Slow Horses is a spy show that feels less like a thriller and more like a study in failure. The series, which premiered in 2022 on Apple TV+, follows a group of MI5 agents banished to a dead-end department called Slough House. These are the rejects, the drunks, the embarrassments, and the simply incompetent.
They are led by Jackson Lamb, a slovenly, brilliant, and utterly rude veteran played by Gary Oldman. The show is based on the novels by Mick Herron, and it wears its literary pedigree with pride. It is not a fast-paced action series. It is a character study wrapped in a conspiracy, and it is one of the best things on television.
The title refers to the agents themselves. They are the slow horses, the ones who have stumbled and fallen out of the race. Each of them made a mistake that ended their career in the main service, the Park. Now they shuffle papers and wait out their sentences. But when a young agent, River Cartwright, gets tangled in a kidnapping plot, the slow horses find themselves closer to real danger than anyone expected.
The show is sharp, funny, and surprisingly tender. It earns its praise. Its Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer score sits at 9.8 out of 10, and that figure is not an exaggeration.
Trailer, via Apple TV.
Inside Slough House
The setup is simple. MI5 runs an internal purgatory for agents who have failed. They are not fired. They are not imprisoned. They are simply parked in a grim office building, given meaningless tasks, and left to rot.
The hope is that they will resign. The reality is that they mostly drink bad coffee and bicker.
Jackson Lamb is the man in charge, and he is a disaster of a human being. He is rude, unwashed, and openly contemptuous of his subordinates. He is also the sharpest mind in the building, and Oldman plays him with a kind of gleeful disgust that is impossible to look away from.
River Cartwright, played by Jack Lowden, is the closest thing the show has to a conventional lead. He is young, handsome, and desperate to prove himself. His failure was public and humiliating. He was caught on camera botching a training exercise, and now he is stuck. The show opens with him trying to get back into the good graces of his grandfather, a legendary spy named David Cartwright. But the plot moves quickly away from personal redemption and into something darker. A far-right group kidnaps a young British Muslim student, and River stumbles into the middle of it.
The show does not rush. It lets the characters breathe. The first episode is mostly setup, but it is setup done with wit and precision. The dialogue is crackling, and the performances are uniformly strong. Oldman is the obvious draw, but Lowden holds his own, and the supporting cast is filled with familiar faces doing excellent work.
Kristin Scott Thomas plays Diana Taverner, a senior MI5 officer with her own agenda. Jonathan Pryce appears as the elder Cartwright. The show is stacked.
Gary Oldman’s Jackson Lamb
It is impossible to talk about Slow Horses without talking about Oldman. He is the engine of the series. His Jackson Lamb is a man who has given up on appearances. His coat is stained. His hair is a mess. He farts in elevators and insults everyone within earshot. He is, by any measure, a horrible person. But he is also the only one who understands how the game is really played.
Oldman plays him with a palpable sense of exhaustion and irritation, and it shows. Every line reading is a small act of aggression.
The character could easily become a caricature. A rude, brilliant spy is a well-worn trope. But the writing and Oldman’s performance keep him grounded. Lamb is not cruel for the sake of being cruel. He is cruel because he is tired, and because he has seen too much. He knows that the people around him are mostly useless, and he resents having to clean up their messes. But he also, in his own way, protects them. He is the only one who believes in the slow horses, even as he insults them.
The show gives Oldman room to work. He is not just a collection of quips. There are moments of quiet, almost tenderness, where Lamb reveals a flicker of something human. These moments are rare, which makes them land harder. Oldman has been widely acclaimed for this role, and he has earned award nominations for it. He is doing some of the best work of his career, which is saying something for a man with his filmography.
The Misfits of Slough House
The ensemble is the heart of the show. River is the nominal protagonist, but he is surrounded by a cast of oddballs. There is Louisa Guy, played by Rosalind Eleazar, who is competent and frustrated. There is Roddy Ho, a tech specialist who is insufferably arrogant, played by Christopher Chung. There is Min Harper, played by Dustin Demri-Burns, and there is Catherine Standish, played by Saskia Reeves, a recovering alcoholic who serves as Lamb’s reluctant secretary.
Each of them has a backstory, and the show doles out those details slowly.
