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'The Tourist' doesn't know who he is — just that someone wants him dead

John Powers

In The Tourist, "The Man" (Jamie Dornan) wakes up in a small town hospital in the Australian outback with no idea who he is or how he got there. HBO hide caption

In The Tourist, "The Man" (Jamie Dornan) wakes up in a small town hospital in the Australian outback with no idea who he is or how he got there.

Ever since the birth of mass communications, our culture has been haunted by the idea of amnesia. In high-class books by the likes of George Orwell or Milan Kundera , forgetting becomes a political metaphor for the erasure of truth. Things are less ambitious in pop entertainments like Memento or the Jason Bourne series . There, memory-loss is less a metaphor than a motor — a gimmick to drive the story forward.

This motor purrs like a Ferrari in The Tourist , a hit BBC series playing on HBO Max. Written by the Williams brothers, Harry and Jack — best known here for The Missing and Baptiste — this funny, suspenseful six-part thriller doesn't merely keep us guessing. It keeps its amnesiac hero guessing, too. He knows even less about his own story than we do.

A bearded, muscled-up Jamie Dornan stars as a T-shirt clad Irishman who gets in a car accident and winds up in a small town hospital in the Australian outback. Known simply as "The Man," he doesn't know who he is or how he got there. But soon after he leaves the hospital, he knows one thing for sure: Somebody wants to kill him.

As he seeks to find out who's after him and why, he's helped by two very different women. Luci (Shalom Brune-Franklin) is a waitress who we aren't quite sure what to make of. In contrast, it's easy to trust probationary constable Helen Chambers, played by Danielle Macdonald. Helen's a newbie cop who struggles with her weight and with a fiancé who speaks of her appearance with such passive-aggressive meanness that I kept hoping he'd become one of the show's murder victims.

While The Man's search for his identity is grippingly plotted, the show lets the action breathe. It takes time to enjoy his encounters with a wide range of oddball types, be it a goofy chess-playing pilot, a Greek mobster, the affably nutty woman who offers him lodging, or the enormous, cowboy-hatted hitman who has the self-satisfied theatricality of an escapee from a Tarantino movie. That said, The Man knows he must keep moving to stay alive.

For all The Tourist 's inventiveness — Episode 5 is a trip — it reminds us that even good pop culture is often derivative. The show's opening car crash sequence mimics the Steven Spielberg movie Duel . More importantly, the Williams brothers are pretty clearly doing a Down Under riff on Fargo . Their series offers the same blend of violence and barbed humor, the same mythologizing of bleak, underpopulated places, and the same cavalcade of viciousness and folly that brings out the heroism in an ordinary person.

The show's moral center is Helen, who, in Macdonald's sensational performance, has our sympathy from the get-go. Her work is so scene-stealingly good that I would call this a career-making performance if I hadn't already said this about Macdonald's electric work as an aspiring New Jersey rapper in the indie film Patti Cake$ .

Helen's transparent goodness makes her the perfect counterpoint to The Man, a handsome hunk who's a mystery, even to himself. It's a great role for Dornan, who, earlier in his career, had a slightly synthetic prettiness that made him ideal for creepy characters like the S&M billionaire in Fifty Shades of Grey . Here, he's a bit older, thicker, and rougher. And just as Brad Pitt often seems liberated when his good looks are masked a bit, Dornan gives his best performance as a man who isn't sure whether or not he's the hero of his own life.

Over the course of the six episodes, The Man struggles to learn whether, back before his accident, he was a good guy or a bad guy. And if he had been a villain, does he have to stay one, even after he starts remembering his past? I won't reveal what he discovers, though I feel obligated to say that you won't get a definitive answer this season. You'll have to watch Season 2 of The Tourist , not yet made, which I bet you will be more than happy to do.

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Culture | TV

The Tourist series 2 on BBC One review: Jamie Dornan is unforgettable in the amnesia thriller's welcome return

While making the first series of The Tourist – an enjoyable, action-packed amnesia romp set in the sun-bleached deserts of Australia – creators Harry and Jack Williams weren't planning on taking the story further.

But the brothers – whose work includes the recent Boat Story and Baptiste – had a change of heart and in bringing the tourist of the title (played by Jamie Dornan) home to Ireland to face the demons of his past, they breathed new life into the show.

"Living in the past doesn't do anyone any favours", says one character, and that pretty much sums up the theme of the series, but boy does it make for some stellar TV, with characters that are deeper and more richly rounded than series one.

The premise remains pretty much exactly the same as the first series. Dornan's character Elliot Stanley still can't remember anything from the past, which makes it tricky when his criminal family is locked in a gang war with rival hoodlums. He doesn't know who is a friend or a foe. Or even who his mum is.

The action picks up 14 months after the previous series, which left Elliot at his lowest, seemingly heading for an overdose after learning some of the very unpleasant things he had done while working for a drug-running gang. A message from cop-turned love interest Helen Chambers (Danielle Macdonald) opened the door to hope as the season ended.

And it's no spoiler to say Elliot is OK (there wouldn't be much of a series two without him) and with Helen he heads to Ireland and find out who he really is. And from there, very quickly, it catches light. A few minutes in and the fun begins as he’s kidnapped (after shaving his frankly appalling beard) by three masked assailants, and the cycle of escaping, re-capturing, punch ups, sarky jokes and revelations begin.

