Like many a police procedural, Vigil at all times begins with a chilly open. This time spherical, nonetheless, it’s completely freezing. We are, as per, thrown headlong into a distinct segment and tangentially Scottish army world the place a homicide has occurred. The first series befell on board a nuclear submarine (the present is, confusingly, nonetheless named after the vessel), whereas the second break up the motion between a military airfield in Scotland and the fictional Middle Eastern nation of Wudyan.
For its third outing, we discover ourselves within the (actual) Arctic area of Svalbard. The space is supposedly demilitarised, however 4 British particular forces brokers are working undercover at a analysis centre, and tonight their mission is to extract a Chinese scientist who has made a discovery that would both save or destroy the world. En route, they’re ambushed by Russians who need no matter world-saving-or-destroying stuff she’s acquired. The scientist escapes – however one of many Brits later turns up useless in a Russian enclave.
The motion strikes from (barely much less) snowcapped (than they was once) mountains to the snuggly Glasgow bed room of Vigil’s police protagonists: DCI Amy Silva (Suranne Jones) and her colleague and girlfriend DI Kirsten Longacre (Rose Leslie), who has spent the previous 12 months taking care of the pair’s child son, Fergal. As far as I can collect, Silva and Longacre are comparatively run-of-the-mill detectives, but Vigil depends on them being assigned to instances that would feasibly set off a 3rd world conflict on at the very least an annual foundation. You know when folks say returning to work after maternity go away seems like a pleasant break from relentless childcare? I don’t suppose that applies when your first day again entails flying practically to the north pole to research a homicide whereas guaranteeing the UK avoids a global incident with Russia. But at the very least Longacre will get some peace and quiet on the aircraft.
Silva, to her slight chagrin, is ordered to remain on residence turf. Little does she know that’s the place the explosive drama is. It’s local weather convention season and a Scottish scientist has flown again from Svalbard with suspicious haste for the event. Moments after Silva doorsteps him at his college, he is blown up by a bomb in his lab. As she enters, one other man runs out – a local weather activist with a slightly convoluted grudge.
In the Arctic, in the meantime, the violence is extra psychological. In order to maintain the peace, Svalbard’s Norwegian police chief should deal with Russian and UK representatives with strict equality. That means the Russians are permitted to nominate their very own detective, Col Zamorin, to the investigation. But is he pal or foe? And who will discover the Chinese scientist and her mysterious grail first?
Vigil is, clearly, not your normal homicide thriller – every sequence is set on the precipice of an alarmingly lifelike geopolitical disaster. The second sequence revolved across the sale of British arms to the Middle East; this time themes embody Russian expansionism, our age of trollish diplomacy and how the pursuits of the worldwide vitality trade trump considerations concerning the local weather disaster (PS: we’re doomed). Playing out over this chaotic backdrop of present affairs is a stream of particular person deceptions: just about each character is harbouring a serious secret. Like a world Line of Duty, this is basically a programme about not having the ability to belief a soul within the police, the intelligence companies or the army. Far from being a assure in opposition to criminality, rank is most likely a affirmation of it.
Wanton complexity isn’t at all times a foul factor in a thriller, particularly within the age of second screening-related simplicity. The downside is that Vigil’s twist-rate is too excessive for any revelation to successfully land. The ranges of conspiracy are flummoxing and seemingly unending: simply as one layer of lies has been peeled off, we’re confronted by one other. The capability to be stunned is stripped away within the course of.
If you possibly can’t put money into the case, you want to have the ability to put money into the leads. Unfortunately, this is Vigil’s weakest hyperlink. Silva is basically a clean slate: the closest factor she has to a character trait is placing on and swiftly taking off a large pair of studying glasses. Leslie assumes a really broad Glaswegian accent to play Longacre, whose defining attribute is that she’s … fairly good? Not to counsel Silva isn’t additionally fairly good – she is! The pair’s working relationship is not impeded by their romantic one, both. They are each too wise and skilled for his or her (gentle) home friction to tip over into popcorn-crunching drama.
Instead, what we’re left with is a thriller designed to wrongfoot the viewer to a tedious diploma, which performs out over a backdrop of pressing real-world jeopardy. Unfortunately, these two issues find yourself cancelling one another out. Vigil makes it arduous to maintain caring, even when it’s the planet’s future that is at stake.