TV Review: Trigger Point

Almost as if Spooks or 24 was back, just a little bit sillier. Vicky McClure helms bomb disposal thriller Trigger Point in great style

“I just can’t believe everything that’s happened to me”

Oh I loved this. From the pen of TV newcomer Daniel Brierly, Trigger Point took a vivid approach to the life of a bomb disposal expert who finds herself in charge of a troubling case of a serial bomber. And in the absolute way of these things [spoiler alert], there’s an increasingly personal agenda with Vicky McClure’s Lana Washington losing both her best friend and her brother by the midpoint of the series, oops!

But because the tone is ever so slightly campy and heightened (it is an ITV show after all), it never really comes across as traumatic as the emphasis is on the high-octane thrill of the chase as Lana starts to question even her friends and colleagues as what is made to look like an Islamist threat turns out to be something more fundamentally dangerous and closer to home. Does it end up being a bit predictable? Who cares, pass the popcorn!

McClure is good fun as the perma-harassed Lana, Jack Bauer-like in her ability to come up with the right call on the spot of the moment, for the most part at least, and suitably challenged by the spectre of death of the people around her. Speaking of, it’s a shame we don’t get more of Adrian Lester but his demise follows in a great tradition of ‘shock’ deaths. Nadine Marshall and Nabil Elouahabi stand out in a pretty company of supporting players.

And for all my joshing, there’s a great sense of tension built up in pretty much every episode as a new bomb threat emerges and a new attempt at defusing is essayed, directors Gilles Bannier and Jennie Darnell do really well in that respect. News of a new series feels a little redundant given how personally connected this case ended up being but it’s always the way and any show that puts McClure in the lead is onto a winner. 

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