Through the highs and lows, the action and introspection, it's Dornan who is the beating heart of the show. The hunky lead is thoroughly believable as someone wrestling with his (lack of) identity, conflicted by the appalling actions he can't remember doing, but also someone who is funny, dry with lowkey charisma that makes this so watchable. The support cast round it out brilliantly. Macdonald brings the same warmth to the second series as she did in the first, and the return of her terrible former boyfriend Ethan is inspired. He is brilliantly played by Greg Larsen as a character who appears to be trying to grapplw with his own toxicity and mend his ways but comes across as even more hilariously boorish and flawed as the series progresses. There's the addition of Olwen Fouere as a crime gang matriarch, who is by turns tender and homicidal. Detective Ruairi Slater is also a new recruit, played by Conor MacNeill – previously in The Sixth Commandment and Industry – who once again plays a weedy character somewhat overwhelmed by events, though this time, he clearly has some deeper issues going on at home.

Throughout, the writing is strong. The show is tense, brutal and often laugh-out-loud funny – one early line about a podcast had me in stitches and the hits keep on coming – and while the action is always engaging as gang warfare ignites, it’s the dialogue, especially between antagonists, that keeps it a delight. At times, the show is horror inflected too, with clear nods to the Saw franchise and Psycho.

This is a welcome return for a show that may well have been underappreciated the first time round – and once again Dornan proves the perfect frontman. Series two turns up the dial and has all the necessary ingredients for a gripping, entertaining time in front of the box on new year's day.

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‘The Tourist’ Thrills, but Doesn’t Take Itself Too Seriously

Even though the six-episode series, airing on HBO Max, is gripping and full of surprises, its creators made sure to include some offbeat humor.

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By Desiree Ibekwe

LONDON — After his car is rammed off the road by a mystery driver in a truck, a Northern Irishman wakes up in a hospital in the Australian outback with no memory of who he is. “I keep telling myself to just try and remember,” he tells the police officer that comes to take his statement, “but it’s like trying to make yourself fly.”

That is the starting gun for “The Tourist,” a six-part limited series that premieres Thursday on HBO Max. After the man, played by Jamie Dornan (“ Belfast ”), leaves the hospital, it becomes clear he was involved in some murky business in his former life, and someone definitely wants him dead.

The opening premise would suggest a typical thriller. Memory loss is a familiar plot device for the genre (see: “Memento,” “The Bourne Identity” et al). “The Tourist,” which first aired on the BBC in Britain this year, is similar in form to the broadcaster’s other tense, tight shows, such as “ The Night Manager ” and “ Bodyguard .”

Unlike those offerings, “The Tourist” adds more offbeat humor and touches of the surreal to a gripping central plot that still provides car chases, shootouts and international criminal outfits.

When he first read the script, Dornan found it surprising, he said in a recent interview. “Any time I thought it was one thing, or I had a handle on where it was heading, it was altered,” he said. “It was sometimes really subtle, and sometimes it was a big whack over the head.”

As the episodes unfurl, rooting for the confused, likable character becomes a little more complicated. In a recent interview, Dornan said that when he first read the script he wondered if the audience would still be on the man’s side, “searching for the answers when they find out what some of the answers are.”

Dornan’s character is joined in his hunt for answers by the police officer from the hospital, Helen Chambers ( Danielle Macdonald ), who is on her first assignment off traffic duty. She feels strangely compelled to help the man, who also finds assistance from Luci Miller (Shalom Brune-Franklin), a waitress he meets at a cafe.

The show’s setting in small-town Australia helps provide comic relief through characters like a hapless but well-meaning rookie police officer and the elderly owners of a bed-and-breakfast. Amid the chaos and danger, there are scenes that tip into the wholesome and heartwarming.

Helen, the police officer, is also an unlikely thriller protagonist: kind, honest and unassuming. Macdonald sees her character as the show’s “Everywoman,” she said in a recent interview. When we first meet Helen, it is clear that she is unhappy and underestimated, by herself and her fiancé.

Macdonald said that she had spent some time figuring out the character’s role in the plot. “The rest of the show is so dark and Helen was so light,” she said. “It ended up balancing really nicely.”

The show’s writers and creators, the brothers Jack and Harry Williams, have become known for conventional thrillers such as the Golden Globe-nominated show “ The Missing .” “The Tourist” came from a desire to do something different. “It’s the kind of show we’d watch, it’s the kind of show we really enjoy doing,” Jack said.

The brothers also have experience with dark-hearted television comedies, having been executive producers on Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s “ Fleabag ” and on Daisy Haggard’s “ Back to Life .” Their latest show, then, was about “bridging that gap, because having made comedies and made drama, it just felt like a natural place for us to operate,” Harry Williams said.

They brought on Chris Sweeney, who also worked on “Back to Life,” to direct half of the series. Despite wanting to work on nondirectorial projects at the time, Sweeney said that he had been won over. “I don’t like straight thrillers, it’s not my thing, but I like things that use a device to talk about what is human existence in a playful way,” he said in a video interview.

“The Tourist” questions not only how the past defines us, but also — through the character trajectories of both the central character and of Helen — the other things we lean on to build our identities. Sweeney said that he felt the script had the “personality” of films he loves within the thriller genre, like the work of the Coen brothers. He described elements of the show as a “love letter” to those films, with scenes that evoke “ No Country for Old Men ” and Steven Soderbergh’s “Out of Sight.”

