When young soap stars leave the show that launched them, they have a couple of career options. One: a short-lived pop career (see Adam Rickitt or Sid Owen). Or two: they move into “proper” drama, allowing them to shed their soapy skin and become Bafta contenders. So it was surprising when Lacey Turner went back to EastEnders after her impressive turn in the first series of Our Girl (BBC1), the drama about a young woman joining up and going to war.
For series two, the Turner-shaped hole is filled by another ex-soapster, Michelle Keegan from Coronation Street, an actor with a remarkably natural presence in front of the camera and a face that the lens more than loves, it positively worships. She plays Lance Corporal Georgie Lane, an experienced medic, engaged to a doctor and about to head to Kenya on a humanitarian mission near the Somalian border.
Nairobi is a long way from Preston and, after an extensive rundown of Georgie’s love life, culminating in an unexplained jilting at the altar by a special forces prat called Elvis, the military procedural cuts in. Her commanding officers conduct a desert-dry briefing stuffed with facts about the political situation in Kenya, and the pace halts as writer Tony Grounds tries to give this opener the authenticity it deserves. He doesn’t stall for long, though, and soon an IED is dropped into proceedings, testing the resolve of the company.
The script includes a lot of the things you would expect, including some unpleasant sexist banter directed at Georgie. “Give us a shout if you get lonely, sugar tits,” gurns one squaddie and, when she shoots him down, a colleague mutters: “She can handle herself.” It’s not the most subtle way to convey her character, but considering the distracting pulchritude of the actor, it would be strange if none of her fellow characters noticed it. It also leads to the frequent juxtaposition of her beauty and the ugliness of war: bloodied stumps, maggoty wounds and blackened flesh are often feet from her lovely face.
Another bugbear is the frequent use of names during dialogue. “Thank you, Lane,” says Georgie’s boss repeatedly. “It’s looking hopeful, Lane,” he adds. “Well done, Lane,” almost immediately after. Either there is an assumption that viewers are goldfish or it’s a military thing I’m unaware of.
At the climax of the episode, Georgie is caught in an ambush that, judging by the teaser for next week, leaves her hostage to al-Shabaab fighters, performing one of those chilling gunpoint videos begging for her release. Presumably requiring special forces help with her escape; cue Elvis on a white charger. The romance manages to coexist with the military drama while still keeping its boots on the ground. But I’ll be interested to see how much of a romantic rescue plot the story relies on in the coming weeks.
Continuing the airdrop of soap stars into war zones, Ross Kemp: Extreme World (Sky 1) began its fifth series with an investigation of rising nationalist extremism in Mongolia. Who better to talk us through the economic, political and environmental factors causing this worrying shift than a former Mitchell brother? That’s what I thought after seeing an episode of his first series and never going back. All that posturing in flak jackets while the real soldiers got on with it annoyed me.
While Kemp may not be blessed with the insight of a social anthropologist, his bravery in situations most of us would run screaming from is unarguable. During this first programme, he meets Mongolian nationalists, who say that Chinese oppression is strengthening their resolve to protect their traditional way of life by any means.
In Ulaanbaatar he meets the White Swastikas, who are dressed in full iron-cross-and-black-shirt regalia in celebration of Hitler’s birthday. They wear their Nazism openly and parade through the streets, to little reaction from their fellow citizens. Kemp blends in, wearing a black beanie hat and bomber jacket, chewing gum.
“Oh shit me,” he yelps as he is lowered 100m underground in a tin bath down a crumbling tunnel to inspect a coal mine notorious for killing its miners. You have to respect his honesty while absolutely boggling at his willingness. I’m not sure how many other soap stars will see this as a viable career option, but good on him.
