shallowness (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
shallowness) wrote2018-01-10 07:05 am
shallowness) wrote2018-01-10 07:05 am
Entry tags:
- crossposted,
- tv,
- uk
Archie Panjabi's new TV show
Next of Kin episode 1
This was a strong opening episode. Panjabi is very good as multi-faceted Nona, the eldest sister in a Pakistani-English family that was gradually introduced. We opened with her being a kind, caring GP and her big brother (Kurt from Teachers!! Ha!) being a kind, caring surgeon in Pakistan. He was on his way back, except you just knew he wouldn’t catch the plane home what with doing one last emergency appendectomy and one last detour. He’d been away for some months and the family were coming over to Nona and husband Guy’s (Jack Davenport) and their cute little boy.
The focus was on the family dynamics, with Nona’s mother, various siblings and their offspring also being introduced, but the context was that there was a terrorist incident in London, that meant travel disruption and a particular edge because militant Islamists were behind it, and then the heartbreaking news that Kareem had been abducted and executed. Amongst their grief the question of where his son was. It was obvious that Dani wasn’t in Spain. I liked the sympathetic way they’d established the family, who had been keeping well-meaning but unhelpful secrets about young Danesh. Nona was very much the big sister, with a slight edge. We also saw how her English husband had picked up so much Pakistani culture through the marriage, if not Urdu (I presume it was Urdu, the show was a bit hazier about subtitles than, say, McMafia). What’s his connection to the police chief?
The next ep looks a little more out there. I was left wondering: was Dani there at the killing of his father? (Oh dude.) Did he give info about him to the bad guys? (Oh dude) Is it directly linked to the terror incident? What did Kareem think his diversion was for? And what else do various family members know? And if there is a massive conspiracy, how likely is it to hold together at all?
Still, so far, it’s yay! Archie Panjabi and yay! Jack Davenport.
This was a strong opening episode. Panjabi is very good as multi-faceted Nona, the eldest sister in a Pakistani-English family that was gradually introduced. We opened with her being a kind, caring GP and her big brother (Kurt from Teachers!! Ha!) being a kind, caring surgeon in Pakistan. He was on his way back, except you just knew he wouldn’t catch the plane home what with doing one last emergency appendectomy and one last detour. He’d been away for some months and the family were coming over to Nona and husband Guy’s (Jack Davenport) and their cute little boy.
The focus was on the family dynamics, with Nona’s mother, various siblings and their offspring also being introduced, but the context was that there was a terrorist incident in London, that meant travel disruption and a particular edge because militant Islamists were behind it, and then the heartbreaking news that Kareem had been abducted and executed. Amongst their grief the question of where his son was. It was obvious that Dani wasn’t in Spain. I liked the sympathetic way they’d established the family, who had been keeping well-meaning but unhelpful secrets about young Danesh. Nona was very much the big sister, with a slight edge. We also saw how her English husband had picked up so much Pakistani culture through the marriage, if not Urdu (I presume it was Urdu, the show was a bit hazier about subtitles than, say, McMafia). What’s his connection to the police chief?
The next ep looks a little more out there. I was left wondering: was Dani there at the killing of his father? (Oh dude.) Did he give info about him to the bad guys? (Oh dude) Is it directly linked to the terror incident? What did Kareem think his diversion was for? And what else do various family members know? And if there is a massive conspiracy, how likely is it to hold together at all?
Still, so far, it’s yay! Archie Panjabi and yay! Jack Davenport.