The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Martin Freeman’s brilliant performance as a down-at-heel policeman has finally exorcised the nice-guy image of Tim from The Office – or a hobbit
The Responder (BBC1, BBC iplayer) continues to be a really good show, although it has no right to be – mainly down to the continual sight of Martin Freeman in the starring role of wannabe “good bobby” Chris Carson. Despite all those Marvel and Hobbit films which have made him an international star, it’s rarely possible to not see him as goldfish-gobbed nice bloke Tim from The Office.
Except in The Responder, possibly for the first time in Freeman’s career, Tim is thoroughly exorcised by his exceptional, gritty, desperate performance.
Created by former Merseyside copper turned screenwriter Tony Schumacher, Chris is a John Rebus-esque study in all the best features of a conflicted lead character in a cop drama.
His personal life is in bits. In last week’s first episode of the second series, we saw he’s separated from his wife Kate (Myanna Buring), but still trying to be the best dad for his daughter Tilly.
He takes her out to buy a communion dress, but has to split the payment between credit cards and unsuccessfully tries to beg the woman in the shop to give him time to pay.
It’s a jarringly realistic example of the tough times even people in responsible, supposedly “good” jobs face, but Chris at his worst is a moral vacuum. He takes the money from a jar in his infirm and estranged dad Tom’s (the quietly classy Bernard Hill, who died last week) kitchen.
Kate, meanwhile, is planning on taking a new job in London, and only Chris normalising his
nd life with a day job might convince her to stay. He hands in a hopeful application, only to be told he has no chance because he’s a known “knob’ead”.
Even for such an intentionally dislikeable character, viewers’ sympathy for Chris flows.
Except then he takes to the street, and he’s in his element. Back in a car on his own, ever since his series one partner Rachel (Adelayo Adedayo) asked not to be partnered with him, he speaks the language of every late-night drunk and desperado he’s called out to on the streets of Liverpool as a 999 police responder.
In one of the most bitterly amusing scenes of a very darkly humorous show, one troublemaker with obviously deep personal issues threatens the cops with a handful of dog poo. Chris has almost talked him down when Rachel just pepper-sprays him. A survivor of domestic abuse in the first series, her experiences and her ex clearly still haunt her.
Chris, meanwhile, does a favour for a mate, his boss Deb (Amaka Okafor), when she tells him to stop a felon she’s spotted, because she’s off-duty and is tailing him while over the drink-drive limit.
In a masterful escalation, it begins to appear Deb is setting Chris up, and possibly being set up herself, as she blackmails him with the day job he wants so he does her bidding.
Likeable small-time crooks Casey (Emily Fairn) and Marco (Josh Finan) are also back, clearly with a deeper “in” to the organised crime backdrop to all this than Chris has managed. Yet despite the great ensemble, this show belongs to the impressive Freeman, and it’s every bit as gripping as the first time round.