Being Human series 2 episode 6 review

Oh, dear. My fears about Annie’s diminishing importance in the show were realised in this latest episode as the second series of Being Human delivered its first truly duff hour.

If last week’s babysitting episode was little more than a slight comic treatment of her lack of purpose in life, this week’s shoehorning in of a fraudulent psychic and the random appearance of her mother were steps too far, in my view. The chances of Annie’s mum just happening to turn up to a psychic show were as slight as the chances of a psychic turning up in Bristol in the first place and this was the clearest evidence yet that episode four represented the culmination of her character’s story arc.

The writers have apparently had no idea of what to do with her since then, so instead of giving her a dignified ending, they appear to be placing her in a bunch of haphazardly connected plotlines that have no bearing on the wider story. And while her relationship with her mother could have been of some curiosity, its treatment here was too sloppily handled to hold any interest.  

Likewise the idea of helping out the ghosts that the psychic had lost touch with due to an accident (utterly ridiculous, by the way). The side-story of the chap on stage who wanted his wife to confess to having had an affair was dull, to be frank, and I was just waiting for Mitchell to come back up on screen and give me a reason to keep watching.

Unfortunately, I was kept waiting as he barely appeared in this episode. His continuing battles with his own salvation provided this week’s finest moments, typically, and built to an explosive climax. Those final five or so minutes – Kemp and Lucy praying before she, very reluctantly, gave the order to get rid of the vampire community, juxtaposed with Ivan spotting the bomb – was perfectly executed and ramped up the tension, providing a cliffhanger to come back for next week ala 24.

Cleverly, clips of next week’s episode showed no glimpses of Mitchell to keep you guessing as to what has happened to all inside the funeral home. I’m thinking he’ll be just fine – the show’s hardly likely to kill off its most interesting character – but it was a nice touch all the same.

George continued in his attempts to get his life back on track by taking the alarming step of moving in with Sam and Molly, which is all a little unrealistic, as I mentioned last week. However, it makes sense from the point of view of him wanting to so desperately live a normal life that he would take such huge strides.

No wolfie action again but that’s all set to change next week from the looks of the preview, so I presume that, by setting up his relationship with Sam, the show is now going to rip his whole world apart again by reintroducing Nina and providing George and Annie with meetings with Kemp. I certainly hope so, as Being Human has been placing so much emphasis on our threesome wanting to become like anyone else of late that it’s in danger of losing its geek factor.

I’ve always loved the central concept of the show: how can three otherworldly beings really live a normal life in society? This second series has admirably attempted to explore that idea in detail, but I worry that in doing so it has held back on the unreal elements of the show and with no werewolves, no vampires and a deathly dull ghost, it risks becoming little more than just another BBC drama. The show is better than this. It needs to prove it next week.

Check out our review of episode 5 here.