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Serial Killers Stalked in Touching Evil
Present-day England: Three children have been abducted. The only clues so far are a daffodil, a yellow Volvo, and the testimony of a deranged psychic who has seen their eventual murder "through the clouds." Enter London's new Organized and Serial Crime (OSC) Unit, a rapid-response, elite crime squad--a fictional equivalent of the FBI. Heading up the case for the OSC is renegade Detective Inspector Dave Creegan--played by Robson Green, the irresistible Dr. Owen Springer in Mobil Masterpiece Theatre's Reckless--hell-bent on finding the three boys before it's too late, by whatever means necessary, however unorthodox, whatever the price.
Smart, sexy, solitary, moody, Creegan and his partner D.I. Susan Taylor (Nicola Walker, Four Weddings and a Funeral; Moll Flanders) rely on the combined crimefighting skills of the Unit to bring to justice the kidnapper and some of England's most-wanted criminals in Touching Evil, the umbrella title of Paul Abbott's (Reckless; Cracker) edgy new five-part, six-hour miniseries.
In the series' two-hour opener, Creegan discovers that the disappearance of the boys and the curious disposition of daffodils recall a similar unsolved incident in Stuttgart several years before. And when it's determined that the owner of the Volvo is pharmaceutical engineer Dr. Ronald Hinks (Ian McDiarmid), formerly of Stuttgart, the case seems straightforward enough. But when searches of Hinks's residence and laboratory, at home and abroad, yield no hard evidence, it looks like the smug scientist is going to get away with murder. Time is running short--and if the kidnapper remains true to form, the boys are still alive. For now.
Locked in a stalemate with Hinks and desperate to find the children, Creegan decides to take matters into his own hands--and a shocking climax reveals that Hinks has not completely dodged justice.
"Creegan is not at all conventional," says Green, who in England is a certifiable heartthrob and boasts a crossover career as pop music idol--with three number-one hits in the UK--and founding partner of Coastal Productions, a two-year-old production company. "He's an honest cop, but a bit of an oddball. He's a man who lives for justice and pushes the law to the limit. The only thing keeping him from being completely unstable is saving lives and, as a father of two, making the world a safer place for his kids."
On the heels of the Hinks case, Creegan, Taylor, and the OSC are called in to investigate the suspicious deaths of three London hospital patients, all killed within hours of each other by a drug that none had been prescribed. Again, the clues are few and enigmatic: Each victim sports a patch of bare skin with a faint outline of "Let me go" tattooed upon it--and each was treated by Dr. Elizabeth Walker (Kika Markham), an outspoken advocate of euthanasia. Under questioning from Creegan and Taylor, Walker admits to having partially erased one of the messages, which, she says, actually read "Let me go back."
The case cuts too close to the bone for Creegan, who, having survived a bullet to the head, is painfully reminded of his own near-death experience. Investigating further, Creegan confirms that all three victims had at one time clinically died and were subsequently resuscitated. Certain that he and the killer, like the victims, share in common a "trip to the other side," Creegan sets a seductive trap only to find himself ensnared.
Touching Evil concludes with a case rooted in cyberspace . Someone has developed a site that manipulates young Web users into committing violent crimes: "Amathus," the site's featured gothic fantasy game, coaches players through a series of violent "tests"--from mutilating horses to homicide.
Creegan and Taylor zero in on a group of local college students when murder becomes the name of the game. Examining the bizarre manner in which the bodies of their victims have been mutilated, Creegan realizes it mirrors a notorious case of fifteen years ago involving a now-incarcerated prostitute, Justine Barber (Linda Henry). He suspects that the elusive "Amathus" Webmaster (Toby Salaman) is obsessed with Justine and enlists her support as decoy to catch him. Meanwhile, another member of the OSC team, D.S. Jonathan Kreitman (Adam Kotz), struggles to face down his own personal demons, and chooses his own brand of justice over the law.
Throughout the series, writer/creator Paul Abbott's aim was, he says, "to produce a series which is fresh and different" from other police dramas. "There are not many stories about educated, 'graduate' coppers--fast-track cops who do more thinking than shouting," Abbott continues. "Touching Evil hinges on high-concept crime stories and deals with difficult subjects, things that touch the heart strings, things that scare people most."
Like Creegan, Abbott has a vivid scar above his right eye (the result of a knifing/mugging a decade ago) and a determined passion in his voice when he talks about what he believes in. Of his crimefighting alter-ego, Abbott says his wife (actress Saskia Downes, who plays Creegan's estranged wife Kerry) "insists she can hear me in Creegan. I can be very cynical, but the kind of things I'm passionate about, I never let up on. I think Creegan is like that. He is very determined and has an unspoken force behind him in dealing with these criminals. I'm interested in people who are not straightforward. It makes the best kind of television."
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