Thorne: Episode 1

Midway through the opening episode of this glossy-looking drama, a smug and sneering suspect reveals his alibi - he was stuck at home, watching bad television. The words he uses are a little stronger than we can use in this review before the watershed, but the gamble is clear: this is another cop show, with another serial killer... what’s to stop us dismissing it alongside all the rest of the sub-par drama out there?

DI Tom Thorne (David Morrissey) being a Sky1 cop rather than BBC One cop, he doesn’t have a huge amount of emotional baggage and a crappy home life - rather, he’s fairly stable (although there are a few, very casual hints as to an event in his history that drives him) and he has a gorgeous apartment with spectacular London views, an Apple Mac, and a huge plasma telly (presumably already linked up with Sky 3D). In short, since the star of the show is fairly switched on, it means that he - and we - can concentrate on the investigation itself. ‘Girls go missing all the time’, one of Thorne’s informants remarks. His reply is as sparse and direct as all the dialogue: ‘No, they don’t - that’s why they make the news’.

Episode 1 of this three-part story - ‘Sleepyhead’, based on the book by Mark Billingham - starts with a twist (it appears to be about one criminal, and almost immediately is about someone else) and is based on a massive misdirection: Thorne’s team are following the case of a serial killer, but since they (like us) are only coming into the story mid-way, there are plenty of assumptions made that aren’t necessarily correct (including the very assumption that the object of their pursuit is in fact a serial killer).

All this makes for a smart, involving drama that requires attention and intelligence from the audience without being too highbrow. Clever drama with immediately engaging and compelling characters.



Airs at 9pm on Sunday 10th October 2010 on Sky1.

Reviewed by Andrew Allen.