Prey

Almost a true-to-life-size copy of The Fugitive, from the story, through division of roles and character types, to length of show. And it’s a copy that is worse than The Fugitive in every way. Which doesn’t mean, of course, that this is a bad copy; it just rather dime a dozen. British TV genre series often stress the “everyday and down-to-earth" and Prey is no exception. Unfortunately, this approach is rather detrimental, because with a thriller about a falsely accused fugitive for whom walking down the street is nerve-rackingly tense because “what if that guy walking toward me recognizes me and reports me", then you can expect constant tension and endless paranoia when you don’t know who (if there is somebody) to trust. Instead, dozens of minutes are spent dealing with the every-day side where it is immediately clear where it is leading and how it will get there. However, as of the second episode, it turns into a classic manhunt movie, which suddenly starts to work (apart from the dumb finale) and, unsurprisingly, this is due to Simm, who was born for the role of a “nice guy from next door who just needs to look at you once, and you soon find yourself taking your gold watch off and pulling out your wallet". Season two is completely self-standing, although some characters do return. The man hunted this time isn’t Simm, but it’s hard to find a better replacement than his long-term acting partner, Glenister. It’s him in the role of an honest prison guard whose daughter is kidnapped and is forced to free one of the prisoners who carries this series along. It’s all just slightly better than season one, but it has its own considerable problems. Mainly it is so clearly traced out and transparent that it has no surprised and rather than three forty-five minute episodes, they should have made it as two hour-long episodes. | S1: 3/5 | S2: 3/5 | (05/12/2014)