Dornan was initially a little concerned about the show’s genre medley. While shooting in Australia, “the three of us, Shalom, Danielle and I, we were all in equal parts terrified at different moments because of the comedy and the drama, and how to find the comfortable line there,” he said. “I was a bit like, are people going to know what this is, or where to hang their hat on it?”

In Britain, at least, the concerns seem to have been unfounded. When “The Tourist” arrived on the BBC’s streaming service on New Year’s Day, it was met with glowing reviews and quickly became the platform’s third-most successful drama opening to date.

Jack Williams said he thought that the show had resonated with audiences, in part, because of its escapist quality, adding that it “isn’t trying to reflect back some of the angst and misery that everyone’s been experiencing for a few years.”

As well as diving into a mystery, viewers of “The Tourist” are transported to a stark, almost otherworldly landscape. The show was filmed across several different locations in the sprawling expanse of southern Australia, where you can “point the camera anywhere and it just looks incredible,” Harry Williams noted. “That said, we had to travel quite a lot of hours within the outback in order to get that desired effect,” he added.

The travel contributed to the shoot’s lasting five months, a period of filming that was also stretched by the ambition of the show: The opening car chase sequence was filmed over two weeks. “It was the hardest job I’ve ever done,” Dornan said. “It’s the longest job I’ve ever done.”

With the show’s success in Britain has come discussion about the possibility of a second season. The show was conceived as a self-contained mini-series, similar to the BBC’s other six-part shows. That “less is more” approach contrasts with the sprawling nature of much of American network television; Showtime’s thriller “Homeland,” for example, ran for eight seasons and 96 episodes.

Tommy Bulfin, a BBC drama commissioning editor, said in an email that, while the broadcaster has a “tradition of doing six episode runs,” ultimately the practice of doing shorter productions was down to the subject matter. “I think the key to the success of these shows is that they’re all excellent examples of brilliantly crafted stories,” he said.

The Williams brothers echoed that sentiment. In thinking about the length of “The Tourist,” the story took precedence. “You have to kind of follow that and the natural course that it would take and not try and squeeze out more,” Harry said. The pair wouldn’t rule out the possibility of a second season, but added that they were cautious about doing so.

“There is no perfect length, just like there’s no perfect length for a book,” Harry Williams said. “But there is an appropriate length for a story.”

Desiree Ibekwe is a news assistant on the Audio team. Before joining The Times in 2020, she was a reporter at Broadcast Magazine and completed a fellowship at The Economist.  More about Desiree Ibekwe

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The Tourist

When a man wakes up in the Australian outback with no memory, he must use the few clues he has to discover his identity before his past catches up with him. When a man wakes up in the Australian outback with no memory, he must use the few clues he has to discover his identity before his past catches up with him. When a man wakes up in the Australian outback with no memory, he must use the few clues he has to discover his identity before his past catches up with him.

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The Tourist – Series Review (4/5)

Posted by Karina "ScreamQueen" Adelgaard | Feb 1, 2024 | 4 minutes

THE TOURIST on Netflix / HBO Max is a new series starring Jamie Dornan and co-produced with BBC. It’s a truly wild ride of a mystery thriller. Full of twists and turns and the most quirky characters at every turn. Read our full The Tourist series review here!

THE TOURIST is a new HBO Max limited series that was co-produced with BBC. In fact, the series originally premiered in the UK on January 1, 2022. Jamie Dornan is the absolute star of this story in the title role.

ALSO READ Our review of The Tourist Season 2 >

The actual storyline plays out in Australia and you’ll meet the most amazing and quirky characters. From the beginning of this story, you’ll both be laughing and feeling the terror that the main character is experiencing. It’s a truly wild ride of a mystery thriller.

Continue reading our The Tourist series review below and find all six episodes on HBO Max now. On February 1, 2024, it is also available on Netflix in the US.

Jamie Dornan is  The Tourist

When you look at the casting, you’ll see that Jamie Dornan ( The Fall series, Synchronic ) plays “The Man”. This is obviously due to the fact that the core plot is all about him losing all his memories after a car crash. Or rather, he is forced off the road by a truck in the middle of the Australian outback.

When he wakes up in the hospital, he has no ID or phone to help him figure out who he is. However, since Jamie Dornan was born in Belfast and uses his real accent in  The Tourist , it’s clear that he isn’t an Aussie. So far, so good.

The series has six episodes and by the end of episode two, you’ll hear his name. However, you should (and will) continue to doubt all the information you come across. Just like “The Man” is ultimately forced to. It seems impossible to truly trust many. If anyone!

Danielle Macdonald shines!

Along with Jamie Dornan as “The Man” (or simply, “The Tourist”), there is another actor carrying the main elements of the plot in this series. It’s the mesmerizing and heartwarming Danielle Macdonald who plays Helen Chambers. A traffic cop who is in training to become a detective.

Danielle Macdonald is absolutely magical in  The Tourist . Every single scene with her just made me either smile or get teary-eyed. From the first time we see her and she’s fumbling and quite insecure, she won me over.

