It was a smart move by the makers of the BBC’s new crime series The Responder to hire Martin Freeman as knackered-before-his-time scouse copper Chris Carson. Freeman is a fine actor and he is at his very best when playing the bewildered Everyman on the edge of breakdown. So he fits the role of the troubled Carson perfectly.
They’ve plonked the poor lad in a troubled marriage, naturally; given him a Sopranos-style psychotherapist, stretching credulity a bit; and, almost sadistically, put him on night shifts as the first immediate emergency responder on the scene, to cope with the berserk and barmy dregs of society, mostly but not exclusively engaged in drug-related crime. Carson accurately sums up his life to his shrink: “I’m a f***in’ shell. The job has ruined me. Every night they spit in me face. There’s blood on me boots.”
