Finesse was the selling point of The Night Manager when it debuted in 2016. It was a class above other spy thrillers, setting itself among moneyed elites – rotten ones, but elites nonetheless – and furnishing itself with luxury locations. In Tom Hiddleston it had a lead with a reputation that signalled that the often tacky espionage genre was looking to improve itself. Based on a book by John le Carré and airing on the BBC in the dying days of the era when that carried heavyweight global cachet, its pedigree was impeccable.
A large part of the rarefied atmosphere the series created, though, was in being one and done: it swept in, won a ton of awards, then swooshed away, leaving behind a delicate waft of something impossibly exclusive. Lesser shows would have hastily cashed in with an inferior second season, but The Night Manager could not be so vulgar.