You might recognize Danielle Macdonald from the Netflix movie  Dumplin’  (2018) where she played the title role. Also, she was in the Netflix horror movie Bird Box (2018) which became a worldwide mega-hit

MORE DANIELLE MACDONALD She also played a key role in the amazing Netflix series  Unbelievable  based on a true story >

Overall, the HBO Max series The Tourist really is chockful of the most quirky, enigmatic characters at every turn. Often portrayed by actors you’ll recognize such as Damon Herriman. He portrayed Charles Manson in both  Mindhunter   and  Once Upon a Time in Hollywood .

Also, the Icelandic actor Ólafur Darri Ólafsson ( Cursed ), who is as big as a house. He is perfect as an American cowboy type. Shalom Brune-Franklin ( Roadkill series ) plays a very important role in “The Man” figuring out more about his identity. Well, maybe. You’ll see!

Watch The Tourist on HBO Max now – on Netflix later!

The Tourist was written by Harry Williams and Jack Williams. The two previously worked on various TV series as both writers and producers. They created the BBC crime-thriller series  Liar  (2017-2020) and produced a series such as Fleabag . A series that certainly also excels at having quirky characters.

The six episodes in this limited series are divided by two directors. These directors are Chris Sweeney ( Back to Life series on Showtime ) and Daniel Nettheim ( Broadchurch , Ash vs Evil Dead ). They each directed three episodes of this BBC and HBO Max series.

If you enjoy a good mystery full of twists, turns, and very  entertaining characters, then you do not want to miss out on  The Tourist  on HBO Max. It’s a real treat and a genre-hybrid in all the best ways.

The Tourist  is out on HBO Max from March 3, 2022. From February 1, 2024, season 1 will be added to Netflix in the US, and season 2 will come to Netflix on February 29.

Writers: Harry Williams & Jack Williams Directors: Chris Sweeney, Daniel Nettheim Cast: Jamie Dornan, Danielle Macdonald, Shalom Brune-Franklin, Damon Herriman, Alex Dimitriades, Ólafur Darri Ólafsson, Kamil Ellis

In the miniseries, a British man finds himself in the glowing red heart of the Australian outback being pursued by a vast tank truck trying to drive him off the road. An epic cat and mouse chase unfolds and the man later wakes in hospital, hurt, but somehow alive. Except he has no idea who he is. With merciless figures from his past pursuing him, The Man’s search for answers propels him through the vast and unforgiving outback.

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About The Author

Karina "ScreamQueen" Adelgaard

I write reviews and recaps on Heaven of Horror. And yes, it does happen that I find myself screaming, when watching a good horror movie. I love psychological horror, survival horror and kick-ass women. Also, I have a huge soft spot for a good horror-comedy. Oh yeah, and I absolutely HATE when animals are harmed in movies, so I will immediately think less of any movie, where animals are harmed for entertainment (even if the animals are just really good actors). Fortunately, horror doesn't use this nearly as much as comedy. And people assume horror lovers are the messed up ones. Go figure!

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HBO Max continues stealth drops of some of the best drama mini-series on television. Last year highlights included “The Head” and “ Station Eleven ,” and they start 2022 strongly with the fantastic “The Tourist,” a twisty tale that plays like an Aussie version of “ Fargo .” With sharp dialogue, clever plotting, and career-best work from Jamie Dornan and Danielle Macdonald , this is a great little thriller, a show that constantly keeps you guessing and entertained in equal measure.

The “ Belfast ” and “ Fifty Shades of Grey ” star plays an unnamed man (at least for a while) who is driving through the very remote Australian outback. He stops at a station to use the bathroom, banters with the guy behind the counter, and hits the road again. Looking in the rearview mirror, he sees a truck gaining on him with remarkable speed. The Man twists off the road to avoid it and the trucker follows, revealing through a POV from his cab that this is very intentional—he’s trying to kill this tourist. They race through the desert until The Man’s car crashes. He wakes up in a hospital with no memory of who he is or how he got there.

Enter a small-town officer named Helen Chambers (Macdonald), engaged to an awful man named Ethan ( Greg Larsen ) and thrust into a mystery about who this handsome Irishman is in a hospital bed. When The Man finds a note with a time and a location in his pocket, he heads to a small town called Burnt Ridge, where he meets a woman named Luci ( Shalom Brune-Franklin ) who might know about his past, ends up crossing paths with a sociopath ( Ólafur Darri Ólafsson ) who clearly wants him dead, and gets a phone call from a man who’s been buried underground. And then things get even weirder.

Created by the people behind the excellent “ The Missing ” (which aired stateside on Starz), the writing on “The Tourist” is a metronomic back and forth between reveals and how those reveals propel the narrative in a new direction. Pushing their way through all the chaos are Dornan and Macdonald, both phenomenal. Dornan finds a quirky, unsettled way to play a man who doesn’t know who he is without resorting to the cliché of the lost soul. If anything, he leans into more of a blank slate interpretation of amnesia, playing a guy who’s more open to what comes next because he can’t remember what came before. And Macdonald is charming and so incredibly likable that she becomes the heart of a show that can be cold at times.

Echoes of “ Memento ” and “Fargo” aside, “The Tourist” also has its own quirky personality. Some of those quirks get a bit extreme in late-season episodes in ways I can’t spoil, but the show is never boring. It’s a reminder that the Dornan who was so great in “ The Fall ” is still out there, and I hope it leads him to more bizarre, challenging roles like this one. There’s an argument to be made that there’s an even-better 100-minute movie in this six-episode mini-series, but that’s not the world we’re in right now. A story like this has a better chance to be told in the TV system than the mid-budget film one, and the writers don’t drag their feet or spin their wheels like so many streaming thrillers. They’re constantly moving our hero forward, keeping us uncertain about his past and even his moral center.

