The Walk-In
ITV | ★★★★✩

Jews are hiding the cure for cancer so they can make money.”

Now a rational person might respond that whoever cures cancer is in fact likely to make a fair bit of dosh, or that Jewish people also die of cancer, or Jews don’t “control” pharmaceutical companies, or even, shock horror, that Judaism holds dear the concept of tikkun olam and that Jewish people are responsible for many medical developments that have benefited the world.

But as highlighted in ITV’s The Walk-In, confusion, ignorance, frustration, anger, fear, even loneliness, all work to defeat the rational, and all work to help hate take hold.

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Home-grown hatred: Ezra Watson, Christopher Coghill, Dean-Charles Chapman, Andrew Ellis and Bobby Schofield in The Walk-In

In following a true-life story of the efforts of anti-racist organisation Hope Not Hate, we’re presented with the opportunity to observe this process in action, as a young man, Robbie, sympathetically portrayed by Andrew Ellis, is drawn into a far-right organisation. We’re also given a vantage point from the other side as former far-right combatant Michael Collins now investigates them.

Somewhere in the middle there is a copious amount of antisemitism, and I’m not sure if it makes for disturbing viewing because of the vitriol, or because of it being expressed here in its easiest-to-recognise form, unhindered by the tropes and codes and dog-whistles with which it permeates the “anti-racist” far left.

It’s also shocking to see how the various external factors are presented as reasons for the adoption of far-right views: the toxicity of Brexit, Islamist terrorist attacks, child grooming and rapes in northern towns predominantly by Pakistani men, seemingly then mysteriously express themselves as antisemitism, with no explanation explored other than: well, that’s neo-Nazis for you.

A missed opportunity then, and a bit messy in its themes, but what is well-expressed in the safe hands of writer Jeff Pope and director Paul Andrew Williams is the journey into far-right radicalisation, and the admirable struggle of the Hope Not Hate organisation to expose and shine a light on those lost to bigotry, and prevent this manifesting as violence, in this case with a plan to murder a MP and a policewoman.

What also becomes apparent is the impact on those fighting for hope, the weariness and frustration that come from the day-to-day dealings with humanity at its worst, and how a price is also paid by family and loved ones.

I’d say there are few better actors to convey this than Stephen Graham, with his hang-dog visage, but it may just be that there are few better actors, period, and his involvement in any project invokes a certain level of class, Venom 2 excluded.

Most affectingly, it’s the flashbacks to his character’s past, and contrasting them with his present, that provide us with living proof of how much people can change.

What’s brushed over though is why “the walk-in” of the drama’s title, who bravely decided to inform on his conspirators, chose to make that change.

It’s a vital piece of the puzzle, and unfortunately its absence detracts from being able to appreciate the larger picture.