Andrew Lincoln Discovers His Inner Rage In the First Images From ITV's 'Cold Water'

Nearly fifteen years after his last appearance in the 2010 series Strike Back, British actor Andrew Lincoln (The Walking Dead) is finally set to return to British TV in the forthcoming ITV thriller Cold Water. Unfortunately, for those (read: me) who were fervently hoping for a return to his more romantic Love Actually or Wuthering Heights-inspired roots, his new series certainly sounds as though it has some unexpected dark edges and an uncomfortably timely hook.

We've all read about it: The men aren't okay. Whether it's the supposed male loneliness epic, their struggles to connect with the fairer sex, or the long-tail emotional impact of toxic masculinity in society, right now is (at least allegedly) a rough time to be a guy. This attitude looks to be a big influence on this six-part series, which focuses on a middle-aged man chafing at the limits of his life as a stay-at-home father, and the ease with which a particularly charismatic leader can amplify, co-opt, and redirect those feelings into something much darker and more dangerous.

Lincoln plays John, a repressed man who can't deal with the fact that middle age has arrived and that fatherhood appears to be all he has to show for it. When a playground confrontation brings his identity crisis to a head, he suddenly decides to move his family out of London to the fictional rural village of Coldwater. There, he finds himself entangled with his charismatic next-door neighbor, a seemingly perfect pillar of the community who runs the local all-male book club and whose intense opinions speak to the anger John seems to be constantly carrying with him.