Some will argue that “The Tourist” gets too convoluted and I’ll admit that I enjoyed the playful uncertainty of the first half of the season more than the intensity of the second half. Although the show does get deeper in how it unpacks lies we tell ourselves and those we listen to from other people. It turns out that everyone on "The Tourist" has a secret or two, and almost all of them could use a car accident to reset the hole they've dug for themselves. 

I'm not sure how intentional it is but the show never stopped reminding me of some of my favorite early Coen films—the noir danger of “ Blood Simple ,” the open roads of “ Raising Arizona ” (and a bearded hunter who seems unkillable), Macdonald’s very Marge Gunderson character—and yet these nods to greats are embedded in a breakneck plot that never slows down enough to distract from its own inspired storytelling. Take the trip.

Brian Tallerico

Brian Tallerico is the Managing Editor of RogerEbert.com, and also covers television, film, Blu-ray, and video games. He is also a writer for Vulture, The Playlist, The New York Times, and GQ, and the President of the Chicago Film Critics Association.

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The Tourist (2022)

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Jamie Dornan as The Man

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Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Tourist’ On Netflix, Where Jamie Dornan Plays A Man Without His Memory Trying To Outrun His Past

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• The Tourist

What would you do if you lost your memory? Not just what you had for breakfast, but all sense of who you are and who is in your life? Then you find out that someone really, really wants to see you dead? That’s the idea behind the new Netflix series, which originally ran on HBO Max back in 2022.

THE TOURIST : STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Scenes of the arid environment in the Australian Outback. A tiny car drives down an empty road.

The Gist: A man (Jamie Dornan) stops for gas; he’s wearing a generic “AUSTRALIA” tourist t-shirt. He has no idea why the attendant at the station makes him sign out for the bathroom key. We see him come out the back door of the bathroom, next to the Dumpsters.

As he’s driving on the seemingly empty road in his tiny Mazda, a massive tractor trailer bears down on him. When the tractor trailer rams the man’s car, he realizes it’s not just an aggressive driver. After a long chase over some rough terrain, the man thinks he’s gotten away from the truck, when the truck slams into him, causing the tiny car to roll over a few times.

The man wakes up in the local hospital, surprisingly not severely injured. However, he has no idea who he is or what he was doing. He doesn’t even remember his own name. He can recall a song title when he’s in an MRI machine, but that’s about it.

A friendly local cop, Helen Chambers (Danielle Macdonald), goes to his room to take a statement. She is a bit uncomfortable with the man’s lack of memory, but ends up being reassuring to an extent. The only thing he finds in his possessions is a note to meet someone the next day at a diner in a nearby town. Helen says she’ll look into that.

We follow Helen home and see that, like most of us, she has issues with her weight, not the least of which is exacerbated by her fiancé Ethan (Greg Larsen) and their upcoming wedding.

Another thing we see is someone buried underground. Desperate to get out of whatever box he’s been put in, he tries to call someone on his phone, but no one is answering.

The man goes outside to get air, but gets lost inside the hospital, scaring him senseless. He decides to check himself out of the hospital the next day, against medical advice, because he needs to go to that diner and find out just who wanted to meet him there. Helen understands why he wants to do it, and gives him a bus ticket to get there.

At the diner, he meets a waitress named Luci (Shalom Brune-Franklin), who seems to be fascinated by his amnesia. When she spills lemonade on him, she takes him out to where there are bathrooms. Just then, there’s an explosion, right in the booth where he was sitting. He wonders aloud why in the world someone is trying to kill him.

Pictures from a disposable camera found at the crash site help him retrace his steps, as well as video from the gift shop he visited. It brings him back to the gas station and its bathroom. He doesn’t find out his name though, as he signed the key sign-out sheet as “Crocodile Dundee.” But he finds something else; a stuffed koala that he hid next to the Dumpster. Much to his surprise, it starts ringing.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Take the movie  Memento and cross it with the quirkiness of the first season of the  Fargo series, and you’ve got the vibe of  The Tourist.

Our Take: The Tourist , written by Harry Williams and Jack Williams ( The Missing, Fleabag ) looks like it’s a complex show with a twisty plot, but when you really take a close look, it’s pretty straightforward. Dornan’s character has no idea who he is; all he knows is that someone wants to kill him. With the help of Helen and others, he’ll try to piece things together before those that are after him, including Billy (Ólafur Darri Ólafsson), the whistling man who almost squashed him in the tractor trailer, catch up to him.

In the first episode,  The Tourist  evolves from what seems like a thriller to a more personal narrative. It’s why we get involved in Helen’s life when she’s off-duty. In a Weight Watchers-style meeting, she claims she doesn’t like her body, even though everyone is yelling about body acceptance. But it also feels like she’s more there because of her fiancé than anything else. So even though Helen knows her name, who’s in her life and what she does, she also hasn’t found herself. Plus, she seems to be made to feel guilty about just about everything.

