Paul Mescal Lookalike Contest Features in New Irish Crime Series

A new Irish crime series arriving on BBC One and iPlayer has found an unexpected way to acknowledge the cultural footprint of one of the country's most celebrated actors — by staging a Paul Mescal lookalike contest as a plot device. Tall Tales and Murder, adapted from Caimh McDonnell's first Dublin Trilogy novel, is a show that never lets the viewer settle, for better and for worse.

A Prestige Pedigree That Promises Much

The series carries considerable credentials behind the camera. Stuart Carolan, whose Love/Hate earned comparisons to The Wire as a defining portrait of Dublin's criminal underworld, wrote the adaptation. Chris Addison — a key creative voice on The Thick of It and Veep — co-created it. That combination of sharp political satire and gritty Irish crime drama ought to produce something singular. According to The Guardian Culture, which reviewed the series, the finished product gestures toward Channel 4's The End of the F\\\ing World, BBC Scotland's Guilt, and even a stripped-down Da Vinci Code* in its DNA — a broad tonal range that the show struggles to fully reconcile.

Aidan Gillen, himself a Wire alumnus, anchors a central mystery as a coma patient who wakes to reignite an underworld dispute over a cache of Celtic gold. The casting is knowing and sharp on paper; on screen, the gangland sequences that follow are described as more formulaic than the pedigree might suggest.

Where It Works — and Where It Fractures

The series is at its most engaging in its quieter, character-driven early passages. Ella Lily Hyland's care home worker Bridget is drawn with real texture — a woman managing addiction while tending to dementia patients with a mix of fierce dedication and dark humour. Her chemistry with Casey Walsh's reluctant night-shift recruit Paul, two people each carrying their own weight of damage, gives the show its emotional core. At 93, Sheila Flitton delivers a quietly masterful performance as Rose, a resident convinced she is still a child. These are the moments that suggest a more focused, affecting drama lurking beneath the noise.

The noise, however, is considerable. The show introduces gangsters, buried treasure, an unconventional romantic subplot, a dysfunctional care home staff, and that now-much-discussed Mescal lookalike contest — all within a six-episode run that accelerates rather than deepens as it progresses. The care home residents, so carefully established early on, are largely abandoned as the plot pivots toward its treasure-hunt mechanics, leaving threads conspicuously unresolved.

The Mescal Moment in Context

The lookalike contest is a brief but telling detail — a cultural shorthand that reflects just how thoroughly [Paul Mescal](/) has become embedded in the Irish popular imagination. His ascent from Normal People to Aftersun and beyond has made him a kind of ambient reference point in contemporary Irish culture, the way certain actors become synonymous with a national moment. It is worth noting that his influence extends well beyond the screen; he recently joined an open letter defending Sally Rooney amid a UK publishing dispute, and his personal life has drawn consistent media attention, including speculation surrounding Phoebe Bridgers' new music and his relationship with Gracie Abrams.

A Verdict That Is Hard to Ignore

Tall Tales and Murder is not a failure — it is too kinetic and too well-cast to earn that description. But it is a show that mistakes velocity for momentum, piling complication upon complication in a way that leaves the viewer stimulated rather than satisfied. The bones of something genuinely compelling are visible throughout, particularly in its central pairing and in Philippa Dunne's deliciously menacing gangster Ma Baker. Whether those bones ever fully articulate into a coherent body is another question. The series is streaming now on BBC iPlayer.