'The Little Drummer Girl' episode 2 recap: Far too much set-up may frustrate viewers

Tricky things, second episodes.

If you’re lucky, you’ve hooked your audience with the first intriguing instalment of your TV series, but once you’ve got them, you’re left with another problem to solve… what the heck do you do now?!

That difficult second episode syndrome has struck down many a drama, so how will The Little Drummer Girl, the BBC thriller adapted from the novel by John Le Carré, fare?

Let’s find out.

WARNING: This article contains spoilers for Episode 2 of The Little Drummer Girl.

1. “We will do it right this time”

If you were busy making a cup of tea when Episode 2 started… tough. It refuses to treat its audience like idiots and opens with an Inceptionesque approach to past events – we get flashbacks within flashbacks within flashbacks.

We learn a little about how and why Mossad spymaster Marty Kurtz (Michael Shannon) roped the mysterious Gadi Becker (Alexander Skarsgard) back in for another crack at infiltrating a Palestinian terrorist cell. An innocent girl died last time, Becker reminds Marty, which doesn’t bode well for amateur actress and new radical Charmian Ross (Florence Pugh), who is next in line on the Israelis’ recruitment drive.

2. “I need to go for a number two.”

Spy work isn’t all bright yellow dresses and swanning around in front of the Acropolis in Athens at night, you know. Sometimes you also have to take a dump in front of people you have just met.

But it will take a lot more than that to faze our Charmian, or Charlie as she’s known to Israeli intelligence. Because it turns out she’s not just an innocent actress after all.

Marty has handpicked Charlie for a mission because he has some dirt on her – she once took part in a dodgy pro-Palestine retreat in Dorset attended by the very terrorist that Mossad has in its custody in Munich.

3. “We are mounting a production.”

That would be Salim (Amir Khoury), the younger brother of Khalil, who Marty believes is the elusive Palestinian bomb-maker.

After picking Salim up in the first episode, the Israelis have rather cleverly made him think he’s being held in some kind of jail, when in fact he’s in a soundproofed room in a Munich flat having a fake prison soundtrack pumped in through the speakers.

This level of foolery perfectly encapsulates The Little Drummer Girl – it feels like almost every character is having the wool pulled over their eyes, along with the audience, even if they – and we – may not be fully aware of it yet. Even the seemingly all-knowing Marty isn’t ahead of the game, despite his extensive collective of “eyes” – he carries around multiple pairs of glasses in a briefcase to help him get into character.

4. “I take whatever role is on offer.”

There are two major problems with this episode. Firstly, Charlie throws her lot in with Mossad way too easily. There is nothing stopping her from walking out the door of their admittedly sumptuous Greek villa and getting on with her rather comfortable looking life of pub-going and amateur dramatics (there wasn’t that much to do in Britain back in the late ’70s).

But bar telling Becker to “go **** yourself” and a few choice quips (“S**t. I’ve been kidnapped by an experimental theatre company.”), she pretty much just goes along for the ride, and has no problem whatsoever pretending to be a terrorist. Damn, things must be really tight on the acting front.

MORE: ‘The Little Drummer Girl’ episode 1 recap – BBC spy thriller is must-see TV
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The bigger problem with Episode 2 of The Little Drummer Girl is that it’s all set-up, and for this reason, I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of viewers bail on the series. The first instalment was a gripping introduction to a shady world where no one is to be trusted, but the follow-up falls a little flat.

Charlie’s recruitment and the spelling out of what this will mean is so laboured – including flashbacks to a fiction we know didn’t even happen – that the narrative is drained of all the tension built up in the series opener. It’s pretty clear that Charlie is going to go along with the plan and that Becker is going to impersonate the imprisoned Salim – so just hurry it along already.

That being said, I am still excited about where The Little Drummer Girl will go from here, particularly as it will hopefully no longer be slowed down by needless exposition.

5. “Don’t confuse drama with reality.”

Salzburg, that’s where it’s going from here, as that’s the destination given to Charlie for her first mission. She must drive there alone in Salim’s shiny red Mercedes, which just happens to be laden down with Semtex.

Against the protests of his colleagues, Becker tells Charlie about the car’s cargo, but it’s not clear if he does this to protect her or to inspire her to play her role of Salim’s terrorist girlfriend more convincingly.

“This is your debut in the theatre of the real,” he tells her. And it looks like the theatre of the real is about to get really messy.