Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Trigger Point’ On Peacock, Where A Woman In London’s Explosive Disposal Squad Helps Flush Out A Terrorist Plot

We’ve always wondered why bomb disposal squads weren’t featured on police procedurals more often. They seem to have tension built right into their work: Clip the right wire before time is up or everyone is blown to smithereens! It’s like the game Perfection but with life and death circumstances. A new Peacock series that initially aired on UK’s ITV focuses on London’s “expo” squad, and it’s an explosive watch (get it?).

TRIGGER POINT: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: A police SUV speeds through a tunnel with its lights and sirens on.

The Gist: Two of the Metropolitan Police’s “expo” units – explosive disposal — are being called to the scene of a “bomb factory” found in a tower block (i.e. apartment building). Lana Washington (Vicky McClure) responds with her partner Danny (Eric Shango). In the other unit is Lana’s friend and mentor, Joel Nutkins (Adrian Lester).

When they get to the tower block, Lana and Joel go up with the police. A woman and child are found under a mattress, and a bomb is found connected to a toilet. Joel manages to not get the two of them blown up when he realizes a secondary control is hooked to a light switch. When they finally defuse it, they realize it contains low-explosive devices, like fireworks. They wonder why such a low-impact device was installed in such a meticulous manner.

The two of them talk a little about their lives, given their friendship. Joel has let the job get between him and his family, but is trying to repair the relationships there. Lana is dating DI Thom Youngblood (Mark Stanley), who comes in to lead the on-site investigation.

Joel and Lana realize a random car parked behind the building is wired up; what they find when they try to defuse it fills the scene with lots of tension. But even then, Joel has a nagging feeling that not every explosive device has been cleared from the scene, insisting that the initial bomb hooked to the toilet was a honey pot to lure law enforcement so the building can be evacuated, making a bigger target outside. He and Lana saw it all the time in Afghanistan, and he follows his instincts.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Trigger Point has a lot of the DNA of Line of Duty, which McClure starred in for its entire run. The case her character will be following will be a season-long arc, but it’s from the perspective of law enforcement you don’t see portrayed all that much on television.

Our Take: Trigger Point, created and written by Daniel Brierley, springs a twist on viewers at the end of its first episode, though its a twist that we see coming, mainly because we’ve seen way too much TV in our lives to not see the signals. But it’s still shocking, and it sets the tone of the show going forward.

We’re not sure why a show hasn’t concentrated on “expo” teams before; every call is full of life-or-death tension. If the expo officers don’t defuse the bomb in time, they and many around them will get blown to pieces. There is always a wire to cut, a timer to beat, a hostage that needs to stay quiet in order for Lana, Danny or Joel to concentrate.

That tension elevates what can be at times a run-of-the-mill terrorist plotline. During most of the first and second episodes, the bombers are thought to be Islamists, but it seems that notion is put aside by the end of the second episode. But even though Lana and the police are chasing what looks to be a faceless enemy, there’s still potential for lots of tension-building in every episode, just by the fact that whoever is doing this is baiting the Metropolitan Police with bombs all over London, and they all need to be neutralized.

McClure is an expert at playing a law enforcement officer whose zeal for the job keeps her from a personal life that one might consider “normal”; we’re sure we’ll get glimpses of her life during the season, but most of this show is procedural in nature, despite the season-long case. How will her personal issues tie in with how she manages the case? We don’t need to see a lot of that part of the story, but we do need to see more than the glimpses we got through the first two episodes.

Sex and Skin: None.

Parting Shot: After an explosion, Thom finds Lana in the swirling ash and pushes her to safety.

Sleeper Star: Mark Stanley does a good job playing DI Thom Youngblood as a fine but humble detective, who only has enough arrogance to help move the case forward.

Most Pilot-y Line: “Stay fucking still, mate; that’s all I need you to do,” Lana says to the suicide-vest-wearing man who came out of the trunk of the wired-up car. Yes, there are many bombs in this first episode, and she says “stay fucking still” more than once. If I had a bomb strapped to me, I don’t think I need someone to tell me to “stay fucking still.”

Our Call: STREAM IT. Trigger Point has lots of tension, and a fair amount of action. What it doesn’t really have is much character development or an intriguing central plot. But you try to look away as Lana tries to defuse bomb after bomb after bomb.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.