The Victim Review

The murder of James Bulger has had a massive impact on the British psyche. Not only was it a horrific crime but also due to the perpetrators being so young. This crime serves as the influence on the Scottish miniseries The Victim.

Craig Myers (James Harkness) is a 28-year-old bus driver with a young family. His world is shattered when a post online accuses him of being an infamous child killer; and he is attacked on Halloween. Anna Dean (Kelly Macdonald) is the mother of that murdered child and the police arrest her for the post. Anna prepares to go to court believing Myers who has to admit to his crime and sees it as her chance to get closure.

The Victim was told in four parts – the first was about the initial crime, second focused on Myers, third was about Anna, and the final part was the resolution. The strongest parts were the middle ones focusing on the main individuals. Myers’ life is destroyed by the accusation because his home is attacked and he is distrusted by his wife who doesn’t know anything about his past. He gets ostracised by the people who know him, suffers from PTSD and worst of all his family suffer from the accusation.

The personal drama was where the miniseries shines. The Victim show how these crimes destroy families. Within Anna’s family she is so blinded by hate and rage that she ends up ignoring her own family. One of Anna’s most powerful scenes was with her younger son who acts out against his mother due to her obsession for revenge. On a human level you can empathise with Anna’s situation – but she was willing to do some questionable actions.

The Victim does feature some of the cream of Scottish acting talent. Macdonald gives a powerful performance as the mother who has never gotten over her grief. It was raw and real portrayal and Macdonald adds a lot of bitterness to her normally sweet persona. Harkness had a juicy role because of what he suffered and he is set to have a good career as a character actor.

The risk of these types of drama series is that they are bloated and leads to the question why couldn’t the story be told in a shorter running time? My go-to example of this is the BBC Three miniseries Thirteen. That show had a great premise and the family drama part of the series was excellent, but it hampered by the criminal investigation and numerous plot twists. The Victim avoids this for the most part – the writer and director wisely split the episodes and their focus. It differentiates the episodes from each other. There was the occasional plot twist that felt contrived for such a realistic story but it was not enough to distract from the main story.

The Victim was a powerful piece of television due to its family and personal dramas and the talents of the actors involved.