Too Much drama, not enough suspense

Full disclosure: I like Grayson Perry. I’ve met him a few times and he’s an incredibly interesting and engaging man, and that rare thing in the art world – someone who is genuinely open-minded and curious.

He’s a great observer and collector of people and ideas, just as comfortable in an East End pub as he is dining at Claridge’s. Grayson Perry’s

Full English (Thursday,

Channel 4) is England seen through his eyes, an exploration of identity in all its many forms. Definitely worth a detour.

WEDNESDAY, CHANNEL 5 hhh Psychological thrillers are all at sea at the moment, what with Amazon Prime’s The Rig and now this, set in a fishing community in Cornwall. Jason Watkins – one of TV’S most ubiquitous actors, and deservedly so – stars as Ed, a gruff Cornish fisherman struggling with impending financial ruin, living at his mother-in-law’s and nursing a deep-seated trauma over the drowning of his son. He has one remaining child, a daughter, the exquisite and luminous Abbie (Poppy Gilbert, left, with Jason) who, to his ill-disguised horror, has taken up with dark-haired cad Ryan (Aneurin Barnard), who talks a good game but seems rather… well, fishy.

The atmosphere is tense – perhaps a little too tense. There’s a fine line between creating a sense of latent menace, and just appearing a bit melodramatic. This leans slightly too much towards the latter, and despite the excellent cast (Cathy Belton is also great as Claire, Ed’s wife) the characters feel a touch cliched. Abbie is almost too perfect, Ryan is almost too caddish, Claire too saintly, Ed too unhinged, and the plot runs ahead of itself. In the end, a little too much drama and not enough suspense for me, I’m afraid.