Unlikely hero

SAVE ME

NELSON ‘Nelly’ Rowe is not really a very nice guy.

He’s got a girlfriend but sleeps around. He’s up to his eyeballs in dodgy dealings and is known to the police for everything from benefit fraud to assault.

He also drinks a lot, always propping up the bar at his local, handling troublemakers for the landlady – maybe with a little too much aggression.

But here’s the twist. As this gripping thriller begins, we’re on his side. He’s our hero – and that makes for a refreshing change.

“Guys like Nelly are usually the cautionary tale. They are almost never the hero,” says The Walking Dead star Lennie James.

Lennie not only plays Nelly, but also wrote the series, which is from the award-winning producers of Line of Duty (a ringing endorsement).

And the cast is cracking, too – Doctor Foster herself Suranne Jones, along with Ade Edmondson, Stephen Graham, Kerry Godliman and Jason Flemyng.

As this starts, everything is so dark and miserable, you might wonder if you’re going to enjoy it, but as the plot twists and turns, it’s thoroughly compelling. It starts with a video message from a teenage girl, Jody. She’s saying goodbye to her mum Claire ( Jones) and is off to track down her father, the man her mum had a fling with 14 years ago.

But the girl goes missing and Nelly is arrested, accused of abducting his estranged daughter. Now he must clear his name and find Jody before it’s too late.

TRAUMA Lennie James and Suranne Jones SKY ATLANTIC, 9pm