SARAH VINE’s My TV Week: Slick and compelling, The Undeclared War might be the new Spooks

• C4’s The Undeclared War is set in the modern-day equivalent of Bletchley Park
• Sarah Vine says she thinks of spies as being debonair cocktail-quaffing chaps
• UK-based writer was unimpressed with the show and it’s digital landscape 

THE UNDECLARED WAR 

THURSDAY, CHANNEL 4 

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Channel 4’s slick new spy series is set in the modern-day equivalent of Bletchley Park, a high-security facility at the heart of GCHQ bristling with the latest technology and populated by brainbox codebreakers who seem barely old enough to vote, let alone hold the fate of the nation’s cybersecurity at their fingertips. 

One such prodigy is 21-year-old Saara Parvin, played by the exquisitely beautiful Hannah Khalique-Brown. The camera loves this girl. We meet her as she’s negotiating a particularly fiendish cyber-challenge, scanning lines of indecipherable code on screen while her avatar, equipped with Lara Croft-style utility belt (nice touch there), negotiates an other-worldly landscape in pursuit of the big prize, a chance to join the team at GCHQ. 

Channel 4’s new spy series is set in the modern-day equivalent of Bletchley Park. Sarah Vine says she thinks of spies as being debonair cocktail-quaffing chaps. L-R: Adrian Lester, Hannah Khalique-Brown and Simon Pegg in the show

In the event she’s beaten by a rival, a young man called Gabriel who arranges his pens in colour spectrum order and can’t quite meet her eye. No matter: she’s accepted anyway, as is he. 

Dinosaurs like me still think of the shadowy world of spies and counter-spies as being populated by debonair cocktail-quaffing chaps with fast guns and even faster cars, which is of course completely ridiculous in this day and age. All this stuff now takes place in emotionless offices and darkened backrooms. 

Sarah (pictured) says that the cast is certainly very strong and the premise is compelling

There are no glamorous rendezvous or breathless entanglements, just the flickering of screens and clickety-clack of keyboards, no martinis, just empty coffee cups and stale canteen sandwiches. And everyone has the emotional intelligence of a lump of clay, while also having a brain the size of a planet. 

This grim new digital landscape collides with the old analogue one as a cyberattack brings down large swathes of the internet. The country is plunged into chaos. 

Everything is down except for social media: not even a silver lining. The prime minister – imagined as Boris Johnson’s successor, played by Adrian Lester – is facing a general election, and could really do without the inconvenience. 

Fortunately, it’s young Saara’s first day of work experience. Somewhat implausibly, she detects a hidden line of code in the virus, denoting an even bigger attack which the team are then able to avert. 

Even more implausibly, she then finds herself being applauded by the Cabinet at a meeting, as her boss, played in wonderfully crumpled fashion by Simon Pegg, reveals her genius to the PM who, in characteristic TV politician style, doesn’t seem nearly grateful enough. 

Saara’s victory is short-lived: back in the real world her father, the one person who really understood her talent and ambition, is in hospital, having tried to take his own life. She arrives too late: he is gone. 

There’s been a lot of hype around this new show. Will it be the new Spooks? Maybe. It’s a tiny bit humourless for my liking, and the characters are all so frightfully miserable it’s hard to feel much empathy with any of them. 

That said, the cast is certainly very strong (it also includes Mark Rylance, and Ed Stoppard does a star turn as a wicked Tory in this first episode), and the premise is compelling. Definitely one to keep watching.

ROWAN’S RATHER RESTING ON HIS LAURELS 

MAN VS BEE NETFLIX 

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Sarah was unimpressed with Rowan Atkinson’s (pictured) new Netflix series Man Vs Bee

There is no doubt in my mind that Mr Bean is one of the greatest comedy characters of all time, and his creator, Rowan Atkinson, a genius. But there comes a point when even his biggest fans have to ask the question: how far can one man stretch the same joke? 

Man Vs Bee is Atkinson’s latest project, this time for the streaming giant Netflix. It has all the sky-high production values you would expect. 

Atkinson himself is characteristically brilliant as the bumbling, downtrodden Trevor, delighted to have finally found a job as a house-sitter for an absurdly rich and pretentious couple. Until, that is, he goes to war with a bothersome bee and ends up destroying the house he’s supposed to be looking after. 

It’s a role he inhabits with total ease, despite the fact that in real life Atkinson himself is accomplished and rather debonair, the opposite of his alter ego. 

There’s just one small problem: we’ve seen it all before. The rubbery face, the awkward gestures, the flailing hands at the end of those spindly wrists. 

Atkinson’s character is as tragic as he is comical, a child-man whose ineptitude comes from a place of innocence, but who ultimately ends up being more frustrating than entertaining. It just all feels rather laboured, and more than a tiny bit like a great comedian resting on his laurels. 

• If you like sharp New York wit, you will love Only Murders In The Building (Disney+), which has just returned with a second series. Whoever thought of casting comedy veteran Steve Martin alongside millennial popsicle Selena Gomez might well have been operating under the influence of a liquid lunch, but it works. Throw in Martin Short, and you have a highly entertaining trio. The premise is simple: they all live in the same apartment building and all listen to true-crime podcasts. When a neighbour is found dead they launch their own investigation, with intriguing results. It’s deliciously stylish and very quirky – perfect light entertainment for a summer’s evening. 

I’d rather stick pins…

In Come Dine With Me: The Professionals (Monday, Ch4), the long-running (45 series and counting) reality show gets a reboot, pitching professional chefs and restaurateurs against each other

In Come Dine With Me: The Professionals (Monday, Ch4), the long-running (45 series and counting) reality show gets a reboot, pitching professional chefs and restaurateurs against each other.

It’s indistinguishable from the original, save for the fact that now the contestants get to bitch about each other’s businesses as well as their culinary failures. 

If you really have nothing better to do it could provide a mild diversion; personally, I’d rather stick pins. 

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