Until the first ad break arrives to remind you that Jed Mercurio’s new police thriller Trigger Point is on ITV rather than the Beeb, you might as well be watching a new Line of Duty. True, there are differences, if you squint. It opens with Vicky McClure in cop gear, speeding through the Blackwall Tunnel as tense radio chatter and foreboding bassy music plays in the background – but rather than Kate Fleming, she is Lana Washington. And instead of the anti-corruption squad, she’s in the bomb disposal squad. Adrian Lester is her partner, Joel Nutkins. They’re old muckers – Afghanistan veterans turned cops – who have an easy rapport. She insists on using his “lucky” wire cutters. They look out for each other. Are you anxious yet? You will be.
It’s a sweltering summer’s day in east London and a bomb factory has been found in a flat. What seems like a relatively innocuous situation, at least by the standards of bomb disposal, escalates through the first episode. No sooner are we enjoying the relief at one bomb not going off, than another bomb is found. Whoever has set this trap has planned it well. With each bomb that doesn’t detonate, the tension builds: that’s the thing about bomb programmes. If Chekhov’s bomb is introduced, eventually there is going to be an explosion. But when?
