Cracker

Cracker is the title of a television crime series in the United Kingdom, made by Granada Television for ITV and created and principally written by Jimmy McGovern. The series concerned a criminal psychologist (or "cracker"), Eddie "Fitz" Fitzgerald, played by Robbie Coltrane. Set in Manchester, it consisted of three series which ran from 1993 to 1995. A 100 minute special set in Hong Kong followed in 1996, and another two-hour story in 2006. Fitz is a classic antihero, unfaithful to his wife, alcoholic, a chain smoker, overweight, addicted to gambling, manic, foulmouthed and sarcastic; and yet cerebral and excellent at his speciality: getting into the heads of violent criminals. As Fitz confesses in "Brotherly Love": "I drink too much, I smoke too much, I gamble too much. I am too much." Each case spanned several episodes and cliffhanger were quite often used, but it was not until the end of the second series that a cliffhanger was employed to tie off the series. Some of the... full article at wikipedia