{"id":100149,"date":"2025-10-27T07:27:06","date_gmt":"2025-10-27T07:27:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/100149\/"},"modified":"2025-10-27T07:27:06","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T07:27:06","slug":"trigger-point-writer-director-interview-season-3-more-cinematic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/100149\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Trigger Point’ Writer, Director Interview: Season 3 More Cinematic"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tITV<\/a> hit drama\u00a0Trigger Point<\/a>, starring\u00a0Vicky McClure<\/a>\u00a0(Line of Duty,\u00a0Alex Rider) as an Explosives Officer in London, is back on U.K. screens for season 3, and the creative team is touting its more cinematic look and feel.<\/p>\n

\n\tSeason 3 lead writer Chris Brandon (Bloodlands) and director Jamie Donoughue (Doctor Who, A Discovery of Witches), who joined Audrey Cooke (Trigger Point, DI Ray) on the new season, are two key players in making sure the series returns with a bang.<\/p>\n

\n\tProduced by\u00a0Jed Mercurio<\/a>\u2019s (Line of Duty,\u00a0Bodyguard) HTM Television, in association with All3Media\u00a0International<\/a>, which distributes the series internationally, Trigger Point\u00a0follows a team of bomb disposal officers in London, dedicated to keeping the capital safe from dangerous devices and terrorist threats. <\/p>\n

Returning cast members include Eric Shango (On the Edge) as Danny, Nabil Elouahabi (Blue Lights<\/a>,\u00a0Unforgotten) as Hassan \u201cHass\u201d Rahim, Natalie Simpson (North Sea Connection) as DS Helen Morgan, and Maanuv Thiara (DI Ray,\u00a0Landscapers) as DI Amar Batra.\u00a0Jason Flemyng<\/a>\u00a0(Gemma Bovery,\u00a0Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels) guest stars in season 3 as the antagonist.<\/p>\n

\n\tTHR caught up with Donoughue and Brandon to go behind the scenes of season 3, which premiered on Sunday, and shooting season 4, set to debut in 2026, right after.<\/p>\n

\n\tLoud bangs, plus wires and explosives that must be defused, may provide much action and tension, but Trigger Point runs much deeper, both emphasized. \u201cI actually think the emotional journey that Lana goes on is what attracted me to the show more than any action, because that\u2019s when a director really connects with an actor, when we can really dig in and find those special moments,\u201d explained Donoughue. \u201cUltimately, that\u2019s what the audience connects with \u2013 the emotional journey that the characters are on. That\u2019s how people can relate. The bombs and action are a lot of fun, but getting that balance right is key.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tMcClure gets the nuances of this balance right, the director noted. \u201cVicky is the queen of being able to do these technical performances around bombs and explosions, but then also being able to tap into that emotional journey of what\u2019s happened to Lana,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhen we create the story, we always endeavor to ground it and bring some truth to it,\u201d explained Brandon. \u201cThat\u2019s why we brought a complex antagonist for Lana who would add to her own psychological complications and make her go, \u2018Where do I stand?\u2019 So it\u2019s been fantastic having Vicky and Jason.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe writer enjoyed unwrapping layers of a story and complex characters across multiple episodes. \u201cWhere we are now in drama is a really unique position to be able to show the very human story that gets somebody from A to B, whether that\u2019s a to b as a bomber or a to b as a bomb disposal expert,\u201d he told THR. \u201cBecause we\u2019re so used now to short sound bites, it\u2019s great to be able to just take somebody on a very muddy journey. They might not seem or be nice, but this is the reason they\u2019re there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAt the same time, Trigger Point wanted to return for season 3 with a more cinematic look and feel. \u201cIt was a real conscious way to go at it and elevate and evolve the show wherever we can, especially visually and cinematically,\u201d Donoughue told THR. \u201cIf we can elevate it, it brings something fresh to the audience. And Trigger Point is one of the gems of ITV and British TV, and it should be standing up to the big American shows as well. So, I worked really hard with our DP Chas Bain to evolve its look. It needs to still feel familiar to the audience, but we wanted to lean into that cinematic experience more.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMcClure told THR she was very happy with the result: \u201cThe previous two [seasons] remain really strong pieces of telly, but we have elevated the show from there. We\u2019ve moved into a different kind of realm. We\u2019re watching something that all of a sudden just feels like it has got a much bigger budget than it does.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHow was shooting seasons 3 and 4 consecutively? \u201cIt all worked in blocks. So I took the first three episodes, and all those three episodes, every scene, were jumbled up together into a schedule,\u201d explained Donoughue. \u201cWe can\u2019t shoot in chronological order. So keeping this jigsaw in your head is hard from a continuity point for me, but also for the actors. Jumping into scene 27 of episode 3 before we\u2019re doing scene 13 of episode 1 can be crazy. So we should all give a shoutout to our script supervisor Hannah [Kenneally-Muir]. Her knowledge of scripts is insane, and that\u2019s who we rely on, because it is too much for us all to keep in our heads.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBrandon loved having a broader two-season canvas to paint on. \u201cIt has been really interesting this year, filming two seasons back-to-back,\u201d he told THR. \u201cDoing a run of 12 episodes is fantastic. And being able to think about that in two slightly different rhythmic balances. Because I write to music, I tend to think in terms of music. So, it was really nice to be able to go across two seasons and create a rhythm that is different.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tHis approach was to think of key story destinations. \u201cWe need to move the story to this point by the end of season three, and then kick it on in season four and add something different again so that hopefully there\u2019ll be variety,\u201d Brandon said. \u201cI think of it like a Dan Brown book. When you get to the end of a chapter of a Dan Brown book, I\u2019ve got to read the next one. You want to find that kind of drive.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ITV hit drama\u00a0Trigger Point, starring\u00a0Vicky McClure\u00a0(Line of Duty,\u00a0Alex Rider) as an Explosives Officer in London, is back on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":100150,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[146,85,399,46,4953,65627,65628],"class_list":["post-100149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-international","tag-israel","tag-itv","tag-trigger-point","tag-vicky-mcclure"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}