'Trapped: Series 2' – Episodes 1 & 2

This is a full review of episodes 1 and 2 of Trapped so don’t read on unless you’re up to date.
Trapped Series 1 was an extraordinary bit of television, the first ever Icelandic drama broadcast on British TV. The first series was the highest rated series ever on RUV, watched by 86% of TV households in Iceland. In the UK it passed 1.2 million viewers on BBC Four. Safe to say then that series 2 has quite a bit to live up to. I’m hoping it’s worth getting excited about.
Bearded man-mountain Ólafur Darri Ólafsson reprises his role as chief police inspector Andri now back in Reykjavik when he is entrusted with an extremely high-profile case. In classic nasty Scandi style we have an immediately gripping immolation opener which is fascinating even as you recoil in horror. Gisli an impoverished sheep farmer from the Icelandic Highlands sets himself on fire in front of the government building, trying to kill the Minister of Economic Affairs who just happens to be his twin sister. Andri is back on top again – a rise so meteoric I’m surprised he doesn’t have a nosebleed. From zero to hero thanks to his hard work and persistence in Series 1. In the first five minutes he’s already chatting to Iceland’s Prime Minister who cuts right to the heart of all Scandi noir motivations – was this attack personal or political?
Vikingur (early contender for best name of the series) is Gisli’s son, working at the controversial aluminium plant up north. As in the first series we get a break from subtitles thanks to the international element here in this industry; something that right-wing Icelanders like the Hammer of Thor group are protesting against – who profits from the devastation this plant causes to their landscape and their livestock? Vikingur already has a lot on his plate before his father’s horrible suicide – he’s in a relationship with Ebo, a black colleague who seems like he’s in the country illegally.
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'Gunpowder' – BBC1

This hotly anticipated three-part drama series about the most explosive event in British politics stars Kit Harington, whose star is in the ascendant as he’s that Jon Snow off of Game of Thrones. Even if you’re a stick-in-the-mud hold-out refusing to ride that fantasy dragon I’m sure you could pick his curly locks out of a line-up. Not only is Kit in the starring role as chief gunpowder plotter Robert Catesby but he’s credited as co-executive producer, and he helped get this unlikely vanity project off the ground. Turns out that Kit has family ties on his mother’s side to the rebellious Catesby family of persecuted Catholics who are central to the drama and to this famous nugget of British history.
We meet the Catesby’s and co back in 1603. Queen Elizabeth I is dead and James I is in charge. Things are not improving for England’s oppressed Catholics. The well-to-do Catesby family are seventeenth century preppers because in this instance the government really is out to get them.
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'The Bureau'

We had a bureau at my parents house. It was an old, wooden, very formal piece of furniture in the dining room (next to the deer head mounted on the wall. I’m not even kidding). They used to keep bills and receipts in the drawer and the posh wine glasses in the top. I’m not sure I knew it was a French word, and I’m pretty sure I’ve never pronounced it correctly in my whole life. The Bureau in this instance is just as smart and formal,but thankfully not so wooden. This is the secret office responsible for deep undercover agents within the French secret service. We meet the agents in a time of transition and confusion.
Rashid (codename Cyclone) is a French Muslim spy operating in Algeria. He refused to drink alcohol in training even though it’s clearly important to know if your operatives can take interrogation while drunk (“I love you, you’re my besssht friend! Guess what I do for a living!”). So it’s shocking that he’s arrested for drunk driving while on an operation.
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'Brendan O'Caroll: My Family At War' – On the Box

Easter Monday isn’t just about eating another six-pack of Cream Eggs and wondering if you can make a bread and butter pudding out of stale hot cross buns. In Ireland it’s a much more important day, especially this year, the 100th anniversary of the Easter Rising, when 1,600 rebels took over Dublin. This was the first act of the Irish revolution.
I like to think I’m no ignoramus when it comes to world history, but this programme taught me a thing or two. Maybe I’m not entirely to blame for my lack of knowledge – growing up in England in the 80s and 90s with the backdrop of The Troubles, there may not have been much sympathy for the Irish Republic in the British national curriculum.
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'And Then There Were None' – On the Box

Oh my! How grizzly, how gruesome, how horrible!
I’m an Agatha Christie fan and I knew despite the veneer of respectability that she liked it dark. And bloody. And sinister. Even little old Miss Marple has a dark side. But in all that time I never realised Agatha Christie was a frustrated horror writer. This all became clear watching And Then There Were None (BBC1), a period murder mystery based on Christie’s novel of the same name. Even George R R Martin (aka the butcher of all your favourite characters) would have said “Come on now Agatha, don’t you think nine elaborate murders based on a racist nursery rhyme that drive a young woman to suicide in a mansion on a deserted island is a bit much? Death by dipping a guy in molten gold is one thing, but this is just nasty!”
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