The lovely and able Pauline Collins does an excellent job in series 1 of portraying the ambassador in a set of interesting stories that raise a variety of issues and problems and are scripted very plausibly.
Of course, being modern TV, we can't just enjoy the drama of seeing the ambassador wrestle with the political and diplomatic challenges of each situation; we have to be subjected to the usual tedioius tropes about career woman torn between personal fulfillment as a woman in a man's world and the demands of motherhood as she tries to hold together her family in dealing with their personal tragedy but in series 1 this codswallop is kept in reasonable proportion to the proper drama.
In series 2 the whole thing goes to the dogs with Peter Egan introduced as a completely ludicrous character, the ambassador transformed from a convincingly thinking woman into an overgrown teenager, and plots that are not worthy of the name.
Pauline Collins continues to do her best but it is asking too much of her to rescue things; she deserves better than the rubbish she is saddled with in series 2.
Of course, being modern TV, we can't just enjoy the drama of seeing the ambassador wrestle with the political and diplomatic challenges of each situation; we have to be subjected to the usual tedioius tropes about career woman torn between personal fulfillment as a woman in a man's world and the demands of motherhood as she tries to hold together her family in dealing with their personal tragedy but in series 1 this codswallop is kept in reasonable proportion to the proper drama.
In series 2 the whole thing goes to the dogs with Peter Egan introduced as a completely ludicrous character, the ambassador transformed from a convincingly thinking woman into an overgrown teenager, and plots that are not worthy of the name.
Pauline Collins continues to do her best but it is asking too much of her to rescue things; she deserves better than the rubbish she is saddled with in series 2.