I’ll admit I didn’t warm to the first Identity story. There was far too much exposition, not enough character development, and some decidedly cheesy dialogue. The writer and creator of the show, Ed Whitmore, wrote to me afterwards and said I’d been ‘a little harsh’. And for the record I probably was, although I claim the mitigating circumstances of the opening Keeley Hawes conversation with the ‘damaged goods’ line. The facet of identity theft covered here is one where someone takes the life of another and then lives as them. Two girls are holidaying in Australia, when one decides she’d rather be the other and kills her. It’s up to the identity team to find the new ‘Olivia’, played quite convincingly by Joanne Froggatt, before she kills again. What we’re given is quite a tense little drama, which managed to inject some genuine tension into what could have been easily so predictable. Combined with some much more elegant dialogue, surprisingly slick cinematography and much less exposition, it made for a singularly better experience. More of an issue is the Keeley Hawes character Martha, who after two stories we still know almost nothing about. It’s not Keeley’s fault, since there hasn’t been much for her to do other than fret about Bloom or give inspirational speeches to her subordinates. As she’s one of the two headline names, I’d feel slightly short-changed so far if it was me. The other characters in the Identity team are rather low-key, with the only exception being DS Anthony Wareing (Shaun Parkes), who I predict will turn out to be a different identity to one he’s presenting to his colleagues. He’s being painted as a mole, possibly investigating Bloom, but I’m confident that his real identity will be more interesting than that suggests. ABC has picked up Identity for a US version, with six initial stories and a full season option. If they like Identity there will be an opportunity for those minor character stories, just not here. Ed Whitmore told me that episode three is his personal favourite, and given the improvements in this one I’m now keen to see it. Here’s hoping Keeley gets more meat in her acting sandwich to get her significant acting chops into from this point onwards. Read our review of episode 1 here.