Perhaps as she gets more involved in the life of Dornan’s character, the more she will figure out who she is. At least that’s what we hope, because Macdonald is utterly charming as Helen, who is very much in the vein of Allison Tolman’s portrayal of Molly Solverson in the aforementioned  Fargo. She’s good at her job, even if she’s a bit green, but also is a friendly and helpful sort who needs to help herself most of all.

There is definitely a bit of a sense of humor running the first episode, but the Williamses aren’t trying to make the show quippy. The humor is there when people seem to be fascinated with Dornan’s character’s amnesia, though he assures them it’s no picnic. The humor creeps in along the edges of the show, but it does just enough to ease what is a pretty serious and grim performance by Dornan.

There is one twist near the end of the episode that we won’t spoil here, but it does make us wonder if, as things get more complicated for Dornan’s character (notice we haven’t named him yet, because the character has none as yet), the plot will become more convoluted. We hope not, as it seems the straightforward manner in which this story is being told suits  The Tourist just fine.

Sex and Skin: Nothing in the first episode.

Parting Shot: When the stuffed koala starts ringing, the man digs out a burner phone and answers it. When the man who’s buried starts yelling in relief that he answered, the man says, “Uh, who’s this?”

Sleeper Star: Shalom Brune-Franklin does some compelling work as Luci, and we know that she’s much more involved in this story than most of the first episode lets on.

Most Pilot-y Line: Nothing we could find.

Our Call:  STREAM IT.  The Tourist  hooked us in with its story, plus the performances by Dornan, Macdonald and Brune-Franklin. Let’s hope the story continues to be interesting as the season goes on.

Joel Keller ( @joelkeller ) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com , VanityFair.com , Fast Company and elsewhere.

• Jamie Dornan
• Stream It Or Skip It

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Summary A British man (Jamie Dornan) tries to figure out why someone tried to drive him off the road in the Australian outback in the thriller series from Harry and Jack Williams. The second season on Netflix is set in Ireland.

Created By : Harry Williams, Jack Williams

The Tourist

All seasons.

Jamie Dornan

Elliot, the man.

Danielle Macdonald

Helen chambers, greg larsen.

Victoria Haralabidou

Lena pascal, shalom brune-franklin.

Olwen Fouéré

Niamh cassidy.

Ólafur Darri Ólafsson

Conor MacNeill

Detective ruairi slater, mark mckenna, fergal mcdonnell, nessa matthews, orla mcdonnell.

Diarmaid Murtagh

Donal mcdonnell.

Francis Magee

Frank mcdonnell.

Danny Adcock

Damon Herriman

Detective inspector lachlan rogers, kamil ellis, sergeant rodney lammon, damien strouthos.

Alex Dimitriades

Geneviève lemon, alex andreas, raresh dimofte, critic reviews.

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Race Across the World review: Return of BBC smash proves travel is best without a smartphone

The hit bbc travel-adventure show returns for its fourth series, and is best understood as being like tourism but in a more intense, concentrated and indeed exhausting form, article bookmarked.

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I have to admit that I find travel so exhausting that I’m at a loss as to why anyone would willingly watch an episode of Race Across the World , let alone have the stamina to keep up with the whole nine hours of viewing that lies before us.

Having tagged along vicariously for the first leg of their journey, north to south across most of Japan, Race is best understood as being like tourism but in a more intense, condensed, concentrated and indeed exhausting form. The five pairs of contestants, ranging from annoying siblings barely in their twenties to a reassuringly mellow couple in their sixties, are tasked with travelling from snowy Sapporo in northern Japan down to the paradise island of Lombok in Indonesia, via various waypoints in Korea, Cambodia and Malaysia – some 15,000 kilometres in total.

Just like any backpacking holiday, the idea is that you move as fast as possible for the least cost (the budget is fixed at £1,390, the price of two air tickets from Japan to Indonesia), and in order to make the best of the adventure try and squeeze in some sightseeing, local culture and pick up a bit of casual work along the way to pay the bills. So it is a race, in the sense that you want to get to the checkpoints and to Lombok first, and win the £20,000 prize money, but to do it within budget and with some actual pleasure along the way. It’s all about balancing these priorities, and that essential nuance gives the show its charm. The only forms of transport that are banned are planes and the ultra-fast Japanese bullet trains, which would spoil the vibe. They should probably call it “The Sort-of Race Across the World”, if accuracy is the thing.

This, therefore, isn’t a full-on scramble, like some version of Challenge Anneka or a leisurely, carefree Portillo-esque travelogue , but one where the contestants have to find a more optimal vacation balance. It was interesting that the winners on this first Japanese leg are Eugenie and Isabel, a mother and daughter who took a pretty long detour to see the isolated, tranquil and lovely offshore island of Sado, on the “wrong” coast from the point of view of sheer speed. It’s so off the beaten track, even for the Japanese, that it was once used as a place of exile for out of favour politicians and the like.

Yet they still arrived, after five days on the road and having missed a connection, two minutes before twins Alfie and Owen, who just about managed to squeeze in a glimpse of Mount Fuji along their supposedly efficient but actually overly panicky and rushed route. It seems that Isabel’s impressive attempt to get a random Japanese boy to teach her the language on a long bus ride paid off; public signage makes little concession to the foreigner, and the universally friendly citizenry speak surprisingly little English. Our contestants don’t remark on it, but Japanese society is an evidently self-sufficient affair, something visitors always find a novelty.

