Mostly, though, this is a compelling work, led by Firth’s lionhearted performance.

Lockerbie: A Search For The Truth is carried by Colin Firth, but its concentration on one man’s quest for the truth also keeps the show’s writers and producers from drifting into melodrama around a real-life terrorist act.

The supporting cast (including reliable British faces, like Mark Bonnar, and Iranian actor Ardalan Esmaili, who convincingly inhabits the convicted bomber, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi) orbit this stellar performance. But from the moment Swire realises his daughter has died – a gut punch that many viewers will find hard to watch – to the bitter end of his fight, this is Firth’s show.

There’s some controversy surrounding this show, as there are many people who don’t agree with Jim’s hypothesis about what actually occurred that fateful day, but Lockerbie reads more as a character study about Jim and his perspective than as propaganda trying to get viewers to agree with him — and Firth makes it well worth a watch.

This initial offering is full of good performances and good intentions but remains affectless. An intriguing puzzle only to anyone too young to remember the event – or at least the headlines and the shock of the country – for themselves.

This drama is strongest when it focuses on the human fallout.

As a domestic drama, it’s one-note — or rather two-note, as Jane alternates between exasperation and support. The series pays no more attention to Swire’s family than he seems to. Firth is onscreen throughout, but because the story is fragmented, jumping ahead for years at a time, he lacks the space to create a full-blown character. (Others fare even less well.)