Apple TV+’s new drama opens at night with Peter Capaldi apparently working as a taxi driver, with two obnoxious characters in the back. The waves of fury and hatred roll off him. I want to note up top that Capaldi marauding the mean streets of London or Glasgow à la Taxi Driver is a show I would watch. Imagine Capaldi as a man forced into nightly proximity with humanity. Wouldn’t you give just about anything to see that?
Fortunately, this show gives him an almost equally sublime role to play. Criminal Record essentially functions as a showcase for Capaldi as DCI Daniel Hegarty, an old-school detective (of the un-bonhomous type), and Cush Jumbo as DS June Lenker, whose race and sex are enough for him to mark her down as part of the new guard.