Stephen and Ivy, the retired couple, aren’t that bothered about coming first, and took their opportunity to tarry at a wasabi farm, pulling up roots, burning their mouths off and cadging a useful lift. Maybe it was something about the famous sauce, but Ivy unloaded how “unintentionally offensive” her husband of many years is, just as he’s asking his hosts how old they all are: “Some have learned to tolerate him, but I love him”. Touching.

What’s also striking about Race Across the World , and something sadly impractical in the “real” world away from reality TV, is how much richer the travel experience of all those involved is because they are deprived, under the rules of the show, of their smartphones. They end up exploring their relationships with their journey partners as much as the picturesque countryside and bustling cities.

The young siblings from Yorkshire, Betty and James, for example, seem to be getting to know each other for the first time on Japanese trains and in random cafes, despite having grown up together. Something similar is also true of the two sets of mum and daughter: Eugenie and Isabel, and Sharon and Brydie. Thrown together and almost forced to talk to one another rather than scrolling through social media, their personal odyssey acquires an emotional and, around the Buddhist shrines, a spiritual dimension. As noted by young James, an unimaginative traveller by his own admission, you don’t get that with a week “having it off in Ayia Napa”. A different kind of pursuit, that.

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NEWS... BUT NOT AS YOU KNOW IT

Race Across The World fans shocked after BBC scraps part they ‘can’t stand’

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Race Across The World viewers have been left in shock after noticing a massive change that’s been made to the BBC series.

Thankfully for plenty of fans, some of them actually ‘couldn’t stand’ the element of the show anyway… so all’s well that ends well!

The competitors on the fourth season of the programme have set off on their journeys across Eastern Asia to try and bag the top prize at the end, following stringent rules every step of the way.

During the latest episode, several viewers noticed that a typical part of the show had been scrapped – the inclusion of recaps or previews.

TV critic Scott Bryan wrote on X: ‘Interesting that #RaceAcrossTheWorld doesn’t have a preview or recap.

‘Then again, with so many people watching this show on streaming and catchup, a lot of them will binge the ep and won’t need it anyway.’

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Responding to him, an X user called Simon added: ‘I’ve never understood the need for a recap. Unless it’s to foreground something you might have forgotten about that will suddenly become important. Less of an issue on a short series with a simple premise.’

Josh agreed, saying that in his opinion, it was never necessary and he’s glad that ‘they got straight into it’.

Rebecca remarked that she ‘can’t stand the recaps and previews’, and typically skips them altogether when they are included on programmes.

Interesting that #RaceAcrossTheWorld doesn’t have a preview or recap. Then again, with so many people watching this show on streaming and catchup, a lot of them will binge the ep and won’t need it anyway. — Scott Bryan (@scottygb) April 17, 2024

Don’t like those shows that show u what’s coming up on the show I’m about to sit and watch it I don’t need to see hats going to happen — Gary (@GaryS31571) April 17, 2024

I feel previews & recaps are so unnecessary these days…. — Bexy, let the music play….. (@begbiewhaack) April 17, 2024

I thought that too – prefer they get straight into it ! — Amisha (@amisha1982) April 17, 2024

The lack of a recap or previous on the most recent episode of Race Across The World wasn’t the only topic of conversation that sparked interest among viewers.

Fans were also left in a state of shock when they thought that they’d misheard the name of a particular location in South Korea .

Best friends Alfie and Owen were racing across the East Coast of South Korea on the BBC series, attempting to reach their second checkpoint Sokcho when they stopped in Samcheok, home of the penis park.

Yep, you read that right.

The best friends had some time to kill for sight-seeing, so opted to visit the famous Haesindang Park, remarking that the penis statues clearly brought tourists ‘from far and wide’.

‘I don’t know how to describe the penis park other than, it’s got a lot of penises,’ Alfie remarked, as he climbed on top of and sat on one of the genitals.

‘What a sight to behold this is,’ Owen replied, as they wished for luck from the legendary park.

Viewers were in hysterics after hearing about the special park, with actor Richard Price writing: ‘Alfie and Owen making memories in that special park in South Korea #topchoice.’

PENIS PARK??????? WHAT IS GOING ON?!!!!! 😂😂😂😂 #RaceAcrossTheWorld — Francesca 🌙✨ (@francescajayne_) April 17, 2024

Come again…..??!!!! Penis Park!!!? 😳🫣 #RaceAcrossTheWorld #RATW #BBC pic.twitter.com/bOPLB2El7M — MommaPeachieUK (@MommaPeachieUK) April 17, 2024

The Penis Park bit in #RaceAcrossTheWorld is already one of the funniest bits of television this year. Easily. — Alexander Fleming (@alextf.bsky.social) (@_alexfleming_) April 17, 2024

I think the “two tickets to the penis park please ” line should go down in television folklore #RaceAcrossTheWorld — David (@DavidBastin12) April 17, 2024

‘The Penis Park bit in #RaceAcrossTheWorld is already one of the funniest bits of television this year. Easily,’ Alexander added.

David echoed: ‘I think the “two tickets to the penis park please ” line should go down in television folklore.’

‘PENIS PARK??????? WHAT IS GOING ON?!!!!!’ Francesca wrote.

Villagers carved sculptures in some phallic shapes to sustain ‘good luck’ after a legend stated that a fisherman brought back the village’s hope of catching fish after urinating into the sea.

