The last time shirtless guys in their 20s showed off their Maori tats at the beach was on The GC. Here's another semi-local show, a little under the radar, a little weirder and darker.
New episodes of Tatau (Neon, Fridays) go online weekly on Sky's video-on-demand platform, just in case you needed another place to be overwhelmed by viewing options. (Freeview is keeping actors employed now, too.)
Although it might have escaped a wide publicity campaign here, Tatau was hyped for the UK's BBC3, which might've hoped it had another cult hit in the vein of Being Human (from the same production company) on its hands. BBC America and Touchpaper TV worked with New Zealand's South Pacific Pictures on this part-murder mystery, part travelogue, which goes some way to explaining why you'll hear at least four different accents.
Perhaps the ambitious show is aimed at teens who might warm to it post set-up but so far, it's patchy at best. A couple of lads from London escape their dodgy pasts for an adventure in Rarotonga. Before they leave, Kyle decides (like many clueless tourists and Robbie Williams before him) that he likes the look of a Maori moko and gets one on his arm in Croydon. The Cook Island locals aren't impressed he has no clue about its symbolism. And the new ink may explain - along with the hallucinogens he and his doofus mate decide to take on their first night with the help of a creepy American they meet in the bar - why he keeps seeing a dead girl in the forest and, later, at the bottom of the ocean.
