‘Blue Lights’ Is ‘The Pitt’ of Cop Dramas

Crime-based entertainment can be a finicky proposition over the holidays. Police procedurals usually come with a heavy waft of politics — potentially not where you want to go if you’re watching with relatives and often a straight bummer when watching alone. The best cop dramas hit a very specific zone between novel and familiar: The routine should be comforting, but anything too rote or stodgy won’t be adequate to the task of distracting you from friends and family, the politics you were trying to avoid, or the constant algorithmic swiping you know is giving you digitally induced encephalopathy. What is a TV viewer in search of some well-made crime fiction to do?

The answer, just as your mother or aunt has been suggesting to you, lies on BritBox with the Northern Irish cop drama Blue L