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Wolfe is a new drama, with a hint of dark humour, based around crime scene investigator and professor (where does he get the time for two demanding jobs?) Wolfe (Babou Ceesay – Free Fire), and sold on being the creation of Paul Abbott, who also brought us Shameless – which was good for a couple of series and then started to fall apart, and No Offence – which was rubbish from the beginning.
And then, as soon as I saw the trailer for Wolfe, I thought he looked like a massively annoying tit. I wasn’t far off.
We first see him apparently breaking into a posh house to do forensics, but then someone comes in, he has to escape, but… he left his mobile phone inside… But it’s his ex-wife’s house, and he’s trying to be all covert. He can’t get over the fact she’s seeing someone new.
And when he takes off his trousers – for reasons I can’t be bothered to remember – after she invites him in, why would a man who has a scruffy beard take the trouble to have his legs waxed?!
Men, don’t be hippies and just have a bloody shave!
Amongst all the family strife including him, his ex, Valerie (Natalia Tena) and daughter, Flick (Talitha Wing), he heads to his first case about a piece of machinery in a meat-packing plant which apparently, accidentally activated and, thus, mangled a 50-year-old engineer, so inside the machine, it’s difficult to tell what’s man and what is edible meat…
It’s a grim scenario, but company boss Dolores (Maggie O’Neill) doesn’t want to put their business on hold(!)
There’s a lot of mumbling in this which doesn’t help, but when it comes to the killer, we briefly see Vincent (Kevin Eldon), a prisoner who was convicted of murdering someone in a similar situation, but it can’t be him because he’s locked up.
So, who did the deed? Obviously, I won’t say, but it felt like Paul Abbott had no idea either, and when it came to late in the script, he just played “Eeny, meeny, miny, moe”, and picked someone at random.
Oh, but there is a chase scene involving a slow forklift truck. Yep, don’t bother with this.
The only decent character in this was Naomi Yang‘s Chinese, petite, nerdy character, Maggy.
Wolfe begins on Sky One tomorrow night at 9pm, with all episodes being available on demand at the same time. The series is not yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD.
Episode 1 Score: 2/10
Director: Adrian Shergold
Producer: Emma Burge
Creator/Writer: Paul Abbott
Music: Vince Pope
Cast:
Wolfe: Babou Ceesay
Valerie: Natalia Tena
Maggy: Naomi Yang
Dot: Amanda Abbington
Steve: Adam Long
Dominique: Shaniqua Okwok
DCI Betsy Chambers: Christine Tremarco
Flick: Talitha Wing
Mrs Woyzeck: Kate Coles
Manager: Ben Crompton
Vincent Frayn: Kevin Eldon
Daniel Colley: Dave Hart
Darren Belby: Sam Hoare
Ben Pulman: Samuel Jordan
Dolores Belby: Maggie O’Neill
Maxine: Pooky Quensel
Passerby: Julie Root
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.