Dead don’t show up in the lab with necklines that plunge to their miniskirts. London is less thrilling than CSI: Miami, and the cold-case squad under the sometimes hysterical leadership of Chief Inspector Boyd (Trevor Eve) is all furious business as it flashes back to World War II to find out why someone has spent decades tracking down perfectly ordinary-seeming men in their humdrum homes, only to hammer nine-inch nails in their heads. I’d say that this is an especially gruesome case in a dark-slicks series, but forthcoming episodes feature even more baroque twists: abducted 5-year-old twins, terrorist bombs, dead bodies with sorry carved on their backs, and a mesmerist who talks disturbed young women into killing their families. So each episode is as gruesome as it’s smart and slick.

Waking the Dead
BBC America
Mondays. 9 to 11 P.M.

Related:

• Archive: “Television”
• Articles by John Leonard
• Table of Contents: Nov 22, 2004 issue of New York | Subscribe!