The Turkish Detective review: There’s a faint whiff of Columbo about this eccentric crimebuster

This, at least, is the fiction the people running television like to maintain. It’s the reason why RTÉ, except when there’s a major sports event on, shows 20 hours of repeats most days in the summer, as opposed to the mere 18 hours of repeats most days at other times of the year.

I’m exaggerating about RTÉ, of course — but only slightly. Still, there’s no doubt broadcasters do take their foot off the pedal a little in summer. This is because they’re saving up all the good stuff until autumn, when the dark evenings are upon us again.

The summer quality drought is likely why we’re seeing The Turkish Detective (BBC2, Sunday & Monday, July 7 & 8), an acquisition that was pushed out at the weekend with little fanfare and continues for three more weeks of two-part stories.

It’s hard to envisage BBC2 showing this at any other time of year. In fact, it’s a surprise that BBC2 is showing it all; you’d be hard-pressed to find a less BBC2-like series.

The Turkish Detective is a strange one. It’s based on a long-running series of novels (26 and counting) by Barbara Nadel, an English writer who lives in Essex and has always been fascinated with Turkey.

It’s filmed on location in Istanbul using a Turkish crew, written by a Briton, Ben Schiffer, who worked on Skins, and directed by a Dane, Nils Arden Oplev, who directed the Swedish version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

If that isn’t international enough for you, it’s made by an American company, Paramount, which shows it on Paramount+ outside Ireland and the UK.

British actor Ethan Kai (Emmerdale, Killing Eve) plays Mehmet Suleyman, a young detective who was born in Turkey and raised in England. He’s decided to return to his birthplace after enduring a long, unhappy period with the London Met. It’s hinted that racism within the force was what drove him to seek a transfer.

But Mehmet has another reason for being in Istanbul: his ex-girlfriend, a journalist, was on the cusp of exposing something big when she was the victim of a hit-and-run that’s left her suffering memory loss.

The official verdict is it was an accident. Mehmet, however, suspects the people she was on to tried to have her killed. He intends to find out who they are and bring them to justice.

In the meantime, though, he has to meet his new colleagues, which he does in a most unconventional way. At Istanbul airport, Mehmet is hustled away by an insistent driver who’s there take him to the police station. When Mehmet tries to converse in Turkish, the driver tells him: “No, English please, English! It’s good practice for me.”

When they arrive at the station, after weaving at hair-raising speed through the heavy Istanbul traffic, it turns out that the driver is actually Mehmet’s new boss, Inspector Çetin Ikmen, played by Turkish actor Haluk Bilginer, who studied at RADA and made his television debut in EastEnders back in the 80s.

There’s a faint whiff of Columbo about Ikmen. He’s eccentric and scruffy, yet he has a mind like a steel trap. He also chain-smokes throughout the first episode — although, oddly, he doesn’t light up once in the second.

Ikmen’s sidekicks are walking clichés: the sexy-but-tough-as-nails female officer (Yasemin Kay Allen), who swats sexists like flies, and the beardy, nerdy tech genius (Erol Afsin), who seems to live at his desk.

Mehmet barely has time to put down his suitcases before he’s dragged off into investigating the murder of a student who was found strangled, but also has what look like whip marks across her back

Mehmet barely has time to put down his suitcases before he’s dragged off into investigating the murder of a student who was found strangled, but also has what look like whip marks across her back.

The Turkish Detective is designed to appeal to a wide international audience, which results in some jarring linguistic choices. Conveniently for fish-out-of-water Mehmet, all the Turkish characters use perfect English when talking to him, yet speak Turkish the rest of the time.

As a thriller, it falls between two stools. It’s not quite cosy enough to be cosy crime, but too lightweight to be considered gritty, despite a plot that involves misogyny and the dark web.

That said, there are some genuinely surprising twists and Bilginer is fun to watch. If you’re in an undemanding mood, it’ll kill a couple of hours each week.

‘The Turkish Detective’ continues on BBC2 on Sunday, July 14 and Monday, July 15 at 9pm