Rat Trap

This new series from Ronan Bennett is just fantastic! I have come to expect consistent brilliance from Tom Hardy (Harry Da Souza), but the bigger delight for me is watching Pierce Brosnan (Conrad Harrigan) strut his stuff and sink his teeth into his meaty role! I think Maeve Harrigan (Helen Mirren) is playing Iago to Conrad's King Lear. She's a treacherous one with her own agenda, and her worthless grandson, Eddie Harrigan (Anson Boon) is her feckless pawn. We see in Jan Da Souza (Joanne Froggatt), the same theme we saw with Carmela Soprano. Both women want the trappings, perks, luxuries, that are the fruits of their husband's labors, but they don't want to accept their complicity in accepting those benefits. Jan asks Harry where he slept last night and Harry accounts for his time as if it was is final confession. Then Jan, sarcastically, tells him she never wants to know how he spends his days. Well Jan, if you don't want to know about his days, don't ask about his nights!

Greetings from Lithuania.

"Rat Trap", a fourth episode of "Mobland" was its most slow paced yet. Rather then moving a story in any meaningful way, its slowly builds up characters. Which is a good thing because as much as i enjoyed previous three episodes, i kinda felt that they haven't really set up characters more - we don't get to see much of their backstories. Well this episode did just that. And while its my least favorite episode so far, its nevertheless was good and important.

Overall, i liked "Rat Trap" for what it is - a solid characters building episode rather then an action oriented one.

As in the previous episode, I'm impressed again by the stylish gritty flow, great acting, menacing vibe & atmosphere with all that turgid family drama, the crown this time going to Harry and then Anthony. Poor Jan is really sandwiched between her man and her man's piranha acquaintances.

After four episodes, the events are electrified a bit more, their constant being on the road is becoming rather strange, the brutality and violence is on the rise and more violent deaths are in queue to happen.

• Screenplay/storyline/plots: 7.5
• Production value/impact: 8.5
• Development: 8
• Realism: 8
• Entertainment: 7.5
• Acting: 8.5
• Filming/photography/cinematography: 8.5
• VFX: 8
• Music/score/sound: 7.5
• Depth: 7
• Logic: 6
• Flow: 7.5
• Crime/Irish/British/drama/mysterious thriller mist: 7.5
• Ending: 7.5.

Loyalty can be a one-way street, as evidenced in this episode in which both Maeve and Conrad Harrigan immediately suspect Harry of being a rat, the worst possible sin in their crime family universe, after the coppers find Archie's corpse. The audience knows Harry is 100% loyal to the Harrigans, a fact underscored by a scene of his wife saying as much to her therapist, but it is telling how easily they can turn against their most loyal employee.

This episode delves into the psychology of the characters more than previous ones, especially Harry's world view versus that of such a "normal" character as his wife Jan (well-played by Joanne Froggatt). I was especially grateful to have her, one of the story's "civilians", get a bit of spotlight in a series otherwise dominated by, in every sense, the repellent criminals.

A major script failing here is the weak set-up of how easily and quickly our stars Pierce and Helen turn against Harry - I didn't buy it, but writers Bennett and Butterworth assume the audience will accept such crucial plot twists without batting an eyelash. The whole series not merely revolves around Harry but is based on viewer identification with him, so such a drastic switcheroo requires a lot more convincing evidence.

To keep the pot boiling, there's plenty of treachery afoot with way too much giving away of devious motivations (especially Maeve's) for my taste. In the final analysis, the question of viewer loyalty to a fledgling TV series (we're only in the fourth installment) is paramount, pun intended.

Lots of talking and reminiscing in this episode and even with the limited scenes with the spoiled brat it still sucks.

Mostly filler this episode as we only move the plot along a few clicks, all pieces of this, pieces of that, every character gets 10 minutes and nothing really said makes much difference to the story.

For as much money and star power attached to this show we should expect better writing and a much better story. The spoiled kid sparking a war just isn't going to sustain an entire season, yet the writers think it will. I can stomach maybe one more show and will probably call it quits.

Never getting better it seems. Long drawn out simple ABC story here. 2/10.