Passenger review: Emmerdale meets Stranger Things via Blair Witch… and I’m confused! writes CHRISTOPHER STEVENS

Passenger

Judgement:

A little help here, please. I could understand True Detective: Night Country, I really could. I’ve been following the twists and turns in Killing Eve and I think I even understood the ending of Line Of Duty.

But after the first episode of Passenger (ITV1) I just have no idea what’s going on. It’s as if the cast of Emmerdale remade The Blair Witch Project. Halfway through they decided it wasn’t working and tried to make Happy Valley out of it.

Then they added some jokes, some metaphors about climate change and, in a sudden burst of inspiration stolen from Stranger Things, an ’80s video game.

David Threlfall, 70, looks completely unrecognizable in upcoming ITV drama series Passenger with a scruffy white beard and haircut

The character of Mr. Threlfall is a fracking manager, who is blamed for a series of mysterious events in the town of Chadder Vale

My best guess is that it’s all a drug-induced fever dream, twisting in the mind of a bread delivery boy whose route in the opening minutes takes him through an ancient forest in a snowstorm.

As he drives by, chain-smoking joints, something hits the side of his truck: a pheasant? A gunshot? A demon? He takes a look around and then drives back to the depot, his truck loaded with loaves of bread. (I can’t help but feel, as an aside, that he’s doing this the wrong way.

Surely the purpose of bread delivery is to drop off the stuff and not bring it back. However, this is the least of the confusions.)

Much of the story takes place in the Dog And Duck, a country pub with strong undertones of Emmerdale’s Woolpack. The old guys sit in a snug, munching on dominoes and guzzling real beer through their false teeth.

In the other bar, 15-year-olds drink lager and blackcurrants, and an argument breaks out over whose best friend is making sheep’s eyes at someone else’s girlfriend.

Outside there is eternal snow. Maybe this is Narnia. Katie, one of the teens, is driving her mother’s car home through the woods (they really need a bypass) until a body falls off the hood. Instead of checking the damage, she wanders into the trees, intrigued by the inhuman screams that echo through the night, dropping her cell phone along the way.

Passenger, written by Broadchurch star Andrew Buchan, follows ‘a close-knit community unwilling to face their fears of change, of outsiders and of the unknown’ (Rowan Robinson pictured)

When she fails to return home, DI Riya Ajunwa goes looking for her.

Riya cares full-time for Mad Sue, her ex-husband’s mother.

But being a cynical, opinionated buyer is a busy job, so most of the time she leaves Sue crouched on the floor of her bedroom, babbling to herself.

Riya doesn’t find Katie, but she does discover a dead deer. She calls the pathologist out in her white forensic suit to examine the remains.

I would love to see Dr. DeBryn’s face if Morse and Thursday did that on Endeavor: “We have a traffic accident in the woods, Doctor…” . . I was wondering if you could take a look.’

Is that all? Far from it. I haven’t even mentioned the Jethro Tull-haired drifter who ran a fracking operation out of his trailer, or Katie’s abusive father, who just got out of prison.

None of it makes any sense at all. Explanations from readers are appreciated, preferably in hieroglyphs.