It’s very difficult to form an opinion of a TV show based on the first episode, even more so when you go into it with some very strong preconceptions. Which inevitably turn out to be pretty much wrong.
We were all agreed that The Hour was going to be the British Mad Men weren’t we? It may have pointed out that it was set in the fifties rather than the sixties (something of a moot point as it’s only in Mad Men’s fourth season that it’s really started to swing – it seems the sixties took a long time to take off), it was set in a newsroom rather than an advertising agency (the more cynical might say that there’s not a huge difference there either), and that there’s a murder mystery at the heart of it (Mad Men didn’t have one of those – although there was the whole question of Don’s identity to uncover in season one), but I still went in expecting a suitable supplement to get through this sadly Draper-less year. Even looking at the promo pictures it was clear which character was going to be which – Dominic West’s Hector was clearly the suave, sophisticated and probably sex-crazed Don Draper figure, Bel, played by Romola Garai (who’s only just been on our screens in the excellent The Crimson Petal and the White) must be the show’s Peggy Olsen, although she seemed to be a bit further up the career ladder, while Ben Whishaw as Freddie seemed to be exuding the air of the young, ambitious but awkward and creepy Pete Campbell.
So in a weird way, it was a bit of a disappointment when The Hour turned out to be pretty much it’s own thing. There may be a few similarities – Toby Jones, as Bel and Freddie’s boss was essentially Lane Pryce (albeit a Lane Pryce with a shadowy agenda, going by the end of the episode) – but the other comparisons were strained at best. Hector did have the image and confidence of Don Draper, and there were hints to him also having a wandering eye when it came to women, but for the most part he came across as too simple, and dull, to fit the label (which isn’t a criticism as such – at the moment I’m willing to believe that this was intentional, rather than the result of bad acting or writing). There were some ridiculously sexist comments aimed at Bel but for the most part she was getting along fine, possibly because the newsroom seemed to be pretty much an equal opportunities employer, what with Lix’s (the always welcome Anna Chancellor) authority going unquestioned. And Freddie turned out to be hardly like Pete at all – yes, he was ambitious to a fault, but he was also principled, honourable (or at least he seems to be) and more importantly he was, surprisingly, the main star of the show. Perhaps the biggest difference between the two dramas was their in their looks though. This was not just in Whishaw’s very on-trend waifish style (with hair that big, and a face that gaunt, he could very easily have been the frontman for a Vaccines-alike band, or Matt Smith for grown-ups), but in the dingy interiors, packed with drab colours and cracking plaster, and in the shooting style – Mad Men being very pristine yet distant, this dingier but a bit warmer, as if to draw you in rather than keep you at arm’s length. And to be honest, it could have done with some of Mad Men’s sexual escapades to liven things up a bit – hopefully there’ll be some of that next week. I suppose this shouldn’t really be a surprise as judging by just how badly Mad Men did in the ratings, it would be foolish to commission a, probably quite expensive, series on the back of it (ABC’s forthcoming 60’s set Pan-Am looks like it’ll be a more straightforward Mad Men knock-off, and even though it has the potential to be really good, it’ll probably last about two episodes because of this). Although, it was closer to being a British Mad Men than The Shadow Line was to a British version of The Wire though – I still have no idea how that series earned such a description.
In truth it’s more State of Play in 1956 really isn’t it? What with it being a BBC series about a news team investigating, and being personally connected to a murder with political implications. The scheduling of which seems to be incredibly fortunate, as the news agenda, and reporter’s links to and influence on politicians is currently being called into question on a daily basis. What was intended to be cold war paranoia – I think we can assume that’s the where the storyline is going as the victim was a political expert – now seems incredibly relevant (the line about the number one rule of reporting being ‘You don’t lead the story, the story leads you’ in particular). And, in a way, this did raise an interesting comparison to Mad Men, in that both are based around a medium on the cusp of change – 1956 being the final year that BBC TV was based at Alexandra Palace – and the question that arises is whether if the advancements made are good thing or not as the personality-fronted set-up for the titular ‘The Hour’ did look rather more familiar than the old-fashioned news bulletin at the start of the show, and a lot more sensational and tacky.
While it may be a bit lazy to just talk of the show in regards to others that came before, it’s really all I have to say about this first episode as, well, it wasn’t exactly thrilling was it? Yes, there are intriguing ideas and the mystery seems compelling enough to come back for (I’m particularly keen to find out how the working class Freddie knew ill-fated society girl Ruth – I’m doubting it was through University judging by Freddie’s Oxford dig at Bel and Hector – and if the mention of the murder victim as not being married means a gay blackmail plot is going to be uncovered later), and there are plenty of great actors in the cast, but it did seem to skip the action in favour of a lot of talk. Not that the action was completely lacking, we did get to see Burn Gorman brutally stab someone, even if they did cross-cut it with Ruth having an ominous nose-bleed at her engagement party – a stylistic trick that I’m not fond of (speaking of things I’m not fond of, I was grateful that Gorman wasn’t given any lines this week as I’ve always found him irritating, hopefully he’ll prove me wrong here though) – and Ruth’s hanging scene was quite shockingly violent, but for the most part it was all so low key that it was hard to follow – I had to turn to the imdb after it had finished to even work out what most of the characters’ names were.
But despite getting off to a puzzling, head scratching start, kudos to the BBC, and indeed Kudos productions who are hardly inexperienced when it comes to ambitious period-ish drama thanks to their time working on Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes, for taking a chance on something a bit different – even if it was a bit more different than most of us would probably have liked. I think I’ll be giving it another go next Tuesday, but will you?
