User reviews

Having read some of the critics reviews, most of which were not very complementary, I decided to give this miniseries a go considering I like most of the cast. Minnie Driver, Goran Visnjic. Sacha Dhawan (who played a delightfully evil Master in the most recent Dr Who series) and Antonia Thomas (from the Good Doctor) as talented people I have appreciated for some time, so I gave this a go. And I was pleasantly surprised.

While I did pick up on some issues with scientific inaccuracies (show me a sci-fi show that doesn't for the sake of speeding the narrative up) I did find the story and intrigue compelling. The characters weren't one-dimensional, they (mostly) had depth (pun intended) and the themes of international politics interfering with scientific endeavour were quite accurate. While politicians mouth "save the world", they are often in the pocket of corporations, so the notion that they are motivated by a desire for world peace and lowering our dependence on fossil fuels is naive when you consider how much money is involved. If a natural biofuel was discovered that replaced oil it would be fought, pure and simple.

That theme was explored here in depth in imaginative ways.

There are high prices that are paid along the way, friendships are made and lost.

The CG isn't perfect, but even on my 4K TV it still looked good today.

So, don't let the nay-sayers turn you off. Give The Deep a go. It's value Sci-Fi with a modern tale to tell.

If you are mature enough to look past some basic cgi scenes the heart of this takes me back to great movies like the abyss. The plot moves fast and each episode is totally not predictable and if it can keep me awake where some series like Bones put me strait to sleep, it has some merit. So no flashing cool Cgi, great sets, good cast, good plot, fast paced. I enjoyed it.Reminds me a bit of the older style british cimena which you can view as dated or classic, but well worth a watch.

Now this did have the potential to be great. I loved the idea and I like James Nesbitt and Minnie Driver. However, despite this great concept and a great cast(on paper that is), The Deep never quite takes off. In fact, a vast majority of it was awful I'm afraid, and I honestly didn't want to say that.

The Deep does have some redeeming qualities. The scenery and photography are excellent and the effects are above average.

However, The Deep has a number of problems. One, the pacing is incredibly sluggish. Two, while the concept was great the story was repetitive and dull. Three, the dialogue is banal and stupid more than it is intelligent and thought-provoking. Four, the direction is pretty heartless. Five, some scenes drag really badly and not helped by some very awkward pauses. Six, the character situations are clichéd and the characters you don't feel anything for. Seven, the acting was not great... at all- it is not the matter of that nobody can act, it is that nobody has anything worthwhile to work with. James Nesbitt(Murphy's Law and the brilliant Occupation) tries hard but is let down by his dialogue and character, while Minnie Driver has some really wooden delivery. Goran Visjinc did little for me either, while there are some members of the cast that don't delve into their characters enough or are too young for them. Finally, the final part of the drama is really quite laughable to say the least.

To conclude, I tried to like The Deep, but the story, pacing and dialogue really spoil what could have been an intriguing drama. 2/10 for the scenery mainly. Bethany Cox

I saw this being advertised on the BBC and it looked quite interesting so I watched the first part. And I was hooked! OK the bad acting was a little off putting, but the show had created a mystery about a Submarine that goes missing in the Arctic ocean and something gigantic had caused it's disappearance.

I told all my friends about it, and said to catch the repeat in the week and I got on-board a few people that was hooked to.

And then part two happened! The mystery has been solved you learn about the something gigantic and the bad acting is still there and this is only part 2 out of 5.

By the end of part 3 you are now bored and know how the story is going to pan out.

You find yourself uninterested and really don't care what happens to anyone, and actually hope that they all somehow meet a horrible icy death by the end of part 5.

I really wish I had not invested 5 hours of my life in this predictable, badly written, poorly acted rubbish.

And I have to say a big SORRY to my friends that I dragged into this boring show. Can you forgive me?

This mini series was to my mind a complete waste of time and money.

The series started off reasonably well, a decent amount of mystery, a few likable characters and a group of actors whose previous work I have loved. It all went down hill pretty soon, I had no respect for the characters who were more concerned with their own personal agenda's and social problems than with the mission in hand. The script had a couple of amusing moments but for the most part dropped and I was able to predict with absolute accuracy which characters would and wouldn't survive the series. The 'frantic' efforts to get the sub going was pretty hilarious and had me yelling at the screen "Stop wasting time!" a sure sign that I was wasting mine.

