David Tennant has described the BBC's latest stab at making the numbers work, still giving a nod to diversity quotas "terrifying". That's probably something of an overstatement, unless he refers to the price of the licence fee for the privilege of watching it. Cast so well, it makes you want to fumble around grubbily in your underpants in excitement. Tennant (obvs) is joined by no less than Italian culinary chef and occasional actor, Stanley Tucci, in the headlining department, but this is littered with talent practically everywhere you look. Pushed the boat out? I'll say.
We're halfway through this catalogue of potentially fatal errors of judgement and already, you can be forgiven for trying to stop your head spinning. Confused you very well may be, but Inside Man is no less gripping for that fact. Undeniably, it is edge-of-your-seat drama and if the first two of the expected four episodes are anything to go by, then writer Steven Moffat (Doctor Who etc) must have a few bombs ready to drop on all of us.
Personally, the first episode blew me away. Moffat's skill at delivering this remarkable situation on paper and the casts' ability to show it was absolutely worth the trouble of spending time with it. It goes to some extremely dark places almost immediately with some abuse on a train and gets worse from there. It's clever too, of course, though maybe not as smart as it it thinks it is. I imagine Moffat scanned the expected demographics for this and wrote the script to make it apparently, if not actually, both smart and razor-sharp enough.
I am looking forward to the final two episodes with as much dread and trepidation as excitement. Either way, I know I will be rewarded mostly unfairly for my time. It not hard-boiled, but it's super-polished, but you get what you pay for, and chances are you already do, whether you like it or not.
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