Distributor: Just Entertainment
Episodes: 8
Duration: 50 mins (per episode)
The Interceptor: Season 1 (Blu-ray) – Series Review
The Interceptor is a British drama and crime miniseries from BBC comprised of eight parts. The series is not your standard crime series although the narrative falls in line with the genre seeing as the show is about a new law enforcement team tasked to hunt down some of Britain’s most wanted criminals and organizations.
Inspired by the book of the same name, The Interceptor details the career of Customs Officer Marcus ‘Ash’ Ashton (O.T. Fagbenle). Together with his partner Customs Officer Tommy (Robert Lonsdale), they take down smaller fishes whom are part of large criminal organizations. When they successfully capture a drug shipper during one of their operations at the London Waterloo Station, Tommy is thrilled. Ash however is tired of dealing with the small fish and wants to capture a criminal higher up the food chain. Naturally their boss is over the moon for having taken 3kg of cocaine off the streets. A follow-up investigation may lead them to something bigger and both officers take this chance with both hands. During the operation that will hopefully lead them to a bigger shark, Tommy is severely injured in a car crash. Ash blames it on his superior but eventually they all blame him for being reckless and Ash is suspended from duty. Not long after, he is approached by Cartwright (Ewan Stewart), the head of the top-secret Undercover Narcotics Investigation Team better known as UNIT.
Ash decides to join UNIT, hoping to finally take down a criminal organization. When he enters UNIT’s headquarters he is met with a friendly face, namely his former Customs training officer Valerie (Lorraine Ashbourne). She explains that Ash has been on UNIT’s radar for quite a while now and that the operation at Waterloo Station was certainly respectable but it also double-crossed UNIT’s operation. When Ash finds the person responsible for Tommy’s injuries, he butt-headingly jeopardized the entire mission of UNIT. When things calm down, Ash brings in Tommy. Together they continue their work at UNIT but not without a few issues along the way. Both men care strongly about the innocent that have been lured in the organized crime and they jeopardize a few more missions. They combine their forces with colleagues Kim (Anna Skellern), a former Met Police Flying Squad member and Martin (Charlie De Melo), a former MI6 agent and learn to help the smaller fish without ruining the end goal of capturing the still unknown boss of the criminal organization. In the meantime, Ash is struggling to keep his wife Lorna (Jo Joyner) in the dark while Cartwright and his team at UNIT are being investigated by Chief Inspector Stannard (Simon Armstrong) from the Metropolitan Police.
The general narrative in all eight parts of The Interceptor is the career of Special Agent Ash as well as the criminal organization he is chasing at UNIT. However, each episode reveals a different part of the criminal organization and the arrests they make range from smaller fish to larger sharks but they have a long way to go if they ever want to arrest the head of the organization. This type of narrative derails from the standard crime series we know. There’s not a lot of action going on in the series either. The enormous lack thereof makes The Interceptor a rather dull and boring crime drama.
As for the acting performance, each member of the cast performs below average. It is hard to tell whether the actors are simply bad at projecting their characters or if it’s just horrible directing. Neither of the characters are truly interesting and none of them are actually likeable so the viewer can’t really form an emotional connection with any of characters. In fact, each character feels almost soulless. Character development is almost non-existent but then again, the series is simply far too short to really see a character grow. The dialogue, no matter the character or scene, is absolutely awful. Witty one-liners and humor are missing in the show. This in combination with the lack of drama causes the series to be long-winded and monotonous to a point where you’d rather stop watching it.
Not only is the entire series quite displeasing to watch thanks to the lack of action and invigorate character irks and quirks, the boxset itself is disappointing too. Spread out in only two discs, they could’ve added quite a few extra footage on a third disc. Perhaps extra footage like character development or research of the topic, would have been able to add some spirit to the series.
Conclusion
The narrative itself seems great as a concept but the show lacks passion, action and stunning dialogues for it to truly shine. Characters don’t really have traits one can like or dislike and the viewers can’t bond with any of them. This makes the acting performance less than average. The Interceptor is a boring crime drama and its execution is absolute rubbish.
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