Surprisingly it was the unknowns (pretty much unknown to me) in the group that kept me interested in this, I found myself fast forwarding through the Minnie, Goran, Orla and James moments to get to the people that interested me.

Finally the ending was predictable and had me relieved that the series wouldn't ever continue, I am incredibly surprised that the BBC churned out this rubbish but then again they are responsible for the recent travesty known as 'Alice and her six dads' a reality show that was really just a showcase for a self obsessed bride.

I've never been too fond of underwater/submarine movies, James Cameron's The Abyss movie from 1989 being a wonderful exception. BBC's The Deep explores similar territory to Abyss... What the heck is down there? Excellent sets, colors & moods with a fantastic cast.

James Nesbitt is in my top five UK character actors and though he is hard-pressed to top his brilliant Hyde/Jekyll in the mini-series "Jekyll" he once again brings a depth to his role that most can't even begin to touch.

I first became aware of the beautiful Minnie Driver from the sadly cancelled series The Riches (with Eddie Izzard)and every moment she is on screen in The Deep is sheer delight.

After three episodes The Deep is a tense, exciting, slightly sci-fi drama that once again places the BBC in the top slot along with HBO.

Highly recommended IMHO!

Mediocre - average: lacking exceptional quality.

The once great BBC has fallen foul yet again to that great modern British attribute; mediocrity. While usually I would applaud the BBC for it's policy on social cohesion the actors inclusion is just well......formulaic. The way in which the BBC put together this drama is almost as though it was drama-by-numbers.

All the building blocks are there:

Ethnic minorities represented (including the new kid on the British block the eastern European) check.

Evil state puppet to attract liberals: check

SF concept to attract males under 45: check

Unnecessary romance to draw in female viewers: check.

Complicated yet vague plot: check.

Sum of all it's parts....FAIL.

The dialogue was ABYSS-mal, the characters seemed to ALIENate the audience rather than draw them and I do understand why viewers might seem DEEPly LOSTed when watching it.

If I said this was really tripe I might insult tripe. I wanted to like it, I really did.

The synopsis looked good; The crew of a research submarine, who encounter disaster thousands of feet underwater in the Arctic Circle.

I never saw a trailer for it (not sure if they made one perhaps not enough film to make a good reel). Let's start out with the good and buzz when you see where this is going.

a) The cast list was amazing...(false hope) buzzzzz ! b) The film work, sets etc. wonderful, nice lighting. c) Good sound. d) The storyline ideas were acceptable, no cheesy graphics. e) Nice personality, pretty eyes, you get the idea.

Unfortunately when it came to the story, and thus the directing what a load of tripe (sorry tripe). If perfect casting can be touched on for a moment Goran Visnjic from ER fame is perfectly cast but unfortunately no medical training (real or imaginary) on this planet could rescue this story from the terminal poor writing/directing. Now in this sort of situation you could often blame actors normally, but I believe they did all they could and saved the show if possible.

I think when you define bad story lines, and detail, I think it is when stupid things happen for no reason that really offer no value, or worse take away from the story line, that the worst damages are here. But that is almost every scene, where you think this is really bad.

This story good be easily tweaked to be seriously good or as a spoof and seriously funny. Unfortunately it was just seriously bad.

I never watched a multi part TV serial before thinking well the next episode (this was a 5 parter) has to be better than that last one. Unfortunately it too plunged deeper.

All that can be hoped for is that the actors do not sue for having their careers lost at sea, I will remember them for quite a while for this stinker (unfortunately).

It is worth watching for how bad it is (but I hear people have been known to wear shoes on the wrong feet for the same reason.

Rating 1 out of 10 (awful)

this series is inspired by the film of the same title, but starts out as flawed as the original film ends.

what else can i say. this series uses poor c.g. to amuse a somatose audience, and uses filler dialog in the same way.

whoever put this series together deserves a good old fashioned trip to the wood shed.

it has few plot points, obviously filled between with incongruous character reactions and stupid dialog which prompt time-filling conflicts, which stretches this tripe from a ninety minute show, into a British series length.

i was insulted by the watching, but unfortunately i kept viewing to see if it would get better or worse. the good news is it didn't get any worse. it played mediocre all the way through.

