The Pembrokeshire Murders, ep 1 review: A solid drama, where even the accents hit the bullseye

The first episode of The Pembrokeshire Murders (ITV) was proceeding as police procedurals tend to do. Creepy serial killer, hard-working detective with personal problems, capable young sidekick, Jim Bowen in Bullseye – hang on,  Jim Bowen? In Bullseye?

If you remember the details of the case, that image probably made sense. For everyone else, it was a surreal moment in a drama that was otherwise entirely straightforward.

Luke Evans is DCI Steve Wilkins, who launches a cold case inquiry into two double murders: the first of a brother and sister killed at their home before it was set on fire, the second of a holidaymaking couple shot dead as they walked along a coastal path.

His suspect, John Cooper (Keith Allen), is about to be paroled after a spell in prison for burglary, and this three-part drama will set out how Wilkins got his man through dogged detective work and forensic evidence. And Bullseye.

True crime is all the rage at the moment. The Pembrokeshire Murders lacks the psychological chills of Des or White House Farm, or the flair of The Serpent. But it is a solid police drama, and at least the accents aren’t a crime. Evans is a Welsh actor in a Welsh drama, which is a blessed relief to those of us still recovering from Sarah Lancashire’s accent in The Accident. Relief too that Allen turns in a respectable performance, he being an actor who has done his best over the years to avoid respectability.

DSI Wilkins has split from his wife – this is signposted in the first five minutes when we see him ironing his own shirts – after some unspecified business in London and is trying to rebuild a relationship with his son, but this is just to pad out the plot because he isn’t the miserable character so often found in detective dramas. He eats microwave meals for one but doesn’t get maudlin about it, and enjoys a nice glass of red but doesn’t appear to be an alcoholic (unless that swig from a hip flask was designed to tell us something, but I don’t think so).

Instead, writer Nick Stevens mostly keeps the focus on the investigation, with a script based on Wilkins’s own book. Wilkins enlists the help of  a TV reporter (David Fynn) to unsettle Cooper, while his team trawl through boxes of evidence for the “golden nugget” that could link Cooper to the murders, and to a third crime.

Even though we know the outcome, there was enough in this opener to convince that it is worth sticking with it through the next two episodes.