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Shannon is 22. Her dad is a fearsome gangster. Her mum is an uncanny amalgamation of a Stepford and mob wife. Her brother’s a computer nerd; her gran is a hard-as-nails nymphomaniac. Shannon doesn’t have a job, hobbies or much of a social life. Instead, she hangs round her parents’ house, set amid swathes of brown scrubland on the outskirts of an anonymous Scottish town, waiting to fall in love. Mint begins on the day she does – at first sight, no less – across the tracks of a deserted train station.
Sparks fly, literally as well as figuratively. Having made her name with Scrapper – a funny, poignant and delightfully creative film about a grieving girl reunited with her estranged father – 31-year-old writer-director Charlotte Regan’s first proper TV project is patently the work of an auteur. A patchwork of VHS-style footage, surreal daydream sequences, gorgeously odd framing and special effects that stay on the right side of YA kookiness, Mint might be the most outrageously beautiful television show since Twin Peaks. I’ve certainly never witnessed a more visually stunning masturbation scene than the one in the opening episode. As Emma Laird’s Shannon fantasises about Arran, her new paramour, the lights of the surrounding suburbs flicker violently before sparks from industrial machinery arc across the screen and armed police jog silently into her family home.
That last bit isn’t a metaphor. Despite the aesthetic triumph, Mint is set not in a world of beauty but one of extreme ugliness. We never get any solid information about the criminal underworld Shannon’s dad, Dylan (Sam Riley) rules, but he certainly seems like a bloodthirsty thug: at a family function he orders an associate to beat up his own (adult) son, a twisted form of entertainment he refers to as “party games”. Shannon is too fixated on Arran (Benjamin Coyle-Larner, better known as the musician Loyle Carner) to give much thought to her father’s unsavoury antics. Until, that is, her mum, Cat (Laura Fraser) sees the object of her daughter’s affections and identifies him as a member of the rival clan who have been causing Dylan and co serious problems.
So far, so gritty 21st-century Romeo and Juliet. Except Mint doesn’t fully continue down that path. Explaining why would spoil a major plot development, but let’s just say that Arran and Shannon’s besotted bubble soon bursts, and this giddily euphoric romantic drama gives way to a sprawling study of trauma, power, loyalty and betrayal. Everyone’s a victim. Cat of the underage arranged marriage she rewrote as her great love story. Shannon of the ill-gotten gains that have cossetted her from harsh reality yet left her at the mercy of terrible men. Dylan – who abruptly walks away from his life of crime, including the Sopranos-style domestic bliss he shares with his wife and kids – of paternal expectation and warped masculine ideals.
Mint’s attempts to delve into the psychological reality behind gangland glamour is broadly successful. Laird plays Shannon with a refreshing combination of bolshie swagger and pure-hearted naivety, Breaking Bad’s Fraser is exceptional as the desperately out-of-her-depth Cat and the impressionistic style makes everyone’s inner torment all the more immersive. Meanwhile, the usual kicks of an organised crime drama are largely absent: there is no hoary detective in hot pursuit, no risky heist to pull off, no undercover agent on the verge of being unmasked. Despite concluding with a mesmerisingly tense finale that returns us to Shakespearean tragedy territory, Mint is less superficially satisfying than your stock gangster thriller – something that was clearly a deliberate, trope-dodging choice.
Still, Mint is a gangster thriller. On the one hand, you can understand why Regan chose to apply her gifts to chronicling this world of heightened emotions and complex alliances. On the other, it feels like a bit of a wasted opportunity. Scrapper proved Regan could infuse tedium with cinematic magic while providing strikingly compassionate insight into knotty, sad yet relatable relationships. Mint (an excellently droll name for a Manchester-based crime show, a slightly confusing choice for one set in Scotland) isn’t quite as emotionally resonant, perhaps because its characters are harder to identify with. And should we really feel so obliged to do so? Surely more than enough screen time has already been devoted to humanising hardened criminals and their kin.
If you’re suffering from gangster fatigue, this oblique spin on the genre might not be quite enough of a departure to win you over. Nevertheless, Regan’s TV debut remains an undeniably impressive feat with an incredible payoff – and if your eyes are in need of a treat, Mint is guaranteed to deliver.
