Strangers, review: this conspiracy thriller could have been made any time in the last 20 years
Bodyguard. Vanity Fair. Press. Black Earth Rising. There’s a lot of excellent, distinctive new drama around at the moment. This creates problems for resolutely three-star affairs such as Strangers (ITV), a conspiracy thriller which, for better or worse, feels like it could have been made any time in the last 20 years (although seeing so many subtitles on prime-time ITV was a welcome surprise).
There were many plusses: John Simm is one of the best in the business at playing everymen taking on the system. Here, his amiable, slightly wet academic Jonah Mulray arrived in Hong Kong in the wake of the death of his wife Megan (Dervla Kirwan) to discover a wall of official corruption, cover-up and the other family his wife had secreted there: world-weary husband David Chen (Anthony Wong) and anti-authoritarian activist daughter Lau (Katie Leung).
In Paul Andrew Williams, Strangers had one of the most reliable directors working in British TV drama, wringing out every drop of the Hong Kong’s queasy exoticism, its unsettling combination of swanky bars and sweaty poverty, the messy collision of Chinese authoritarianism, big business and waning British influence. The plotting was solid (the gunshot heard on Megan’s valedictory voicemail was a vintage cliffhanger), although the expositional dialogue needs polishing.
The trouble was, it felt predictable and, at eight episodes, overlong. Co-stars Emilia Fox and Tim McInnerny, here playing British consulate wonks, are invariably wrong ’uns unless the former is the lead. Jonah will surely bond with Lau or David in his quest for justice. Said journey will probably end in frustrated resolution. I may well be wrong – last Sunday’s Bodyguard confounded my expectations – but there’s just too much great TV around to persevere with the merely passable stuff.
