Chris Connor reviews the season 5 premiere of Slow Horses…
Slow Horses’ fourth season brought in the largest audience for the show to date. The explosive plot featuring a plot to destabilise the park and a storyline close to River and David Cartwright, upped the action and set anticipation high. The show returns with its fifth season, based on Mick Herron’s London Rules. It once again sees the Slough House crew roped into preventing a threat to the public. Fans can rest assured it once again has all the ingredients they’ve come to love.
We open in a sleepy London suburb called Abbotsfield, where a lone gunman begins a shooting spree, killing someone canvassing for the London Mayor with a mayoral election imminent. Nick Mohammed is a welcome addition to the cast as Mayor Zahar Jaffrey, running for re-election against a far-right opponent. What links this shooting and Roddy Ho? Ho is seemingly a target of a white van, saved at the last minute by Shirley Dander.
The opening episode raises all sorts of questions and has its share of action. There are shifts from the source material with Louisa planning on taking an indefinite break from Slough House, and River tasked with organising her leaving drinks. “Putting on a spread”. This leads to some memorable exchanges between Rosalind Elazear and Jack Lowden.
Gary Oldman might appear briefly, but Lamb continues to be a delight whenever he’s on screen, cynical and ironic but seemingly one step ahead of everyone else at all times. While Shirley does some digging into Ho’s potential assassins, she does let herself down later in the episode, clearly still traumatised by the loss of Marcus in the previous finale. River himself is also adjusting to his family’s past and the actions of his father in the previous season.
The season 5 opener lays out the stakes in its opening moments and quickly begins moving the pieces into place. While it is Will Smith’s final season as showrunner, it starts as it means to go on, setting up what promises to be another hit for Apple TV+ and a fine way for Smith to bow out at the helm. It has all the intrigue, humour and action fans have come to love the show for, with plenty more in store across the next five episodes.
Chris Connor
