"Slow Horses"

 

I have actually watched the complete first season of "Slow Horses" sometime ago and completely forgot about it, probably because in my mind it got confused with similar "Department Q" - both series are dealing with a police team nobody believes in. While "Department Q" has a police team working from some gloomy basement, "Slow Horses" is more or less very similar premise, here we have MI5 agents banished to decrepit and neglected "Slough House" (hence the title of series) where they are expected to shuffle papers until retirement or voluntary resignation. The agents in Slow Horses" are here as a punishment: we eventually learn that all of them made mistakes that cost them career and instead of being fired, they are sent here in a purgatory. 

On top of this hierarchy is Jackson Lamb (brilliant Gary Oldman) who is purposely selected to lead this team of losers because he is extremely unpleasant, arrogant and rude - not to mention flatulent - and his task is to make life hell for his agents. He often sleeps in the office, apparently never have shower and you can almost feel cigarette breath reeking from TV screen. Than there are agents: River Cartwright (handsome Jack Lowden), ex- alcoholic Catherine Standish (Saskia Reeves), computer wizard asshole Roddy (Christopher Chung), sweet couple Louisa and Min, the whole cast of supporting characters and occasional star appearance of sour faced Kristin Scott Thomas (as director of MI5) and Jonathan Pryce (as retired head of MI5 and grandfather of disqualified River Cartwright). Because each season has only 6 episodes, it is actually inviting to watch - I would never approach something that already has many seasons - this doesn't mean its easy to watch, because the stories are extremely complicated and convoluted, just as it should be in the world of spies and double spies. You can't really trust anybody here and if there is one thing you can always count on, its that characters are mostly not who they pretend to be. 

So I re-watched season 1 (with greatest pleasure) and than enjoyed season 2 where the main antagonist turned out to be my very own Croatian actor Rade Šerbedžija who happened to be the star of the very first theatre play I ever saw as a kid. He was probably the biggest acting name during my childhood and I even remember owning the LP album of poetry where he recited and it was a huge bestseller. Nowadays it seems as he found his place in international productions as a token bad guy from Eastern Europe, so if you need a mad professor or a scientist or KGB spy, he is usually the one. Season 2 was actually even better and more complicated than season 1 so now at this point I have really high expectations for season 3 which I will start next week as soon as I have time off. Very enjoyable!