Law & Order: UK/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Awesome Music: The first show in the franchise to feature an original theme tune rather than a remix of the original. The result is epic!
  • Bittersweet Ending: To many episodes where legal victory can come at a great cost. Driven home in "Survivor's Guilt"-- Matt's killer is caught, confesses, pleads guilty, and even sincerely apologizes for his actions. But despite all this, Matt, like so many other victims, can never be brought back.
  • Fridge Horror: The episode "Deal" ends with Ronnie frantically trying tend to the injured Matt. The following episode begins with the now stunned Ronnie still at the crime scene, watching the technicians at work. The horror is in realizing that Matt probably never made it to the hospital, otherwise the episode would have opened there. Which means realizing that he must have died at the scene. Which means realizing that poor Ronnie probably had to endure watching his partner/friend/surrogate son die right in front of him, completely powerless to help--and he's already lost a partner to violence.
    • There's also the matter of the wife and son of Matt's friend, left widowed and fatherless when his friend killed himself, who now have to contend with another devastating loss, probably coming just as they were beginning to recover from the first one. It's especially bad for the boy, who clearly viewed Matt as a big brother/uncle type and whose relationship with Matt would no doubt have eased the pain of losing his father--only to lose him too.
  • Harsher in Hindsight: Several in-show examples.
    • In the episode "Samaritan", not only are they investigating the shooting death of another police officer, Matt muses to Ronnie that it must be tough to lose a partner, then fumbles as he realizes that he's just reminded Ronnie of his own experience.
    • In the episode "Confession", Ronnie states, "God forbid Matty here got himself shot, I'd be out there straight away trying to find out who did it and string him up myself." A year later, that's precisely what happened. The irony becomes even crueler when you recall that throughout the show, it was *Matt* who would flip out if/when Ronnie seemed to be in danger.
  • Most Wonderful Sound: The recurring two-note sound heard across the Law and Order franchise.
  • Role Association: Martha Jones and Apollo are flirting with each other whilst doing pretty mundane jobs. Plus, Apollo's sporting his natural accent--and hair.
    • And now the 5th doctor is joining them?
  • Spoiled by the Format: For fans of The Mothership, once you see which episode forms the basis for the UK episode, who did what and why, as well as what will happen is fairly apparent from the start. Especially bad with the "Survivor's Guilt": Once you know it's based on "Suicide Box", you know Matt wasn't shot in retaliation for a drug dealer's conviction. That said, the UK writers tend to change things enough to keep it interesting, and most episodes aired so long ago, it's virtually impossible to remember every plot twist that took place.
  • Tear Jerker: Steel's efforts to comfort and help a 13-year-old boy who's just pleaded guilty to murder after swallowing his barrister's argument that his genes made him a killer.
    • Matt struggling to hold back his anger and his tears when he talks to Alesha after her rape. It's especially poignant considering that he spent the first half of the episode freaking out over her initial complaint (that her doctor had touched her inappropriately), but now needs to put his feelings aside in order to be there for her.
    • Alesha begging James to prosecute her rapist:

"You're always saying we should fight for the victim. I'm the victim. (tearfully) Fight for me"

    • Just about every scene in "Survivor's Guilt". Standout moments include Ronnie simply asking Matt's killer "Why?", actually empathizing with him (he was acting out of misplaced vengeance over the death of his brother) and finally reaching out to him with words that clearly referred to himself--“When someone you love dies, the hardest thing is to be left behind. You’d do anything to bring them back. You’d take their place.”, and later, in a conversation with the gunman's mother, "The police officer, who died? His name was Matthew Devlin. And he was like...like *my* son."
  • What an Idiot!: Yes, Sam, sleeping with the 'victim' was a brilliant move.