The term “Ripperology” was coined in the 1970s to describe the obsessive community that had grown, over the course of a century, around the Jack the Ripper case. Some Ripperologists posited absurd theories, others championed obscure suspects or stalked the killer’s east London haunts. A few turned the focus to his victims. But all were driven by the strange frisson of curiosity that arises from proximity to evil. That fixation with the unsolved Victorian murders led, also in the Seventies, to the media branding a new Ripper and creating a new legion of Ripperologists. This time, it was the Yorkshire Ripper – Peter Sutcliffe – who is the subject of a new seven-part ITV drama, The Long Shadow.
“I find if you don’t solve a murder in the first couple of days,” purrs David Morrissey’s Assistant Chief Constable George Oldfield, “it’s an uphill struggle after that.” When the body of a prostitute is found in Leeds in 1975, the police are optimistic about a swift resolution. But ACC Oldfield’s warning rings true: days turn to weeks, weeks to years and the bodies start to stack up. At the centre of the case, in its early moments, is Detective Chief Superintendent Dennis Hoban (Toby Jones). DCS Hoban’s job is twofold: he must catch the killer but also fight the public indifference to the murders of sex workers. “While this man is at large,” he declares, solemnly, in a TV appeal, “no prostitute is safe.” Jones and Morrissey are the core of a cast of excellent British actors (which includes Daniel Mays, Lee Ingleby, Liz White and many others), and the drama unfolds against an impeccably recreated backdrop of 1970s Yorkshire.
