The idea of having a crime drama span two countries isn’t new. ‘The Bridge’ from 2011 is probably the best example. A body is discovered in the middle of the Øresund Bridge which links Copenhagen in Denmark with Malmö in Sweden, resulting in a joint investigation by the police on both sides of the divide. It introduced us to the wonderful Saga Norén (Sofia Helin), one of the finest characters to come out of crime drama in years. ‘The Drought’ (‘Sequía’ in Spanish), Walter Presents’ latest offering, is another country-spanning thriller – this time between Spain and Portugal.
If you want to avoid spoilers, stop reading this article now.
The basic idea is an interesting one – a drought has hit a wider area by the Spanish/Portuguese border, exposing a small village that had been abandoned years ago when a reservoir was built. The lack of rainfall has meant that the old buildings are visible once more. Whilst exploring the area, an elderly man – a former resident of the village – and his granddaughter stumble across human remains.
Detective Inspector Daniela Yanes (Elena Rivera) investigates, along with the local police commissioner (who also happens to be her father), Javier Ortiz (Juan Gea). They discover the remains of two bodies, both of which have been shot approximately 30 years ago, around the time of the abandonment of the village.
Daniela’s ex-boyfriend, Óscar Santos (Miguel Ángel Muñoz), is a journalist and uses their relationship to get access to information he then prints in a story about the case, much to her annoyance. But when his article results in a phone call promising more information about the two bodies (who are yet to be identified), he takes her along to meet the source.
The Portuguese side of the coin comes in the shape of another police officer – Detective Hélder (Marco D’Almeida). He travels across the border at the request of a wealthy woman, Amelia, to whom he appears to owe some sort of debt relating to his family. The story of the unidentified bodies has piqued Amelia’s interest for reasons that aren’t yet clear, and she convinces him to risk his job to dig up all he can about this mystery in Spain.
There’s more than a little soap opera about this series. It’s all a little formulaic and predictable, and the characters are somewhat limited. But sometimes you don’t want haute cuisine – you just fancy a cheeky kebab. And that’s what this is – it’s fast-food drama, but it’s tasty and satisfying, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
I really like the storyline of a village revealing its mystery after all these years, and I hope that the series lives up to that basic premise, because it’s a promising start. The good-looking cast do their best with the cards they’re dealt with, and the hot and sunny locations are a delight to watch on a grey English winter’s day.
Walter Presents: ‘The Drought’ is available as a full boxset on C4 Streaming from Friday 16th February 2024.
