Streaming on: Apple TV+
Perhaps the biggest tragedy of the modern streaming era is the treasure trove of truly outstanding shows that lie hidden away on Apple TV+, criminally unwatched by the majority of people. A prime example of such is Will Smith’s Slow Horses, a gloriously low-fi subversion of traditional espionage thrillers, centred around an outcast band of MI5’s least wanted. Following on from the two seasons Apple dropped last year, this Christmas heralds the welcome arrival of another, based upon Mick Herron’s third book in the Slough House series, Real Tigers.
Shrugging off its grimy East London streets for a 007-worthy prologue in Istanbul, the series opens with guest stars Katherine Waterston and Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù entwined in silk sheets, before embarking upon a boat chase through busy shipping lanes and a frantic pursuit through bustling Turkish side-streets. It’s a healthy flex of Apple’s budgetary might, archly aping the very globe-trotting spy stories that Slow Horses resolutely sets out not to be — all the while priming us to be unceremoniously dumped, post credits, into a musty EC1 storage room and the familiar, tumbledown environs of Slough House.
With Jackson Lamb, Gary Oldman may have landed the role of his career.
This season sees Catherine Standish (Saskia Reeves) snatched from a Barbican back alley, lending more personal stakes as the team — initially on the back foot — scramble to keep her alive. What follows is a mix of unconventional spycraft (Lamb’s answer to a foot-pursuit involves a double doner from the local kebab shop) and desperate heroics (Jack Lowden’s River Cartwright staging an ill-advised raid on MI5 HQ) as they gradually fit the pieces together. It’s a compelling, lean and expertly constructed spy mystery, but the real joy of this show lies not in its sharp left-turns or elaborate rug-pulls, but rather its exemplary character work.
With Jackson Lamb, Gary Oldman may have landed the role of his career: a marvellously vulgar, foul-mouthed slob with a talent for weaponised flatulence. That this is George Smiley so thoroughly gone to seed could easily have lent this an air of tongue-in-cheek spoofery (a ‘Carré On’ show?), but while the sharply written scripts are consistently funny, this never crosses into farce.
Lamb’s flock of drop-outs and losers prove just as satisfying company, ranging from a reckless quixotic (Lowden) to a grief-stricken burn-out (Rosalind Eleazar), a surly drug addict (Aimee-Ffion Edwards), a problem gambler (Kadiff Kirwan), and a supernaturally obnoxious incel hacker (Christopher Chung). Together, this gaggle of hapless heroes are so fantastically dysfunctional that their every interaction is an absolute joy. So much so, in fact, that the show’s stand-out moments tend to be consistently low-key — whether it’s Shirley and Marcus unwilling to interrupt their bickering while being arrested by the police, or Cartwright quipping his way through the receiving end of an interrogation-room beating. So delightful are these character moments, that the series’ (surprisingly large-scale and elaborate) action sequences, while beautifully staged, almost feel superfluous.
Flying as far below the radar as its cast of unlikely super-spies, this horse is more dark than slow — a beautifully crafted prestige drama that would be more than worthy of a prime-time slot on BBC One. If you’ve ever toyed with a subscription to Apple’s streaming service, this should be reason enough to bite the bullet.
