Love/Hate: S1 Episode 2 Review

Very late thoughts on Episode 2. They're not all positive.

Undoubtedly an incidental fact but the show's title this week perhaps divided its viewers into the two eponymous camps. Admirably quick in getting down to business and setting up new relationships, including some between old flames, it nevertheless promised a great deal more than it delivered and some of the scenes were downright wonky. This week's episode then:

The Party.
Dear God. There's no way of filming this sort of thing successfully if you ask me. Parsing the embarrassment of watching grown men act like children and watching grown men act like grown men acting like children, is a difficult one at the best of times. This was fully like watching TV in the traditional sense, a non-acting hinterland where gurning people shamble around mock props. The blurred lens shots to reflect the coke usage was naff and although the soundtrack was probably dead on (who am I to say?) the whole thing felt deeply superficial.

The Shipment

Nidge: looks menacing, but he's actually called Nigel. Ooooh.

What promises to be the first of many collabs between John Boy and the younger hoods around him wasn't too badly executed, but the chat and camerawork gleamed with a veneer that the show would do well to shake off quickly. There was a great deal of histrionics - a particularly wince-inducing scene between Nigel and Trish was the epitome of the set piece - and again none of it felt particularly close to the bone. Welcome to soap opera territory.

Darren and Rosie
One of the better moments involved Robert Sheehan (again - he's quite interesting to watch) and his on-off partner Rosie (right), abandoned for his continental jaunt and now back within his doe-eyed orbit. This was probably the standout scene and the resumption of their relationship had that inimitable feel of realism. Stumpy, the sharp point of the triangle (way to ruin my metaphor 'Stumpy'), remains a refreshingly unknown quantity with equal displays of faux-gentlemanly behaviour, paranoid suspicion and, at the end, simmering menace.

The Hypnotherapy Guy
Deeply unfair of me but this was a scene The Sopranos could have done in its sleep, and the principal difference is the age gap. When lovely Darren threatens a famous psychic TV personality with extreme violence it's more difficult to believe he'll actually do anything than not, and I guess this is where the boy-band criticism hits home. Tony Sirico would have nailed this. Maybe Sheehan just needs some shell suits and wings in his hair.

 On A Positive Note...
There were some nicely realised character traits. Darren's violent rage at the mystery bin vandal following phone call was intelligent and reasoned, and the ironic scene of Nigel the drug mule accuse the clown hired for his child's birthday of ripping him off was just right. Aiden Gillen powered through the whole thing like he still had David Simon's words ringing in his ears - please don't kill him off! Proof that in small quantities Love/Hate works - but please, less gangster parties.

Pictures courtesy of Irish Independent and Channel 5