Posted: 01/26/2008

Chancer – Series 2

(2008)

by D. B. Bates

Available from Acorn Media.

In the second series of Chancer, the writers managed the impossible. They took two of their most irritating characters—Piers Garfield-Ward (Simon Shepherd) and Jimmy Blake (Leslie Phillips)—and made them nuanced, interesting, and funny. This was a necessary change, since none of the characters from last season’s Douglas Motors storyline return, but it’s a credit to both the writers and the actors who play them that the drastic changes to these characters felt believable.

The story resumes 10 months after last season’s cliffhanger finale, with Stephen Crane (now known by his true name, Derek Love, and played as always by Clive Owen) just about to have a “good behavior” parole hearing. Of course he gets out of prison, because if he didn’t there would be no story, but there’s very little fallout from last season’s various storylines. We have a few throughlines—like the decay of Klebers Bank, and Jo Franklyn (Susannah Harker) having a new baby in tow—but mostly the story focuses on how to save Piers’ family estate.

Like the first series, Chancer continues its deft combination of high-finance con games and soap opera dramatics. It’s mostly satisfying, though the “who is the baby daddy?” storyline is obvious from the get-go, and introducing Jimmy Blake’s daughter, Anna (Louise Lombard), as a love interest for Derek Love leads to some awkward stumbles toward the end.

In fact, while I enjoyed the series overall, the last two episodes had me groaning, as they introduced Anna’s stereotypically psychopathic ex-boyfriend as a dangerous foil (and played as cartoonishly as possible by Michael Kitchen), which meant leaving the finance stories as an afterthought. I probably would have had less of a problem with this had it been a 13-episode series like the first; with only seven precious hours to tell the full story, it felt like a big cheat to toss in some lazy histrionics in the home stretch.

Despite the flaws, when combined with the first series, Chancer is one of the most entertaining British shows ever made. It’s no surprise that his performance as Stephen Crane/Derek Love brought Clive Owen fame; it’s just surprising that it took almost another decade for him to gain international recognition.

D. B. Bates was recently released from an African prison and is in hot pursuit of his con-artist ex-girlfriend.

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