Gary Oldman’s Jackson Lamb pulls out a drawer, puts in his hand and pulls out a middle finger telling his bunch of losers, ‘And what are you going to do about it?’
Mick Jagger’s unmistakable voice reminds the people he’s shepherding are at Slough House: "Surrounded by losers, misfits and boozers/ Hanging by your fingernails/ You made one mistake, you got burned at the stake/ You're finished, you're foolish, you failed/ There's always a hope on this slippery slope/ Somewhere a ghost of a chance/ To get back in that game and burn off your shame/ And dance with the big boys again".
And then you too want to be insulted by the boss in ways that will make you choke on your teeny cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches and tea. You are River Cartwright and Sid Baker and Standish and Roddy and Louisa and Harper - each with their own reason for having been banished to the slovenly Slough House - in exile to a place where an MI5 agent is expected to do nothing.
The show will truly keep you glued to the telly like you’ve never done before. And not unlike Le Carre, you will discover a world of a conspiracy that has spiralled out of control taking you along for a ride across London dodging CCTV cameras with a stand-up comic kidnapped for his jokes. You know intimately how the immigrants to the UK attempt to live normal lives while the anti-immigrant hatred simmers just beneath the surface. You feel the helplessness of the victims while the coppers seem to twiddle their thumbs, tied to their posts because of politics.
Everything and everybody at Slough House sticks at the craw of the Regent House (the home base of the MI5). "You can get your coats washed, as well as your hair and you could also get that budget," I paraphrase what Kirsten Scott Thomas scathingly tells Oldman to do as they sit at the bench by the canal negotiating. Her Diana Taverner is so amazing, so scathing and disdainful as an antagonist that you are doubly amused by Oldman’s knowing smile as he tells her: "You had better wash your coat, as there seems to be some bird shit on it." She ignores him and walks away.
You have seen scenes like this in spy movies: the meeting of the spy and his handler for the first time, the meeting between a spy and his informant and more. But this meeting between the two heads of the same agency - one on the supposed top and the other scraping the bottom is so beautifully shot that you watch it again not for the two superb actors in the scene, but for the third silent actor in the shot: the light that falls on them and the water in the canal. This is stunningly shot and you realise that the drama is not limited to the story alone.
The frustration that Cartwright feels is yours too. While James Bond travels from one country to another with ease, driving across towns in foreign countries as if he weren’t foreign, and being dressed always for the occasion the presents itself to him. Cartwright or Standish, you have wrestled with a door that sticks in real life. You have been frustrated by uncooperative colleagues who have treated you to a verbal judo each time you’ve needed to deal with them, and yes, you do feel for Shirly Dander (played by Aimee-Ffion Edwards) who appears in Season 2. She’s been banished to Slough House because she hit her superior officer not because he made an appropriate suggestion to her, but because when she hit him he said, "You hit like a girl," and that made her hit him again. Of course, Shirly admits, "He never got up after that."
But the kidnap drama that unfolds in Season 1 has the hallmark of how pure frustration can be: a result of facing conniving criminals and the constant crossing swords with colleagues out to manipulate your setbacks. For someone who watches crimes and legal shows with a passion, the sound of that axe still makes me squeamish.
The writing made me look up books by author Mick Herron and also grateful to know that Slow Horses has been renewed for Seasons 3 and 4 as well. And before you are awed by the name Will Smith credited as the writer of the series, allow me to burst that bubble. It isn’t the wonderful actor who joined the wild and the infamous by slapping Chris Rock. Will Smith is the writer who is credited on that excellent show: Veep. And yes, I would be remiss if I don’t mention how visceral the show gets: You can actually smell the unwashed Oldman and his room and will remember how he eats with both his hands, flicking the salt and oil off his fingers and wiping them on the nearest cloth surface… Watch Slow Horses on AppleTV+ because you will like the losers… They’re "not just any f***ing losers, they’re my losers."
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