Silent Witness (TV Series) Choices: Part 1 (2005) User Reviews

A decent, but very bleak episode.

[Sleepin_Dragon · 6/10 · 19 July 2018]

Choices continues Series Nine's rather grim theme, even avid fans would agree this isn't Silent Witness's golden era. The overhang fron Ghosts is very much in play, Leo is of course suffering, and making the lives of his colleagues difficult. The story of the discovered body is also hugely depressing, as is the family situation for young Wayne, I know it's meant to be dark and harrowing, but there is virtually zero humour, no lighter moments. The gang story is ok, but again it's just a bit on the bleak side, a few good moments including the shooting scene. Tom Ward was the episode's saving grace, I didn't care hugely for some performances, Craig Kelly, Q and Thronne Lewis I didn't care much for. Small roles for Nikki Amuka-Bird and Freema Agyeman, now both well established, superb actresses.

One word, grim. 6/10

Gang War

[Hitchcoc · 8/10 · 12 March 2019]

The episode starts out with a drive-by shooting in front of a nightclub. A guy with some sort of rapid fire gun shoots indiscriminately at a group of people. We find out later there is more to this scene. Nikki gets involved because she always sees the human element. She butts heads with the investigator who is just in a hurry to be done with it. Leo continues his angst, a couple months after the deaths of his wife and daughter. He is pretty much useless, sniping at everyone, even his closes friends. This is a dreary episode where two sides are playing against the middle.

Horrible characters & grim stories

[Johnny_West · 1/10 · 26 November 2022]

Somebody named "Q" plays the main thug villain who owns a club where the drug dealers are fighting over turf. He is nasty, shrill, vile, and shouts his lines in arrogance or anger in every scene. I would never watch this episode again.

The rest of his gang includes the best friend who secretly works for the rival gang, and all the standard stereotypical drug gang characters. Nothing new or special or thoughtful in regards to this part of the story.

The rival gang is made up of Jamaicans that are stereotype cut-outs from dozens of similar movies and TV shows. The supporting gang characters all seem to have been ripped off from the Steven Seagal movie "Marked for Death." The only one missing is "Screwface." I have not seen anything this incredibly racist since the 1990s.

One highlight is that Freema Agyeman is in Season 9 episodes, but she plays a minor role as a police officer. It would have been nice if she had a much bigger part in Season 9, because next to Emilia Fox and Tom Ward, she is the best actress on Season 9 episodes.

Emilia Fox is easily the best actress in this series as soon as she joined the cast. Tom Ward is excellent in a supporting role. William Gaminara is annoying, rude, always disrespectful and degrading to his staff, and just hard to watch.

Now in Season 9, he gets to be rude to his staff and then five minutes later he is in therapy re-capping the previous scenes. Just ponderously boring, and Thank God for fast-forward. I could not watch this if I had to sit through all of the Leo Dalton / William Gaminara scenes.

Dalton is a boss character from before the 1970s?? I cannot imagine any employees post-1970s taking so much abuse from a boss. Just watching his management style is depressing.

The other half of this two-part episode involves a decomposed body that was a drug-user. Perhaps the worst was how nasty Connely the detective was, and how much he did not want to investigate the death, or even record that the body was found.

When the body is found, Connelly just wants to put the box back over it and walk away, because he sees it as a waste of his time. I did not like that character, and was hoping he would get his due at some point.

Depressing

[handcrafted · 2/10 · 12 April 2022]

Never watched this when it was first televised.

I watched it last night and I cannot believe that all the black characters are typecast as drug and gang members shooting each other... if I had been a black actor and read this script I think I would have been very angry.

I don't think they could make this episode in 2022 it would not have been acceptable.

Too depressing to enjoy the storyline ... Very disappointing.