David Duchovny’s new Amazon Prime thriller continually shoots itself in the foot

Warning – spoilers ahead…

At the mid-way point of Amazon Prime Video’s new series, Malice, Jack Whitehall’s character crouches beside an unkempt tombstone in a London graveyard and begins to vigorously scrub away overgrown shrubs.

Whitehall, who plays ‘evil male nanny’ Adam Healey, eventually manages to scrape away the mulch and moss to reveal the names of his mother and father, etched into two slabs of concrete.

As his facial expression turns pensive and sombre, he turns around to look at his equally troubled sister and snarls: ‘They didn’t deserve this.’

It’s a moment in this six-part thriller, which also stars X-Files actor David Duchovny and Game of Thrones’ Carice Van Houten, that ticks the box, telling us exactly what Whitehall’s character is thinking right then and there.

But it’s also one of many heavy-handed and crudely expositional lines that rob any and all intrigue out of a potentially dramatic scene.

Created by James Wood and set in Greece and London, Malice follows Adam who becomes acquainted with the Tanner family, headed by ultra-rich businessman Jamie (Duchovny) and his wife Nat (Van Houten).

When the family’s nanny falls dangerously ill on a family holiday, Adam schemes his way into their London home, where his true vengeful nature starts to emerge.

Turning Jamie and Nat against each other, Adam secretly plots to bring down the entire family because of his obsession with Duchovny’s character.

When questions arise about Adam’s odd behaviour, those who dig deeper into his past find themselves in a dangerous game in this revenge thriller that is somewhere between The Talented Mr Ripley and Netflix’s You.

But unfortunately, Amazon’s latest drama fails to live up to either of its two biggest influences, despite the efforts of a star-studded cast.

Littered with stiff, wooden dialogue and some head-scratching plot points, Malice fails to entice you as it attempts to build its world of mystery.

For a show marketed for its shocking, thrilling twists it felt strangely quiet and conveniently obvious, even with Whitehall set loose as a murderous, twisted parasite on Duchovny’s flawed family.

Throughout the course of six episodes, though, the drama certainly has some interesting and shocking moments.

In brief, unexpected spurts, when the action really gets going, Whitehall is genuinely creepy as a seemingly nice guy who openly watches pornography at a coffee shop and attends strange sex pool parties.

The Bad Education star also enjoys some strong moments with Duchovny, notably when the pair’s evening at a Greek strip club takes an interesting turn before the nanny’s dark past starts to unravel.

But whenever it felt like the series was finally getting somewhere, it somehow kept shooting itself in the foot with a bizarre line of dialogue that pulled the viewer out of the moment.

The clearest example of this come when Whitehall’s character has just committed murder and is driving around with a dead body in his boot and one of the young Tanner children and his friends oblivious in the back seat.

In what is already a twisted and dark moment, he is then pulled over by police for driving while using his phone.

As the tension ramps up and we wonder whether the policeman is going to find the dead body, finally, he is issued a ticket and sent on his way.

But before Whitehall even takes a sigh of relief, he calls the policeman under his breath a ‘corrupt, special measures, racist c***’.

What are we meant to feel in this situation?

Are viewers suddenly meant to throw their arms in the air in support of Whitehall’s anti-police stance after he’s just committed murder? Are we meant to feel sympathy towards him?

It’s unfortunately one of many momentum-robbing moments that feels devoid of direction and confidence in what it wants to be.

And by the time the action has finally picked up and we see the conclusions of each character’s storyline, it’s tough to feel anything.

Whitehall plays a despicable man capable of committing atrocities, while the family he torments is both snobby and self-entitled. 

The sum of all these parts doesn’t add up to much. 

Whitehall is clearly a talented actor, but one can’t help but think he would be more suited to a dramedy, with less out-and-out horror and killing.

It would be interesting to see Whitehall in a different project, as Malice’s script did him no favours. The same could be said for Van Houten and Duchovny, though the latter, now 65, at least made the most of his screen time by showing off an enviably toned physique in an impressive rotation of tank tops.

Given the strength of today’s TV landscape, Malice just doesn’t deliver a story gripping enough to compete.

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