Review: "Honey", the Killing Eve prequel, brings Cold War spy comedy to BBC One
The Guardian's reviewer praises "Honey", a prequel to "Killing Eve" set in 1980s East Berlin, as highly entertaining, though he finds it grows more predictable as the season goes on.
British newspaper The Guardian has published a review of the television series "Honey", a prequel to "Killing Eve". Set in East Berlin during the Cold War of the 1980s, it is available on BBC One and the iPlayer streaming service. The reviewer describes it as a very entertaining spy comedy-thriller packed with naughty jokes.
The series opens with Graham Anderson (Rory Kinnear), a British "press attache", which is to say a spy handler, trying to cross into East Berlin with his wife Anne (Sonita Henry). Through a car chase, a number plate swap and a disguise, he smuggles in a young agent, Martha (Ann Skelly). Two years later, in 1982, Martha is stuck in low-level "honey trap" work: posing as a waitress in a bar, she lures men home and photographs them in compromising situations.
How the story develops
Bored, Martha forms an uneasy alliance with a self-assured CIA agent, Kurt Fischer (Nate Mann), and a risky entanglement with Friedrich Baumann (Jannis Niewöhner), a hunter of traitors for the Stasi, East Germany's security service. Martha and Kurt investigate a mysterious death that Baumann is also looking into, without his knowledge.
The reviewer praises Skelly's performance, the period-appropriate design and the choice of music. However, he feels the series becomes more predictable as the season goes on, and ends up far more conservative than first impressions suggest. He also criticises the way Martha is made to lust after both of the new men in her life.
Link to Killing Eve
Martha is the cover identity of Carolyn Martens, a character played by Fiona Shaw in "Killing Eve". The reviewer considers this connection superficial, adding nothing to the series. He says "Honey" reminds him of "Ponies", a show cancelled this year, though it is slightly less funny and thrilling. Overall, he concludes that there is room for both.
