Jamie Dornan’s Australian mystery series simmered along both literally and figuratively last week.
The Northern Irish actor plays “The Man”, a Kim-Carnes-loving, Bette-Davis-Eyes-singing ragamuffin who is deliberately driven off the road in the dusty Australian bush by a lorry, knocking him unconscious and leaving him with amnesia.
The first episode built up sympathy for The Man as he tried in vain to find out his true identity, but the second episode revealed that we might not like what we find when his true colours are finally revealed.
Clearly influenced by both American westerns and Australian comedies, The Tourist feels like it should be more of a scream than it actually is. Alas, the Australian bush is a large place and even in TV world it takes characters ages to get from A to B.
A lot of the action has been taken up so far by Dornan’s character quizzing the natives about local landmarks and their distances from their current location, puzzling over which dry lead to follow next. It is hardly edge of your seat, nail-biting stuff. I mean.
Things picked up at the end of episode two when we found out that The Man, real name Elliot, killed someone in his previous life. What is worse, finding out you are a murderer, or finding out you have a dorky name like Elliot?
Something to ponder during Elliot’s next boring car journey through the bush.
The Tourist, BBC One and iPlayer
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