All those head-hunted bosses ("We'd lose them to other broadcasters if we didn't pay them vast salaries") entirely failed to spot that they were spending millions on piffle.

The story is completely arbitrary. Crises suddenly blow up because of gobbledygook, along the lines of "Oh no, the crinkly squigglegram is about to blow!", but this doesn't matter because, whew, they can also be solved by similar bits of nonsense. They never quite say "It's a long shot, but it might just work", but that's what they mean. As for the ridiculous business about the nuclear reactor and radiation, I won't say more to avoid spoilers.

Apart from the bogus crises, the story moves along like a glacier. Someone decided to spin it out over numerous unnecessary episodes. This has a terrible effect on the dialogue, which involves pointless silences and repetitions ("The squigglegram!" "What, the sqigglegram?" "No! It can't be the squigglegram!?" Pause. "I'm afraid so. It's the squigglegram.")

Greatly shortened, this might have made a moderately entertaining serial for CBBC. As it is...

I liked the premise, unknown danger, underwater thus claustrophobic thus small cast (including Minnie Driver who I've always liked). I still think the idea could have worked. However what we got was an absolute disaster. It failed on every level I can think of. There were so many holes in the plot you would be hard pressed to find enough large underwater vessels to drive through them all. The personal relationships between the characters was shallow and unbelievable, and their responses to events totally absurd. It may have been slightly helped by reducing the run time from 5 hours to 90 minutes.

Where are the new BBC programmes to rival Doomwatch and Out of the Unknown, or the fantastic Edge of Darkness. Maybe I'm just getting rather old.

How many BBC executives are going to get a bonus for this one I wonder?

And as for one reviewer using this production to compare the BBC with HBO I just despair.

Anyone hungry? Try tripe...or this show. Big name actors to entice us; James Nesbitt, Minnie Driver - but what a waste of viewing time. The scriptwriters should be shot. Oohh look, there's a thing; ooh look, it's big; ooh look, nasty Russians. Bland, bland, bland.

The story did not develop the characters for us. We are expected to trust the script and almost automatically know that Minnies character is the leader, that she's in love with another, that James character is the broody tough guy who will overcome the adversity, that Svetlana knows 12 languages and is not just a pretty face. Also, add in a token black female character cos somehow, that balances the crew.

I thought scientists in a sub would all wear the same clothing, you know, overalls or wet weather gear.

Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea was better and that was 40 years ago.

One hour never to be recovered. Forget the next four.

By the middle of the third episode I just didn't care. There's some kind of mystery and it's impossible to care. The plot started to fall apart and the behavior of the characters became ridiculous and unreasonable. I thought there was the bones of a fantastic story in here but between the horrible acting and even worse dialogue, I could not even force myself to finish. I don't even know what happens and I don't even have enough interest left to look at a summary. That's how bad it went from compelling to losing my interest completely .

I'm not even interested enough to delve into what went wrong here. Despite it having the pace of a snail they managed to dangle plot threads and completely miss out on the chance to deliver some compelling mystery and drama. I'm not even judging the scientific inadequacies of this thing but it was clearly written by someone that knows nothing about diving. About the pressures involved in the challenges. It's completely ridiculous by the third episode and it really did start out strong. It's sucked me in with characters that vanish to be replaced with empty planks of wood.

Honestly by the end I was hoping everybody would just die.

2 characters under the water deserved to live, and neither do. Such a dissatisfaction of time spent. Could have been an interesting story. But just stupid decision after stupid decision.

Unless they are known to actually exist there, putting volcanic vents under the ice caps seems like poor writing to me. Wouldn't they melt the ice?

Drilling deep through an 800 degree 'volcanic field' is more likely to produce hot magma, than oil. Drilling underwater, serviced by subs, seems problematic. Not 'cheep' energy at all. And could not be kept secret for long.

Unless they are known to actually exist there, putting volcanic vents under the ice caps seems like poor writing to me. Wouldn't they melt the ice?

Drilling deep through an 800 degree 'volcanic field' is more likely to produce hot magma, than oil. Drilling underwater, serviced by subs, seems problematic. Not 'cheep' energy at all. And could not be kept secret for long.