Family reaction to boy's death.

Actually, the mom saw his body on the beach before that and was freaking out. That scene was just confirmation of something they already knew in their hearts. So at that point they were in shock. When my sister died, I just sat in stunned silence for about 2 hours.

Freedom of religion means ALL religions not just your own.

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But then again: what would be the right reaction? Would they all explode? Usually the first expression in such a case is a totally blank face.
I hate the soapish overacting which does not reflect real life at all, and for that show underacting made more sense as everybody had to wonder what it means for them.

How has no one pointed this out before? The picture above shows their reaction moments before Danny's death was confirmed. After they are told the body on the beach was indeed Danny's, they all react just as you'd expect - absolute devastation and unabashed crying. How can you not remember Beth's reaction?! It was one of the most heartbreaking things I've ever seen. Did you even watch the show or were you clinging on to something to be clever about?

It was far far more poignant than the reaction of the family in the American version, Gracepoint.

Indeed. Not to mention top of cultural differences we have peoples own particularities. And I find it nice to learn about different cultures and cinema and TV is good way to travel further. And at times what we believe to be artistic failure, appears to be true and natural for the country or region where film/show is made.

The 'cool' reaction does not mean any less shock and I could say that not being able to scream and panic shows how deep the shock may be. lack of strong emotions may be related on the way of showing "disbelief" - "No, no.. no... this person is not harmed, or dead... " and here disbelief is expressed more closer to the way you saw on Broadchurch. I am not from UK myself. In fact I am 1800 KM away from it, but I was able to relate to the way it was shown. I didn't question it for a moment.

Many UK shows have the same way of showing grief with occasional bursts to cry, where people are calmed down by someone. But rarely you have someone "do the Hollywood thing" and it's safe to say, yes its how 'they do it'.

But then again even in Europe, when you go towards south - more extreme emotions are likely shown.

I have never came to think that "Hollywood reaction" is real one somewhere, and every time I saw it in films I've kind of linked it to bad directing or overacting. And maybe this is why often EU cinema feels too distant (or hard to relate) for some, while US cinema feels over-dramatic to us on many occasions.

Please don't take this the wrong way, but are you black? I've seen many news reports where a young black male is killed and the females do the stereotypical collapse, literally, into a screeching, fainting mess. I see this in many stories from the Middle East and Arab countries, too. Maybe it's a cultural thing.