Ride or Die began with a typical day for a fiftysomething woman in a TV drama. Having assassinated a Russian oligarch in an Alpine mountain resort, Judith (Hannah Waddingham) skied away with Olympian speed, effortlessly evading capture by the many goons who pursued her, right until they crashed into trees. Back on solid ground, she went into a bar where she beat all the blokes in drinking games, before pulling a hunky young barman who was heartbroken the following morning when she made it clear that this was merely a one-night stand. Then, zooming home in a sporty Merc, she still found time to call her friend Debbie in London with the assurance that ‘I’ll be back for book club’.
But prior to the white wine and literary chat, Judith first had to contact the shadowy agency (is there any other kind?) she works for and receive some dismaying news. Sam, her apparently teenage line manager, passed on the director’s disapproval of her rule-breaking ways and tried to pension her off with a Patek Philippe watch. Judith, of course, was having none of it. Understandably terrified of her, Sam agreed to give her a one-last-chance job: killing Billy Donovan, head of a London crime syndicate. Much to Judith’s disgust, though, the agency’s chosen weapon was poison. (‘Poison’s a coward’s game,’ she protested. ‘Where’s the showmanship?’)
