The BBC's new six-part series "Rebus" "doesn't feel necessary, exactly", said Rachel Cooke in The New Statesman: every day seems to bring "sheeting rain and another new police drama, and Ian Rankin's novels have been well adapted before": between 2000 and 2007, there were four ITV series based on the books. Still, this outing, written by the playwright Gregory Burke, "is shaping up to be a keeper".
While the detective sergeant John Rebus of Rankin's most recent books is "a weary, wily old-timer", said Dan Einav in the FT, this Rebus is a younger man (played by Richard Rankin, no relation).
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