{"id":552436,"date":"2026-04-27T00:02:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T00:02:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/552436\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T00:02:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T00:02:08","slug":"sheridan-smith-is-superb-in-this-gripping-follow-up-to-the-responder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/552436\/","title":{"rendered":"Sheridan Smith is superb in this gripping follow-up to The Responder"},"content":{"rendered":"

Schumacher takes his time. The first episode establishes Leanne and Matty, the dodgy casino boss (Barry Sloane) and his mum (Geraldine James), and introduces various plot lines. It can feel both busy and slow, but stick with it. The story carries you along through the sheer force of Socha\u2019s and Smith\u2019s charisma and you\u2019ll be rooting for this hopeless Bonnie and Clyde<\/a>.<\/p>\n

These flawed characters are fundamentally good people whose desperation leads them to do bad things. Schumacher\u2019s 10 years in the police have informed his world view. The lead gangster isn\u2019t a cardboard cut-out villain<\/a> either. The only character who doesn\u2019t ring true is, ironically, a police officer investigating corruption at the casino. She\u2019s the kind of tenacious female detective who crops up in every TV drama.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a tenderness to the portrayal of Liverpool and it feels rather lovely to have two further Brookside<\/a> alumni (alongside Sloane) in the supporting cast, in the shape of Louis Emerick and Sue Jenkins, aka Mick Johnson and Jackie Corkhill.<\/p>\n

The drama is heightened \u2013 it isn\u2019t even the lowest point of Matty\u2019s week when he\u2019s punched in the face by a loan shark who punishes him for non-payment by making him take possession of a holdall full of cocaine, which his disapproving teenage daughter stumbles across and throws away \u2013 yet the drama always feels rooted in real life. \u201cF—ing hell, Matty, it\u2019s not Line of Duty<\/a>,\u201d the detective tells him, and it\u2019s all the better for it.<\/p>\n

The Cage is on BBC iPlayer<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Schumacher takes his time. The first episode establishes Leanne and Matty, the dodgy casino boss (Barry Sloane) and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":552437,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[243,5343,96,708,263,15127,3133,167224,391,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-552436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-bbc","tag-culture","tag-entertainment","tag-liverpool","tag-review","tag-sheridan-smith","tag-television","tag-television-editors-choice","tag-tv","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=552436"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552436\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/552437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=552436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=552436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=552436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}