The Salisbury Poisonings

I let this three-part BBC series pass me by when it aired over the summer of 2020, but its appearance on the Guardian's top 50 shows of the year led me to download it. Like much of the country, I remember the initial incident very well, but the secondary victim's story - as well as the specific response to the incident were interesting to learn about.

A Russian double agent, Sergei Skripal (Wayne Swann) and his daughter Yulia (Jill Winternitz) fall suddenly and violently ill on a park bench in the small English Cathedral City of Salisbury. When the identity of the victims become known, the police begin an immediate enquiry and Detective Nick Bailey (Rafe Spall) leads an investigation of the Skripal home. It's later discovered that the pair have been exposed to Novichok, a manmade and very lethal nerve agent and stringent efforts are made immediately to limit the potential exposure of the general public, led by Tracy Daszkiewicz (Anne Marie-Duff) the Director of Public safety for Wiltshire.

The docudrama really presents the details of the incident on quite an intimate scale. The Skripal's themselves are rarely seen and the alleged perpetrators only briefly in news footage, the 'why' of the attack is not explored. Instead we follow Nick Bailey through his exposure and reaction to the nerve agent, his time in hospital, the effect on his family, and then the survivors guilt he suffers. It's all nicely played by Rafe Spall and Annabel Scholey. We follow Tracy Daszkiewicz as she is pulled into the situation, sacrificing her family time to try and keep the city safe, often offering a lone argument for expanding safety measures against opposing government priorities. Then we follow the sad case of Dawn Sturgess, a mother played by Myanna Burning, whose boyfriend accidentally exposes her to the delivery mechanism for Novichok and who can't survive the dosage. We see the impact this has on her family.

Much of the macro story is going to be classified for quite a while still, so complaints about that not being there, whilst I agree would have made for a better show, are missing the point somewhat. I'd agree with the reviews that suggested that just two episodes and less repetition, particularly of the family lives, would have made for a better series, but performances are good across the board in what is occasionally a tough watch, about everyday heroism.

I wasn't sure what to expect from this, such a shocking real life event could have been sensationalised or spun, but credit where it's due, this was very well told.

Very well acted, a top notch production all round, we learn Salisbury's story, what happened to the father and daughter on that fateful day in 2018, but also the effects on beautiful Salisbury and its residents.

It could perhaps have been made into two parts, I think the three installments was perhaps a little overlong, Duff and Spall however made up for that.

It's a shocking, sad story, hard to believe possible in this day and age. The negative reviews are unrealistic, this is a good insight into what happened. 8/10.

I just watched all of this and was much impressed. It could have been done differently,it could have been a Hollywood movie or it could be less fact based but I think the approach taken was the correct one. The far left Russian apologists and the anti BBC Daily Mail readers seem to have formed a sort of Nazi-Soviet pact to slag off this production. I will give no plot spoilers but having followed the real events in the news when it happened it seems like a fair account of what happened. This is not a glamorous production. The famous tourist attractions of Salisbury are not featured and Anne-Marie Duff should be praised for looking like a real women and not a model in this.

I did enjoy learning the story, and the performances were fine. However, when I was done, I had questions about, Tracy, the public health director. She's our main character, but I really had no idea what her job entails. Maybe they could have added, at least a few, examples of Tracy performing some functions of the job. It was a disservice to the real life person portrayed because the only thing they showed was her distraught, stressed and void of confidence. She was overworked, but I never saw her work. She would show up somewhere and just looked wrecked. If her job was to show up and look wrecked at her job, she was excellent. As a bonus, when at home, she looked wrecked there too.

I know from local newspaper articles that many people in Salisbury felt that the showing of this docu-drama was too soon after the event. That it would rake over old coals and put our city once again in a bad light. We'll for me it didn't.

For those looking for a hard-hitting insight into how and why the Russians attempted what they did or why the suspects have never been charged then go watch the news specials that came out at the time. But for a view of how the real people at the heart of this whole affair were really affected then the writers, directors and actors have done a good job.

Yes, it is low key in its look and feel. Yes, there are a lot of people who know Salisbury thinking 'that's not somewhere I recognise'; the use of locations from other cathedral cities threw me off the narrative a couple of times wondering where the characters were meant to be. But most importantly it drew me in to understanding more of how just frightening the possible outcome of not having an early intervention could have been and the emotional strain on those key families.

For you 1 star reviewers I say your expectations were skewed from the start. It was good to see what felt like a truthful docu-drama.

And as my son said at the end of part 3, 'well, that was emotional.'