Just thought I'd post in here to say I just watched S1E1 for the first time & really liked it!  Much more than I'd anticipated.  I loved how real it felt in the sense of seeming like they're real folks, aye.  Intrigued how it'll continue now!  I'm not a particular fan of the crime drama in general.  Appreciated the power in letting us imagine the awfulness in that box and letting us experience what the policeman would be experiencing standing beside it, knowing it must be opened too... rather than showing unneccesary awful. 

Look forward to watching more in any case now!  Damien seemed different here to anything I have as yet seen him in as well, though of course this was only episode 1!

I'm going to second (or third) the comments here.  Suspects is a refreshing change from the typical crime drama.  I used to be a fan of crime drama, but the genre got saturated with impossibly suave characters and an emphasis on technology that simply does not exist.  Suspects gets real, from the basic tools the cops have (dry erase boards and printers that get jammed lol) to the way cops actually talk - you know because they are human and don't always have epiphanies and fully formed monologues just spontaneously flow from their tongues...  I like the fact that you can literally see the actors thinking about what they are going to say sometimes because that mirrors how someone would work things out.  The shooting style came under criticism initially but I also like that.  It is a drama, so not quite an in your face documentary with the cops being followed by cameras, but you do get these little glimpses sometimes when they do address the camera directly that tickle me pink.  Just like that little touch.

I agree it gets better and better. Damien, Clare-Hope, and Fay get more comfortable in their roles, it becomes more natural, and fabulous (though often heartwrenching) storylines.

Damien is wonderfully sharp & witty, and despite the emphasis being on the case & suspects, in little nuggets of time he's managed to infuse Jack with as much multilayeredism (yeah I'm making up words) as we've seen in his other roles. I really admire him for taking on the challenge of improvising, he's really got an aptitude for it.