Oh, Broadchurch-- I Wish I Could Quit You.

Honestly--how bad are the police in Dorset anyway?

--Jack Marshall has a previous conviction as a sex offender. He doesn't want to talk about it. Oh well, unless he's willing to talk, the police have NO WAY of finding out what the conviction was for, TOO BAD. I mean, it's not like a guilty conviction would be a matter of public record, would it? And there's no reason to think that any newly appointed DI from outside of Broadchurch would know anybody in any other police force to find out that information. Too bad there are no telephones in Broadchurch to make a call or anything.

(Also too bad there's no such thing as Google either. Curse you, charming seaside town that exists outside the 21st century!)

--Hey, wait? The autopsy showed Danny wasn't sexually abused. Why would a sex crime conviction (from about a hundred years ago, back when Jack Marshall was 40) have any bearing on a murder investigation where molestation had been ruled out?

--Cigarettes? AT THE SITE OF THE BODY?? Hey! I know! Instead of playing Bad Cop to force a confession out of poor elderly Jack Marshall (about an affair with an almost-legal girl that he married after he served a 1 year sentence--an affair that happened during the reign of Charles II), why don't you ask him if he carried that kind of cigarette and who bought them from him? Because it's more fun to disapprove of your great-grandpappy's sexual history than to ACTUALLY INVESTIGATE THE MURDER?

--Is ANYBODY looking at Danny's computer? We saw Tommy Miller deleting messages from Danny from his own phone and computer, and there was some rigamarole around not being able to find Danny's phone--but what about his computer?

--Also--mobile phone bills from the Lattimers? Danny's phone would probably be on a family plan--is anybody looking at trying to figure out who he talked to and texted by any other means? Oh no--we're just going to sit around and wait for the missing phone to turn up, because by the Law of Narrative Necessity, it has to show up. That's science.

--Who do I think is guilty as of this week? There are a few suspects:

1. Chris Chibnall. The same clunkily bad writer who gave us Torchwood's embarrassment "Cyberwoman" AND Doctor Who's risible "Dinosaurs on a Spaceship" continues to miss the point of plotting out the show you are writing. There is just no police activity going on here! It's like they just hang around and wait for somebody to show up with some evidence.
2. The Middle-aged Men of Broadchurch--because leaping to the conclusion that Jack Marshall is a homosexual pedophile says a little too much about your own fantasies and fears than I want to have to know about.
3. BBC America, for editing out a scene in which Tom Miller asks his father how long a murderer might go to prison, and for any other scenes they have cut out. Also, for not airing this series back when the UK got it too.

Yup. I think that does it.