TV Pick of the Week: Kaos - review by Yvette Huddleston

And the programme makers have assembled an extremely classy cast – Jeff Goldlum as Zeus for starters. What an absolutely inspired piece of casting, few actors can do narcissistic petulance better than Goldblum and the king of the Gods was the very definition of petulant narcissism. Goldblum is clearly having a great deal of fun as a blingy Zeus – all gold watches and eye-catching leisure wear – living in his shiny-wallpapered palace with his steely, formidable wife Hera (Janet McTeer) who is forever turning those who displease her into bees. We see her tending affectionately to her bee hives in the beautiful gardens of their palatial home, a tenderness she does not display towards anyone else, least of all her stepson Dionysus (Nabhaan Rizwan).

Prometheus (Stephen Dillane) is occasionally summoned by Zeus from the cliff face where he is hanging with an eagle eternally pecking at his liver – a situation he has been placed in by Zeus – to offer up some home truths, soothing homilies and wise words. Dillane’s voiceover guides us through the story which opens with a monument to Zeus being unveiled in Krete that turns out to have been vandalised by a gang of Trojans. This incident, as well as the discovery of a new wrinkle on his forehead, throws Zeus into a tailspin, believing it is the beginning of a prophecy which will see his reign replaced by chaos. He starts to plot his revenge against humanity, despite Hera advising him not to.

Meanwhile Dionysus, desperately seeking a purpose finds one when rock star Orpheus (Killian Scott) loses his beloved wife Eurydice, known as Riddy (Aurora Perrineau) in a road traffic accident. What Orpheus doesn’t know is that Riddy was planning to leave him and he is desperate to see her again. Which is where Dionysus comes in, offering to help him enter the Underworld and find his lost love.

Also in the starry cast is Billie Piper as the soothsayer Cassandra, distraught that no-one believes her prophecies, who predicts Riddy’s death when she bumps into her in a supermarket. And there is a lovely turn from David Thewliss as a business-like Hades, presiding over a monochrome underworld.