Review by C.J. Bunce
From Glitch and Requiem writer Kris Mrksa comes an atypical British police story, Protection. What looks at first like it’s going to be a UK take on In Plain Sight, which detailed the life of U.S. federal marshals for WITSEC, the series’ six first-season episodes instead follow a typical British detective formula, but in a new way that is enough to recommend. That formula is a woman lead, here Downton Abbey and Happy Valley’s Siobhan Finneran as detective inspector Liz Nyles, great at her job protecting witnesses readying to testify against the criminal element, but unlike the male-led British cop shows, this lead’s private life gets in the way and causes her to fail at her job. Why is it so hard to show a competent female cop who can balance work and home and doesn’t get her hands dirty? The Bletchley Circle, Rosemary & Thyme, and Ashes to Ashes had the right idea, and Unforgotten and The Bay did, too–until they didn’t.
But a taut script, smart direction, and quality cast make this worth your time. Protection is now streaming on BritBox via Prime Video.
Another police procedural that made a similar misstep with its women cop leads but had good potential was No Offence, and it, too had strong characters–played by Joanna Scanlan and Elaine Cassidy–but after building up the two cops as competent in the first season the writers obliterated their effort in later seasons. Protection doesn’t have the brash and comedic bits of No Offence–this is pure drama–and if you go with the idea that DI Nyles’ mistakes are in furtherance of saving lives–that she may have legitimate reasons for withholding key information–it works. Plus its suspenseful storytelling and mystery will have you jumping to the next episode.
The UK version of WITSEC is similar in function. DI Nyles keeps under wraps locations of the hidden witnesses, with other members of her department privy to information on a need-to-know basis. This includes subordinate DS Raj Kholi (Chaneil Kular) and her boss, DCI Arun Kapoor (Ace Bhatti). But it’s not supposed to include a fellow cop in the branch–who is also her lover–DS Paul Brandice (Barry Ward). When Brandice is found dead along with the people Nyles is sworn to protect (a botched protection as seen in Bullitt and Van Der Valk), what could have been a story of UK witness protection’s competence is instead a poster for police corruption. It turns out there’s a mole or two in the department, one of whom may be Brandice.
Life on Mars, Mr. Selfridge, and Class star Katherine Kelly co-stars as DCI Hannah Wheatley, brought in to investigate as the UK’s “internal affairs,” immediately targeting Nyles as negligent or even complicit in what unfolds as a state-level crime web involving drugs, weapons sales, the intelligence community, and the local mob element. Jonathan Cake (Stargirl, Chuck, Law & Order) is a good addition as an ex-soldier who served with Brandice.
Siobhan Finneran carries the series’ entire six episode drama as she balances care for her aging father, her needy teenaged daughter, and the orphaned daughter of her dead witnesses, all while hiding the fact she had a personal relationship with the dead cop who shouldn’t have known the location of the protected witnesses. Was she just caught being a cop in love? Her own web of deceit spirals as bodies pile up and her subordinate is accused of involvement.
The best scenes find Finneran and Kelly going head-to-head–the audience knows Nyles means well and Wheatley is just doing her job–but you want them both to work it out somehow. Their relationship mirrors the relationship in the U.S. series The Closer when Kyra Sedgwick’s Captain Brenda Lee Johnson started to make mistakes as she handed off her position to Mary McDonnell’s Captain Raydor for the sequel series Major Crimes. Viewers can imagine Nyles and Wheatley would be good for the people of the UK if they could just work together.
The series wraps up the questions and mystery with no hanging threads in a satisfying finale. A good start to the year for fans of British television, Protection is the kind of story viewers will want ITV to pick up for a second season, just to find out what the writers can do with these characters next, especially Siobhan Finneran’s DI Nyles and Katherine Kelly’s DCI Wheatley. All six first season episodes of ITV’s Protection are now streaming on BritBox.
Catch up with our reviews of other quality British TV series, beginning with our Top 10: Life on Mars/Ashes to Ashes, Zen, Why Didn’t They Ask Evans?, Mr. Selfridge, Guilt, The Hour, The Gentlemen, Black Doves, and Shetland. You could stay pretty busy with our full list of top British TV recommendations, including Van Der Valk, Bodkin, The Bletchley Circle, Grace, Hinterland, Glitch, Mystery Road, Culprits, The Day of the Jackal, Professor T, Supacell, and the first season of Sherlock, plus Marchlands, Lightfields, State of Play, Protection, After the Flood, Traces, Picnic at Hanging Rock, Ordeal by Innocence, Unforgotten, The Bay, Wild Bill, Quirke, Requiem, The Gloaming, The One, The Tower, Collateral, Roadkill, Stay Close, The Salisbury Poisonings, and A Confession.
Other British series across genres that are worth checking out (a few still to be reviewed here) include police procedurals Luther and Case Histories, fun romps like Monarch of the Glen, Para Handy, Cranford, Viva Blackpool, and As Time Goes By, and “cozy mysteries” Rosemary and Thyme, Father Brown, Hetty Wainthropp, and Death in Paradise. One of the best of all British productions is the reboot of All Creatures Great and Small, which is in our British Top 10 (and the original is good, too). Of course there’s always Doctor Who for your sci-fi fix (and spin-offs Torchwood and Class), The Watch for your fantasy fix, Truth Seekers and Sea of Souls for your supernatural fix, and Spaced for more sci-fi fun, and we really should add House, MD, for Brit lead Hugh Laurie’s one-of-a-kind performance. (We’ve also reviewed but don’t heartily recommend so much Dublin Murders, The ABC Murders, The Pale Horse, The Silence, The Five, The Missing, Thirteen, or Broadchurch, as well as No Offence, which could have merited a review for its first season but, like Sherlock, its later seasons were a disappointment).