Alfie and Owen are up against two mother-daughter duos, Eugenie and Isabel, and Brydie and Sharon, married couple Stephen and Viv, and brother-sister pair Betty and James.

The teams are racing across 15,000 kilometres in several countries, travelling from Japan to Lombok against the clock, and leaving behind their smartphones, any internet access and bank cards in the hope of winning a £20,000 cash prize.

Race Across The World airs Wednesdays at 9pm on BBC One and iPlayer.

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Season 1 – The Tourist

Where to watch, the tourist — season 1.

Watch The Tourist — Season 1 with a subscription on Netflix.

What to Know

Jamie Dornan makes for a compelling guide through The Tourist , a beguiling drama that deepens its mystery with solid shocks and welcome moments of levity.

Audience Reviews

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Danielle Macdonald

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Dubai floods: Chaos, queues and submerged cars after UAE hit by record rains

Passengers report being stranded in the desert city as the international hub struggles in the wake of unusually heavy rain

Don’t blame cloud seeding for the Dubai floods

Dubai is wrestling with the aftermath of extraordinary torrential rains that flooded the desert city, with people describing harrowing stories of spending the night in their cars, and air passengers enduring chaotic scenes at airports.

Up to 259.5mm (10.2in) of rain fell on the usually arid country of the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday, the most since records began 75 years ago . The state-run WAM news agency called the rains on Tuesday “a historic weather event” that surpassed “anything documented since the start of data collection in 1949”.

As the sun returned on Wednesday, along with it came stories of people stuck in cars and offices through an arduous night.

“It was one of the most horrific situations I had ever experienced,” said one Dubai resident in his 30s, who did not want to give his name, after his 15-minute commute turned into a 12-hour ordeal on flooded roads.

At Dubai’s airport, one of the busiest for international travel, with nearly every flight repeatedly delayed, Emirates passengers were told to stay away “unless absolutely necessary”.

Frustration from those already there began to build.

A large crowd formed at a connections desk, clapping and whistling in protest as they waited for information.

“They are completely lost, it’s complete chaos – no information, nothing,” fumed one passenger, who did not want to be named, after a 12-hour wait, Agence France-Presse reported.

Standing water lapped on taxiways as aircraft landed. One couple called the situation “absolute carnage”. They spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity in order to speak freely in a country with strict laws that criminalise critical speech. “You cannot get a taxi. There’s people sleeping in the Metro station. There’s people sleeping in the airport.”

The BBC reported other passengers were diverted to Dubai World Central Airport – also known as Al Maktoum airport – telling the broadcaster they had been “living on duty free” and that water was in short supply.

One furious British traveller told PA Media that once his flight was diverted to Dubai World Central, he had not been given any food or water either. “It’s just been an absolute disaster. We’re stuck here and seven hours without a single update is inexcusable.”

Emirates, Dubai’s flagship airline, posted on X on Wednesday night: “Customers should expect delays with departures and arrivals” and that while some passengers had been able to get to their destinations “we are aware that many are still waiting to get on flights”.

The airline cancelled all check-ins and announced that it would continue to suspend services until Thursday morning, apologising for the disruptions. Those on FlyDubai, Emirates’ low-cost sister airline, also faced delays.

Dubai airport posted on X early on Thursday that flights had resumed from Terminal 1 but urged people to travel to the airport only if they had a confirmed booking, as flights continued to be “delayed and disrupted”.

Paul Griffiths, the airport’s CEO, acknowledged the issues with flooding on Wednesday. “It remains an incredibly challenging time. In living memory, I don’t think anyone has ever seen conditions like it,” Griffiths told the state-owned talk radio station Dubai Eye.

Neighbouring countries were also hit by heavy rains earlier this week, including Oman, where 20 people have died, including 10 schoolchildren swept away in a vehicle with an adult.

Soldiers were deployed to badly affected areas of the sultanate, which rests on the eastern edge of the Arabian peninsula, to evacuate people trapped by flooding.

Schools will stay closed in Dubai until next week, authorities said, underscoring the difficulty of the clean-up.

In an unusual direct intervention, the UAE president, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, ordered “authorities to quickly work on studying the condition of infrastructure throughout the UAE and to limit the damage caused”, official media said.

The president also gave orders for affected families to be transferred to safe locations, said a statement carried by the WAM news agency.

Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, wrote on X about “efforts being made by teams of citizens and residents that continue day and night” as the city’s media office posted video overlayed with dramatic music of officials conferring in groups and water pumping appearing to take place in the background.

Photos too were posted of what it said showed water flooding into desert areas.

صور من جريان الأودية في صحراء القدرة في #دبي pic.twitter.com/pyXP8OpBVF — Dubai Media Office (@DXBMediaOffice) April 17, 2024

Similar scenes were visible around the Gulf state including in Sharjah, in neighbouring Dubai, where people waded through main streets and paddled around on makeshift boats.

At least one person was killed in the flooding. A 70-year-old man who was swept away in his car in Ras al-Khaimah, one of the country’s seven emirates, according to police.

The UAE government announced that remote working for most federal government employees had been extended into another day because of the impact.

Agence France-Presse, PA Media and Associated Press contributed to this report

• United Arab Emirates
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Dubai streets still flooded as authorities scramble to clean up – video

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