Portrait of Ray Shoesmith (Scott Ryan), a tall, dark, fit not particularly handsome divorcee of 42. If you live in Sydney you might have seen him cheering his daughter on at a girls soccer game or at the park picking up after his dog Boof. Living alone in a modest flat, driving a modest car and dressing modestly you more than likely wouldn't have noticed him.
Easy-going, low-key with a warm smile and a twinkle in his eye he can be taken for pleasant and normal, good-natured but not overly friendly, shy but boring. He can be so deceptively soft-spoken and polite you wouldn't know to count yourself lucky that a fleeting encounter was all you had with him.
Ray wouldn't want you to give him a second look under the vast majority of circumstances. The same twinkle and smile can form a telling leer that signals his darker tendencies. Cross him and there will be trouble. He never fights fair.
Ray is similar to a fair number of likeable blokes his age. He's been married but it didn't work out. He still tries to be a good father to his little girl Brittany. His brother Bruce (Nicholas Cassim) has special needs and Ray is there for him trying to be a good sibling. His best mate Gary is married to Tatiana (Lizzie Schebesta), a complicated woman with an even more complicated family. He tries to help Gary where needed.
Helping Gary includes pretending to have left a porn DVD at Gary's flat that Tatiana finds objectionable due to its use of urine - ergo this episode's title. Ray is far from delighted to do it, and entirely embarrassed as well as disgusted by the whole thing. His mate is evidently worth such a sacrifice though it is not immediately clear why.
Ray's work life remains a source of angst. Whilst retaining a professional demeanour and carrying the wisdom of two decades experience, he nevertheless hasn't risen very far within his milieu. A competent mid-strata functionary, he finds himself covering for the mistakes of others and showing younger associates a better way of accomplishing tasks.
A key difference from other workers having hit a kind of ceiling in their careers is that Ray is a violent criminal in the employ of a local crime lord Freddy (Damon Herriman). His boss is a soft touch and nearly as incompetent as a number of Ray's colleagues. As a result Ray is called upon to commit more acts of violence to straighten things out.
Not really looking for love, he nevertheless meets Ally (Brooke Satchwell), an attractive woman with smooth charm, who works in healthcare as a first responder and things go quite well between them.
By the end of this episode it offers him a more daunting challenge than he is used to. He is not going to be able to hide what he does, or how he does it from her for long. If he follows up on their meet-cute and it evolves into anything it is likely to be ill-fated.
The question is whether the promise of what it might offer has too much potential for Ray not to pursue.
What writer/star Scott Ryan means by the name "Mr. In-Between" I reckon refers to a kind of duality in Ray's nature and in his profession vs his public countenance. The violence he commits professionally sometimes seems appropriate to him in dealing with routine difficulties he has day to day.
Easy-going, low-key with a warm smile and a twinkle in his eye he can be taken for pleasant and normal, good-natured but not overly friendly, shy but boring. He can be so deceptively soft-spoken and polite you wouldn't know to count yourself lucky that a fleeting encounter was all you had with him.
Ray wouldn't want you to give him a second look under the vast majority of circumstances. The same twinkle and smile can form a telling leer that signals his darker tendencies. Cross him and there will be trouble. He never fights fair.
Ray is similar to a fair number of likeable blokes his age. He's been married but it didn't work out. He still tries to be a good father to his little girl Brittany. His brother Bruce (Nicholas Cassim) has special needs and Ray is there for him trying to be a good sibling. His best mate Gary is married to Tatiana (Lizzie Schebesta), a complicated woman with an even more complicated family. He tries to help Gary where needed.
Helping Gary includes pretending to have left a porn DVD at Gary's flat that Tatiana finds objectionable due to its use of urine - ergo this episode's title. Ray is far from delighted to do it, and entirely embarrassed as well as disgusted by the whole thing. His mate is evidently worth such a sacrifice though it is not immediately clear why.
Ray's work life remains a source of angst. Whilst retaining a professional demeanour and carrying the wisdom of two decades experience, he nevertheless hasn't risen very far within his milieu. A competent mid-strata functionary, he finds himself covering for the mistakes of others and showing younger associates a better way of accomplishing tasks.
A key difference from other workers having hit a kind of ceiling in their careers is that Ray is a violent criminal in the employ of a local crime lord Freddy (Damon Herriman). His boss is a soft touch and nearly as incompetent as a number of Ray's colleagues. As a result Ray is called upon to commit more acts of violence to straighten things out.
Not really looking for love, he nevertheless meets Ally (Brooke Satchwell), an attractive woman with smooth charm, who works in healthcare as a first responder and things go quite well between them.
By the end of this episode it offers him a more daunting challenge than he is used to. He is not going to be able to hide what he does, or how he does it from her for long. If he follows up on their meet-cute and it evolves into anything it is likely to be ill-fated.
The question is whether the promise of what it might offer has too much potential for Ray not to pursue.
What writer/star Scott Ryan means by the name "Mr. In-Between" I reckon refers to a kind of duality in Ray's nature and in his profession vs his public countenance. The violence he commits professionally sometimes seems appropriate to him in dealing with routine difficulties he has day to day.
