Rebus (BBC1)
DI John Rebus is a bad man trying to be a good copper. Fans of the novels by Sir Ian Rankin understand this, and we try to forgive him his violence, his drunken moods, his cruel sarcasm and his disloyalty.
But the bestselling books have defeated every previous attempt to translate them to television. Ken Stott and John Hannah have both tried, and been unrecognisable as Rebus.
Richard Rankin (no relation to the author) gets much closer to the character on the page. Trouble is, he becomes so deeply nasty that the show is all but unwatchable.
This adaptation opened with Rebus confronting a bloodied patient in an ambulance after a road accident. If you knew the books, it was quickly obvious this was gangster Ger Cafferty (Stuart Bowman), the detective’s nemesis.
Richard Rankin (no relation to the author) gets much closer to the character on the page
The bestselling books have defeated every previous attempt to translate them to television
But if you were new to the story, you might wonder why Rebus gut-punched him repeatedly, smashed his head against the side of the vehicle, then tried to suffocate him. It seemed like harsh summary justice for driving without due care and attention.
During the next 45 minutes, Rebus punched his brother across the room in front of his own daughter, drank himself senseless, sneered at a detective constable for being new to the job, and ranted about English incomers who have the nerve to fall in love with Edinburgh — ‘they stay, they have kids, and they start getting into the environment and cycling about the place like they’re in Denmark or something.’
He capped this by jumping into his elderly Saab 93, to pay a visit to an old friend, an ex-policeman confined to a wheelchair, who was eaten up with suspicion that his wife was having an affair. She was, of course . . . with Rebus himself.
Perhaps most unforgivably, he colours his hair with a bizarre, metallic dye. When he went for a walk, it acquired a copper sheen in the sunshine. He looked like a 1960s housewife with a beard and a hangover.
Trouble is, Rebus becomes so deeply nasty that the show is all but unwatchable
We’ve seen a similar combination of explosive violence and self-loathing before, in another BBC1 crime serial, Luther. But Idris Elba’s title character was saved by his charismatic power. Rebus doesn’t have charisma, just a collection of negative traits.
The more interesting personality was Rebus’s brother Michael (Brian Ferguson), a former soldier now working as a delivery driver and struggling with debt.
Rather than let his wife sign up for the food bank, he took his Army pistol from its hiding place and robbed the local drug dealers. It’s good to see the spirit of free enterprise isn’t dead.
Each successive Rebus novel focuses increasingly on his sidekick, DS Siobhan Clarke (played here by Lucie Shorthouse). After one episode she has made little impression, but she might prove the saving of the show.
All episodes are now on iPlayer. The first part screened in Scotland on Friday night, and in the rest of the UK on Saturday. I’ve given up wondering what the BBC thinks it’s playing at.
