If you love Monk, check out this British mystery series

monkthe popular USA Network comedy/mystery series from the early 2000s with Tony Shalhoub as obsessive-compulsive, phobic detective Adrian Monk, ran for eight successful seasons. Before the series finale in 2009, viewers couldn’t seem to get enough of the uptight, quirky private eye who was so paralyzed by fear and compulsion that he often could barely move, let alone solve crimes without being pushed and held up by his assistants. Audiences seemed to be drawn to a character who embodied both extreme human weakness and the best of intuitive logic. Perhaps it was Monk’s ability to present himself so well while displaying such ridiculous manners that he piqued our interest.

If you miss monkperhaps Professor T.a mix of mystery, humor and drama, produced by ITV and now in its third seasonis exactly what you’ve been looking for. Eccentric Cambridge criminologist Jasper Tempest, known to his students as “Professor T,” is as fussy and germophobic as Monk, and also autistic. He doesn’t panic as easily as Adrian Monk. Instead, he’s mostly frozen and emotionless, but it’s still hilarious. In comparison, Monk comes across as manic compared to Tempest. In the first episode of the current season, now streaming on PBS and Prime Video, our revered hero ends up in prison, of all places, while on trial (for firing a shotgun in the Deputy Chief Inspector’s office at the end of season two—don’t ask) and simultaneously defending his cellmate against an assassination attempt on a hated prison guard. Call it “doing your homework from the inside”!

Professor T (2021)

Professor T focuses on Professor Jasper Tempest, a criminology lecturer at Cambridge University who suffers from obsessive compulsive disorder. Despite his difficult personality, he helps the police solve complex crimes thanks to his sharp mind and unique perspective.

Release date

June 3, 2021

Pour

Ben Miller, Emma Naomi, Barney White, Sarah Woodward, Andy Gathergood, Douglas Reith, Frances de la Tour, Juliet Aubrey

Main genre

crime

Seasons

3

Creator

Paul Piedfort, Malin-Sarah Gozin

What is “Professor T.” about?

In addition to his work as a lecturer in criminology at Cambridge, Tempest also works as a consultant to the police.frequently called by a former pupil who is now a detective inspector and a former lover who is now a chief inspector. Over the last two seasons we have seen him struggle in vain for dominance over his mother, unsuccessfully attempt therapy and go back to dating, with disastrous but hilarious results. Socially, Tempest is a disaster; professionally, he is brilliant. Each episode features a police drama, investigating crimes in the style of twisted Shakespearean familicides while advancing the storylines of the various characters.

Professor T., the brainchild of the Flemish screenwriter Paul Piedfort, began as a Belgian series of the same name in 2015. It was subsequently reproduced in Germany and Czechoslovakia, where it remained until its adaptation in the UK and America in 2021, where it received both critical acclaim and gained popularity, achieving an audience rating of 79% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Professor T. is the Briton Adrian Monk

The character Professor Jasper Tempest is almost always introduced and accompanied by Italian opera music, which, at least in his imagination, reflects his classically refined sensibility. His habits, such as his coffee preparation, are demanding. Storm is the exact definition of the word “eccentric”. He suffers from both obsessive-compulsive disorder and autism, is constantly wearing rubber gloves or cleaning, and is prone to flights of imagination (which are dramatized for the audience).

He had a difficult childhood (the death of his father on Jasper’s 10th birthday haunts him) which he often recalls. Normal human emotions are too much for him. He regularly sits alone, silent and pensive, on the roof of the college, staring at the skyline of the medieval city, where he is frequently visited and disturbed by his needy, possessive and domineering mother and a strange and motley crew of college and police colleagues. Nevertheless, he is a brilliant and intuitive (almost psychic) ​​forensic scientist.

Busy 58-year-old English actor and author Ben Miller says he was the perfect actor for the role of Professor T. because, like the character, he studied at Cambridge and also suffered from obsessive compulsive disorder. In the UK, he became known as one half of the comedy team Armstong and Miller on British television and radio from 1996. After appearances with Rowan Atkinson in the forgettable film Johnny English and a one-year role as the wasteful gambler Baron Featherington in the first season of BridgertonMiller began with the role of Professor T., in which he is virtually expressionless except for his stiff but broad gait and his Monty Python-style body language. It’s a wonderfully nuanced performance: fussy, droll, understated and very entertaining to watch.

Other cast members include the legendary comedian Franziska from the tour (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire), who steals every scene she appears in as Tempest’s rich widowed mother from hell, Adelaide, with her equally neurotic dog Kafka, the frequent subject of her frighteningly modern paintings. Co-Stars Emma Naomi And Barney White bring much-needed sex appeal and youth to the show as the competent, insecure and oddly named DI Lisa Donckers and the square-chinned but gentle DS Dan Winters, who are sometimes a lover and sometimes a work colleague. Julia Aubrey adds complexity as DCI and Tempest’s former lover Christina Brand.

The very funny Sarah Woodward as Tempest’s hateful and crazy secretary Ingrid Snares, Andy Gathergood as gruff DI Paul Rabbit and Douglas Reith and the clueless university dean Decano round out the humorous cast. The omnipresent mustiness and the Tudoresque brick architecture of the old research college—with its stiff champagne receptions and dark wood-panelled rooms— becomes almost as much a character as Oxford is to the Morse And Lewis Series.

The third season of ITV’s Professor T. is currently airing on PBS, and the series was recently renewed for a fourth season. Crime lovers can join the current season without watching the previous episodes; they stand alone. Each season consists of six one-hour episodes. Each episode presents a new crime to solve and tells the life stories of the various characters surrounding Professor T. However, it’s also a good idea to start with Season 1, Episode 1 and get to know Professor T from the beginning on Prime Video before watching the new episodes on PBS. It won’t take long to get hooked.

Professor T. can be streamed on Prime Video in the US

Watch on Prime Video