But even the exciting twist at the end as the runaway train set off, driverless, the remaining people on board effectively kidnapped, doesn’t change the fact that this is very schlocky.
I will watch this because it’s already better than last year’s US celebrity version (that had John Bercow as a contestant) and for the hope that it will turn nastier.
Despite the jargon fetish, the dialogue has actually improved in series three. McClure is still the best thing in it, with Kerry Godliman as Sonya, the bomb data specialist, a close second. But the plot is no less preposterous. In fact, it is more so.
It was hard to tell from the first episode whether this version will be a binger, because it went very heavy with the exposition stick. .... But it is all warming up nicely.
This comedy might not be to everyone’s taste and at times it feels to be stretched too thinly over so many episodes. But it has many layers and deserves plaudits for being utterly original in a time when so much isn’t.
Sally Wainwright’s Riot Women (BBC1) started with a dramatic punch to the face and kept up the raucously high energy of a pneumatic jackhammer until the end of the episode.
Anthony Horowitz’s thriller is reasonably entertaining. And it is interesting, structurally. .... The trouble is that at no point do you feel remotely convinced that this is the Mexican wilderness.