Hunted episode 4 review: Kismet

This review contains spoilers.

1.4 Kismet

Hunted’s still not doing itself any favours in the credibility stakes is it? For anyone struggling to enjoy the BBC/Cinemax spy drama, my advice is to check your disbelief at the door and embrace a world where standing sideways makes grown women invisible to the naked eye, where bicycles are as nifty as Range Rovers, and where spooks make daring MacGyver-like rope-sliding escapes down the glass buildings with eyeball-burstingly great views of the London skyline in which everybody inside the M25 lives and works. Achieve that, and you’ll begin to have fun.

If, that is, you can keep up with the spiralling-outwards plot. Last week I crossed my fingers and wished that we’d already met the cast that would shepherd us through the series’ remaining episodes, as the place was becoming overcrowded with underwritten characters. This episode, to add to the existing roster, arrived a Belfastian godfather, a mysterious priest, a hunk in a wheelchair, a framed pimp, and a dead Communist. I’d better stop wishing for stuff.

It was Aidan’s turn to spend time in front of the flashback wall this week, after Hunter’s erstwhile lover/potential assassin discovered her secret room (well what did we expect, he is a spy). Instead of experiencing blurry orange flashbacks though, all he had to go on were Hunter’s somewhat feeble-minded felt-tipped arrows and notes to self: “Why did he hire me?”, “Who runs Byzantium?”, “Why do I have so many hats?” and “Is anyone at home following all this?”.

Meanwhile, Fowkes is still bonding with Dave Ryder, the Worzel Gummidge of East-End crime, having infiltrated Turner’s goon-brigade to play ‘It’ with the suitcase that we’re led to believe holds the key to everything. It turns out that Turner – a wrong-un and no mistake – made his fortune by making shrewd stock market investments after cold-bloodedly arranging a series of large-scale murderous “accidents”. What’s the betting Stephen’s dead wife turns out to be alive and held prisoner by Turner in that shady house across the road after having stumbled on his dastardly scheme?

The creepy fake Dr Goebel is taking a somewhat dilatory approach to assassinating Hunter, first biding his time on stealthy surveillance, and then (according to next week’s teaser) attempting to perform the old syringe/eyeball trick on her in a leafy suburban street in broad daylight. He’s obviously not Hourglass’ best operative…

The episode saw another dark and bloody gag crept in to sit alongside last week’s line about Hassan’s boot. Have you heard the one about the Communist beaten to death with a bust of Karl Marx? It’s a cracker, as was much of Kismet, once you’ve done the necessary and quelled the voice of your inner sceptic with some spiky sedative-laced jewellery. 

Read Louisa’s review of the previous episode, Hourglass, here.

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