Thriller The Drowning keeps viewers guessing

Has Channel 5 finally found a hit drama to rival the much-lauded series regularly seen on BBC and ITV, Channel 4, Sky and Netflix?

Well, it’s sink-or-swim time for the much-anticipated The Drowning, a new four-part thriller co-written by Tim Dynevor – husband of Coronation Street actress Sally and dad of Bridgerton star Phoebe – which is being broadcast across consecutive nights this week.

If the show’s cast, which includes former EastEnders, Coronation Street, Waterloo Road and Strictly star Jill Halfpenny, Robin Hood’s Jonas Armstrong, Whitechapel star Rupert Penry-Jones and The Split’s Deborah Findlay is anything to go by, it could be unmissable viewing.

Halfpenny plays fraught mum Jodie, whose son has been missing for eight years. She has been rebuilding her life since his disappearance and suspected drowning – until she sees teenager Daniel (Cody Molko), and becomes convinced he is her missing child. Whether she is right or not, in that moment, her spark of hope is ignited and she commits to a dangerous and transgressive path that will take her to the edge of reason.

Armstrong portrays Jason, Jodie’s brother, the only real support she has had in her life. As a practising lawyer, he believes he is always in control and is on the cusp of a huge promotion. However, Jodie’s discovery could unravel the whole family.

Meanwhile, Findlay plays Jodie’s mother Lynn, with whom she has a tricky relationship.

Finally, Penry-Jones stars as Daniel’s father Mark, an architect who keeps a tight rein on his emotions – and his son’s life.

Tonight’s opening episode begins nine years on from the disappearance of Jodie’s four-year-old son. To cope with her obvious grief, she has immersed in a job that requires a lot of physical labour and has isolated herself from the world she once knew. But then she sees Daniel who she decides to follow, soon discovering where he lives and goes to school. When the police and her ex-husband Ben (Dara Devaney) dismiss her passionate conviction and say she’s gone “completely mad”, Jodie takes matters into her own hands and begins to infiltrate and inveigle herself into Daniel and his father Mark’s lives.

She manages to access the school through a music teacher vacancy, but her lack of qualifications and urgency to get close to Daniel forces her to ask one of her employees, Ade (Babs Olusanmokun) to help her source forged documents, after discovering his own work papers are also fake.

Throughout this week, we will see Jodie use a private lesson with Daniel to prove that he is her missing son, while Ade comes under pressure from the document forgers to stump up with more money. Jodie’s urgency to prove Daniel’s identity gradually increases and she continues to juggle her struggling gardening firm and her new teaching job, much to the dismay of her business partner Yasmin (Jade Anouka).

An incident at school gets the authorities looking deeper into Jodie’s background, and as the confusion surrounding Daniel’s identity increases, secrets start to unearth.

Jodie eventually has to face what happened all those years ago head on. But will she find what she is desperately searching for?

And also, have the bosses at Channel 5 found the ratings success they crave, or will The Drowning sink without a trace?

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