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Channel 4: The Returned


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Tomorrow (Sunday 8th June) at 9pm: The Returned

Supernatural crime thriller (in French with subtitles) set in a French

alpine village, where the most striking feature is a vast dam.

As the drama

begins, the villagers are planning a memorial for the victims of a tragedy

four years earlier, when a school bus full of children plunged off a

mountain road. As they deliberate, a teenaged girl makes her way home, where

her mother discovers her raiding the fridge. “The weirdest thing happened to

me,” says the girl brightly, mouth full. Her mother’s expression is a

mixture of stupefaction, horror and love: her daughter, Camille, was one of

the children killed on the bus.

Across the village, similar scenes are taking place, accompanied by odd

phenomena: the lights flicker on and off, the dam seems to be draining. The

dead are returning to join the living.

Discussed in The Telegraph, The Guardian and on CanalPlus (in French).

The series was filmed around Annecy, a beautiful area of the Alps close to where I lived up to the time I moved to the UK at the age of 19... [:)]

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[quote user="nectarine"]... And apparently the advert breaks will all be in French![/quote]

Really? [blink]

I wonder if they're going to be French adverts as seen on French TV, or if C4 is going for the fake French accent over British ads...?[8-)]

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apparently all in French

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/nicole-papa-channel-4-to-screen-all-adverts-en-franais-during-french-zombie-drama-the-returned-8638932.html

will definitely be staying up for this tonight!
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[quote user="Clair"]Intriguing.

I didn't realise until quite late that Camille and Léna were twins...! [:$]

And who (what?) is the young boy?[/quote]

Exactly! It was only when Camille was experiencing Lena's sensations on the bus that I realised they were twins ... because of the 4 year age difference between them NOW that had thrown me. The murder was quite brutal .. not sure where that fits in. And the young boy ... what a twist at the end when he's in the road.

Yes, I was hooked. This looks like it could be a really addictive series. And they have the 'closed' feeling of that valley town, a sense of isolation. I'm looking forward to next week!

edited by a mod...

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I really enjoyed the first episode; the music added to the atmosphere. It's a spooky town - all those new builds and underpasses and all rather deserted. I think all the returned are from the coach crash which was caused by 'Victor' (though Camille didn't help!).

At last, something good on Sunday evening TV to look forward to.

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[quote user="Pommier"]I think all the returned are from the coach crash...[/quote]

They're not.

The young man whose name escapes me (the one looking for his girlfriend Adèle who has moved on from the flat and from her job in the pub and is shacking up with the gendarme), he was standing in front of his own grave in the cemetery and the year of his death was shown as 2002, whereas the coach crash was 4 years before "the returned" show up.

Also, the old man who jumped from the dam (the one the nurse gave the injection to), his wife is totally unchanged from the pics in his flat, eating from the pan in his kitchen.

And why/how did he have pics of the various "returned" people? (he was shown setting them and his house - and his "returned" wife? - on fire before jumping off the dam)

It's an intriguing puzzle for now...

Very oppressive atmosphere and landscape.

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[quote user="Pommier"]It's a spooky town - all those new builds and underpasses and all rather deserted...[/quote]

Yes, the deserted bit is very rural France but I question the likelihood of all those lights burning in the village at night... in Normandy everything is shuttered and black by 8pm or darkness, whichever is earlier. [:)]

I wonder if the poor guy who jumped off the dam will now return...

E2A: I meant to say that I thought the girl who was stabbed in the underpass seemed to recognise her attacker. She seemed to look at him in shock - more than "just" the shock you'd show in that situation.

E2A2: it's repeated this evening at around 11pm on 4Seven if anyone needs a second look.

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Just to see where I used to live, I kept zapping to have a little look. Didn't find the music scary, as that is one thing that usually 'gets' me first. And it was wonderful to see 'my' mountains again. The dam looks like the Barrage de Tignes to me, was it?????

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Am really enjoying this. It is eerie, realistic. Intriguing storyline, cant wait for the next episode. am not really a TV person, but this has got me going.!

I mentioned the series to my friend who lives in France. She is a fluent speaker. She said she gave up on French TV long ago and only watches her UK Satelitte. She was quite intrigued to be watching a French programme on UK TV.

I especially liked the French sub-titles for the UK Commercial Ads.

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[quote user="Deby"]I especially liked the French sub-titles for the UK Commercial Ads.[/quote]

That made me smile! The complete opposite of last week's advert break!

We're still nowhere near finding out who Victor is...

And what about the young man beaten about the head by the bar owner? and the dead hanging wolf (?) suddenly revived?

Why is the gendarmette so aggressive?

What's causing the water water level of the dam to drop?

And there's something I don't like about the religious counsellor bloke. He's more dodgy than anyone else...

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Deby, We have satellite via SKY and we can get TV5Monde, and that is basically francophile and mostly in french with no sub titles. It's on SKY on 799 and I think on Virgin 825. We watch quite a few things on it, some of our old favourites like Thalassa and Faux Pas Rever etc and the news on France2, on half an hour later, so 20h in France and 19h30 in the UK. Some times good series are on, so maybe Les Revenants will be on one day.

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well the wolf came back to life, because the dead are returning. It's very spooky ... I'm guessing that the child Victor is probably a long-dead returnee since he doesn't figure in anybody's memory of a lost child. And what's with the serial killer's method of stabbing his victim and trying to eat her liver ... ? Yikes.

I think the diminishing water level in the dam is linked to this ... is there something hidden under the water, perhaps, which is generating this return to life?

There's somethign a bit surreal about this, it reminds me of 'Twin Peaks' all those years ago.

A gripping series. This, together with Saturday night's 'The Americans' means we are staying in on weekend evening from now on !
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Lots of elements of what have been recounted make me think of a book that I have just read, the setting, the style of suspense, the wolf...................

Do you know the name of the writer?

The book that I read was "Seeking whom he may devour" by Fred Vargas, probably a nom de plume, I was quite a way through the book (written in english) when I realised that several of the dialogues were just too French, on closer inspection it has been translated from the French original and Fred Vargas is a woman, a historian, archaeologist and novelist born in Paris.

I recommend the book and would like to read more of her work but in the French language.

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