The Missing: Series 2 review

The Missing was a successful television series written by the Williams brothers, Harry and Jack, which first appeared in 2014 starring James Nesbitt as a desperate father looking for his missing son after he disappears in France on a family holiday.  The series showed two parallel timelines between the incident when the boy disappears to the investigation some time later, led by the inquisitive detective Julien Baptiste (Tcheky Karyo).

The series ended in a somewhat downbeat finale with Nesbitt's character traversing rural Europe still looking for his boy, with many characters broken beyond repair.  Many reviewers thought the series was a stand alone one, with little comeback expected.  Yet the Williams' have returned with a second series, this time however, Baptiste is the focal point of the drama.

Baptiste, is still on the trial of the missing girl Sophie Giroux, and his interest is pricked when a young British girl, Alice Webster, goes missing near to her home at the military camp of Eckhausen, Germany.  When Baptiste begins his investigations in 2014, he is of sound mind and his investigations begins to upset people as more skeletons are let out of the closet.

Again we have a dual narrative as we follow the fall-out of Alice's disappearance in 2014, along with the present day when 'Alice' supposedly returns to her home after escaping captivity.  However, as with most mystery-thrillers nothing is what it seems and the labyrinthe storyline takes the viewer on many twists and turns as Baptiste - who is fighting a brain tumour - becomes a pivotal figure travelling to the Middle East to uncover the truth when a military cover-up may be happening.

In this day and age, the sensitive subject matter of false imprisonment (Josef Fritzel among others) and the unsavoury detail of child sex abuse, the Williams' have taken these topics and used them to great effect to create a story of fear and mystery.

While the thread has been stretched over the eight episodes, we could have perhaps done without the sojourn to the Middle East, nevertheless the acting has been top notch. Karyo brings a rare humility to Baptiste, whose desire to find justice is all conquering even to the detriment of his short-term health.  Keeley Hawes, as Alice's mother, Gemma, continues her purple patch of recent roles bringing a steel to a grieving mother and while David Morrissey's Sam can come across a bit chauvinistic and ignorant, he portrays the rigidness expected of a stubborn man.

The entire ensemble helps elevate the series to your run of the mill whodunit show; from Laura Fraser as the cold Eve Stone, who is pregnant when we first meet her, sleeps with Sam and has to protect her weak with dementia father, Adrian (Roger Allam).  Yet the casting is superb across the board, from Julien's wife, Celia (Anastasia Hille) who share those brilliant intimate moments with Karyo pleading for him to return home to Derek Riddell as Press Liasion officer, Adam Gettrick; the performances are impressive throughout, not to mention the sterling work of the young cast especially Abigail Hardingham in various guises of Alice and Sophie.

In a year of great drama on the BBC and the current clamour for true fiction such as 'Making A Murderer' it is great to see an original drama have you gripped from episode one to its conclusion; and even rarer to see a drama's second series be better than the original. The Missing Series 2 is the The Godfather Part 2 of television drams in that sense. That is the highest praise you can give this terrific series.

The Missing (Series 2) will be released on Blu-ray and DVD on 26th December from Aim Publicity.

HANGMEN

Marking his return to the theatre after 10 years away making hit films such as In Bruges, Martin McDonagh's new play Hangmen is a chamber piece set over two nights in an Oldham pub run by Harry (David Morrissey), the second best Hangman in England, who is being interviewed by a young reporter Clegg (James Dryden) for the Oldham Gazette, about the abolition of hanging and the death penalty in 1965.

From the outset, when we see Harry perform a routine hanging of a soul pleading his innocence alongside his assistant Syd (Andy Nyman), McDonagh does not hold back in depicting the broad strokes of the characters promptly. Harry is a man who likes his work, is respected and proud of the service and identity the work provides, whilst Syd is beneath Harry and will start there in stature and class.

The play has a real rat a tat about the dialogue, a back and forth usually seen in 1930s Screwball comedies, you have to keep your wits about you otherwise you might miss some information but McDonagh is always gracious enough to stop and take a breathe with a well placed shit or fuck to halt proceedings.

The introduction of Mooney (Johnny Flynn), an upstart Londoner into the pub looking to rent a room out, prompts a shift in tone from light to sinister as Mooney may well not be the lad about town people think he is.

The play at 2 and a half hours long with an interval is breezy and flies by, this is in part thanks to the writing ably helped by the stellar cast throughout lead by Morrissey's strong central performance, his arc from begrudging self-satisfaction to acceptance of his changing role in a changing time is delicately handled by such an accomplished actor.

Flynn as Mooney plays him with the right menace and needle as the diffident outsider with a hint of Malcolm McDowell from If... and A Clockwork Orange in there, and while Nyman as Syd does do meek and weak well, this reviewer would have greatly liked to have seen Reece Shearsmith's performance where laughs and pathos would have mixed better.

And a special mention to Simon Rouse as half-deaf Arthur who gets the cheap laughs as part of the three man Greek chorus of Harry's regulars, and brings the house down with an innocuous line 'At least Shirley is safe, that's the most important thing', a line of heartfelt intent but misguided context.

Matthew Dunster's direction is tight and the use of the conversation between Harry and Clegg where they look out to the audience instead of each other is handled well, and the set design and period detail by Anna Fleischle is pitch perfect to a tee from Harry's three piece suit to Mooney's pencil tie.

Stop hanging around and go see Hangmen before its life is cut short.

Hangmen is at the Wyndhams Theatre, Charing Cross Road and is a Delfont Mackintosh Theatre.