The series is adapted from the first novel in Herron’s series, also called Slow Horses. The book was published in 2010, and it was a hit. Herron’s writing is known for its wit and its cynicism, and the show captures that tone perfectly. The slow horses are not heroes. They are people who made mistakes, and they are living with the consequences. The show does not ask you to root for them in a conventional sense. It asks you to understand them, and it makes that easy through sheer force of characterization.
The show also does not shy away from the ugliness of the spy world. There is no glamour here. The offices are drab. The cars are ordinary. The violence, when it comes, is sudden and brutal.
This is not James Bond. This is the grimy reality of bureaucratic espionage, where most of the work is paperwork and most of the danger is political. The show is refreshingly grounded in that reality.
The Kidnapping Plot
The central plot of the first season involves the kidnapping of a student named Hassan Ahmed, played by Antonio Aakeel. He is taken by a group of far-right extremists, and the case lands in the lap of Slough House by accident. River stumbles onto the scene, and he cannot let it go. The investigation pulls the slow horses into a world of conspiracy and betrayal, and it quickly becomes clear that the kidnapping is not what it seems.
The show is careful with its reveals. It does not telegraph its twists. The pacing is deliberate, and the payoff is worth the wait. The show is less interested in action set pieces than in the slow accumulation of dread. By the final episode, the tension is almost unbearable. The ending is satisfying, and it sets up the next chapter without feeling like a cliffhanger. It is a complete story, which is increasingly rare in the streaming era.
The show also has a lot to say about the state of modern Britain. The far-right group is not a cartoon. They are portrayed as ordinary people with dangerous ideas, which makes them more frightening. The show explores themes of nationalism, surveillance, and the rot at the heart of institutions. It does not hit you over the head with these themes. It lets them emerge organically from the story.
Will Smith’s Adaptation
The show was created for television by Will Smith, the British writer and producer, not the American actor. Smith has a background in comedy, and it shows. The dialogue is sharp and often very funny, even in the midst of danger. But the humor never undercuts the tension. It is a delicate balance, and the show manages it with skill.
The direction is also strong. The show has a gritty, handheld feel that suits the material. The camera is often close to the actors, capturing the sweat and the anxiety. The lighting is muted, and the color palette is drab. This is a world without glamour, and the visual style reflects that.
The show looks like it smells, and that is a compliment.
The tone is consistent throughout. The show is cynical, but not nihilistic. It believes in the possibility of redemption, even if it does not make that belief easy. The slow horses are failures, but they are not lost causes. The show is ultimately about the value of persistence, even when the odds are stacked against you. It is a quiet, humane message, and it lands.
The 9.8 Score
The show has been a critical darling since its debut. Its Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer score is 9.8 out of 10, which is nearly unheard of for a television series. That score is not just hype. It reflects the quality of the writing, the acting, and the direction. The show has also been nominated for numerous awards, including recognition for Oldman’s performance. It has continued well beyond its first season, with new installments arriving steadily.
The show’s success is a direct result of the strength of Herron’s source material and the skill of the adaptation. It is a rare case where the television version is as good as the book, if not better. The show has also introduced a wider audience to Herron’s work, which is a good thing. The novels are excellent, and the show does them justice.
Slow Horses is not for everyone. It is slow, by design. It is talky, and it rewards patience. But for those willing to invest the time, it is deeply rewarding. It is a show about broken people trying to do the right thing, and it is funny, sad, and thrilling in equal measure.
Final Score
Slow Horses is a masterpiece of television. It is smart, funny, and emotionally resonant. It features one of the best performances of Gary Oldman’s career, and it is surrounded by a cast that is uniformly excellent. The plot is engaging, the dialogue is sharp, and the direction is confident. It is a show that respects its audience, and it asks you to think.
It is not a show that will appeal to everyone. If you are looking for nonstop action, this is not it. But if you are looking for a character-driven drama with real stakes, this is essential viewing. The show is a reminder that the best spy stories are not about gadgets or explosions. They are about people, and the choices they make.
- Title: Slow Horses
- Network: Apple TV+
- Premiere year: 2022
- Based on the novel by: Mick Herron
- Created for television by: Will Smith
- Starring: Gary Oldman, Jack Lowden, Kristin Scott Thomas, Jonathan Pryce
- Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer score: 9.8 out of 10
Slow Horses is a show that rewards attention. It is a slow burn, but it is a fire that burns bright. The show has set a high bar for itself, and it has cleared it with ease.
This is television at its best.
