Creator: Frank Spotnitz
Starring: Melissa George, Stephen Dillane, Adam Rayner, Patrick Malahide, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Morven Christie, Lex Shrapnell, Stephen Campbell Moore, Tom Beard, Oscar Kennedy, Scott Handy, Indira Varma, David Sterne,
Running Time: 464 minutes
Certificate: 15
HUNTED has just finished its run on BBC 1 and unfortunately it has already been dropped by the BBC due to its poor performance. Perhaps a spy show taking place around the same time as the release of James Bond film SKYFALL wasn’t a great idea. However, HUNTED is a fantastically crafted show that easily rivals the best of Bourne, Bond, or Ethan Hunt.
HUNTED follows Sam Hunter (George), a woman who works for a private espionage company. Right here we see a major difference from many spy related films and shows. The spies work for a company and not their government, making them more mercenaries for hire. It’s an interesting spin, for as we hope our heroes succeed, sometimes their clients’ motives are less than honourable. Hunter is supposedly killed, but goes into hiding for a year. She walks back into her place of work as she believes she was set up by a mole. Meanwhile she is put undercover with an unscrupulous business man, Jack Turner (Malahide), who is involved in a scheme to acquire a dam in Pakistan.
The series relies on a lot of unavoidable tropes from the spy genre. We have double crossing, secret meetings, infiltration, fights, chases and so on. Luckily, everything is handled exceptionally well. The fights are choreographed in such a way that they make the best use of their surroundings. It always annoys me in spy films when a fight breaks out and nobody thinks to use what is available to them. Here that’s not the case, with convincing struggles taking place in enclosed spaces or out in the open. The show also has a unique stylistic edge that puts it above other examples in its genre. One fight is played out in a wooded area as the autumnal leaves fall to the ground; meanwhile fireworks erupt in the background, beautifully silhouetting the combatants. The final episode in the series even employs a brief animated segment that outlines a fairytale which works as a metaphor for our heroine’s struggle. These artistic flourishes are used sparingly and seamlessly integrate with the story.
As the show progresses so does the pacing. Characters reveal their true motives, the past comes back to haunt certain people, and Hunter finds herself in increasingly compromising situations. Hunter is a great heroine for the series. She is strong and dangerous, but unlike her male counterparts, she has a maternal instinct that is impossible for her to ignore. She becomes very attached to Turner’s son (Moore) and grandson (Kennedy). Luckily this doesn’t make her week, just human. You get a sense that everyone on her team is greatly affected by their jobs and the things they have to do. Not having them justify their actions with “It’s for the good of the country”, makes it a morally ambiguous show and one you can easily get sucked into.
There are a few things that let the show down for me. Although all the performances are good it takes itself very seriously to the point where everyone walks round with a blank face. I understand the cold calculating nature of espionage but seeing dozens of characters with blank expressions can detach the characters from us emotionally. Only Lex Shrapnell seems to be having any fun at all and I really enjoyed his character’s undercover exploits in a far less glamorous setting than Hunter. The main villain, Jack Turner, is also shown to be so reprehensible that he could have been a cartoon. He kills without a second thought, is racist, and spouts dialogue such as “Who can ever have enough money?” His emotional scenes at the end of the series should have come earlier, as it was all too late for any sort of empathy.
HUNTED is a blistering show that, although it flirts with common and recognisable plot strands, it also mixes it with genuine emotional content and fascinating visuals. At times the plot tries too hard to interconnect different stories, to the point it has to invent characters to tie things up quickly, but when it does focus on its main goal it is a show that has the potential to be at the top of its game. Hopefully a new channel will come in and take over where the BBC left off.
HUNTED is released on DVD and Blu-ray on 26th November 2012. You can grab a copy here.
