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“It has to be the hour that you can’t miss. The hour you have to see.”
Let’s get one thing straight: The Hour is not “the British Mad Men”. It’s doesn’t have a similar tone or perspective to Mad Men. It’s not even set in the same decade as Mad Men. Yes, the men wear lovely suits and everyone smokes and drinks a lot, but the similarities end there. The Hour is a very British look at the world of TV news in the 1950s, and a small group of people determined to save it from stagnancy and irrelevance.
From the off, the acting is excellent, as you would expect from this cast list. Freddie (Ben Whishaw) is rather irritating at times, but I suspect he’s meant to be, and his ability to read the small details makes him a more interesting character on closer inspection. Hector (Dominic West) walks the fine line between charming and slimy, which again is clearly intentional. Freddie may be the central character, but it’s Romola Garai as Bel who seems to be the most intriguing so far. Yes, Garai nearly always plays period roles, but she’s so darn good at it. The supporting cast are just a delight to behold in relatively small roles, especially Anna Chancellor, Anton Lesser and a wonderfully creepy Julian Rhind-Tutt, giving the world a real texture and richness around the main characters.
For me, all the scenes about the new TV show worked marvellously – the politics behind it all, the strong women, the completely alien world of early television, the sense of change in the air – even if calling the in-show programme 'The Hour' is a bit on the nose. The period setting is marvellous, from the costumes (oh, those brooches!) to the sets (that yellow lamp!) and even the names. You just don’t get people called Hector or Freddie or Bel these days, and whoever came up with “Lix Storm” for Anna Chancellor deserves some sort of award.
Unfortunately alongside all this there was a conspiracy subplot that so far feels unnecessary and completely tacked on. Maybe I just have conspiracy fatigue from power watching all of The Shadow Line in a few days followed by the start of Torchwood: Miracle Day, but it all just felt terribly familiar and dull, even though it did give us Burn Gorman looking fabulously sinister in a wonderful 1950s style hat. Now, I love a slow-paced period drama as much as the next girl (especially if the next girl is a Mad Men nut like me) but the addition of the subplot just slowed it down too far, and took time away from what was really interesting. Perhaps it will start to feel more integrated as the programme progresses, but right now I just don’t care.
Still, the first episode of a new series is hard to pull off and the parts of The Hour that dealt with the world of TV were interesting enough to carry me through the rather familiar-feeling conspiracy scenes, and it was certainly enough to bring me back for a second episode. I’ll be on brooch-watch throughout.
The Hour continues Tuesday 9pm BBC2.
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