A high-budget series set in the Outer Hebrides – it’s hard to believe it’s taken this long, given how popular subtitled TV is. It’s a good, solid series, even if the plot stretches credulity

It is difficult to imagine An t-Eilean being made even 10 years ago. It is billed as the UK’s first ever “high-end” Gaelic drama series, which means, I think, that it was expensive to make (a report last year put it at £1m for each of its four episodes). The title translates as The Island, and it is set mostly on the Western Isles, which makes it breathtakingly beautiful and means that everyone is in possession of a good solid coat. An t-Eilean exists thanks to renewed interest in and support for the speaking of Gaelic and, with subtitles no longer being seen as a barrier to enjoyment, has a strong shot at winning over an audience far larger than the 60,000 or so fluent speakers in Scotland.

Local businessman and boy-done-good Sir Douglas Maclean (Iain Macrae) is one of the richest men in Scotland, having outgrown his humble beginnings as “the proud son of a bin man”, and he and his family now live in a baronial mansion on the shoreline of Harris. The Macleans and their more loyal members of staff appear to lord it over the local people, some of whom are their tenants, and there is a distinct tension brewing between rich and poor. When Sir Douglas and his wife, Lady Mary, are attacked at home, there is one obvious suspect, and no shortage of potential others who might have been eager to dole out his comeuppance.

An t-Eilean aired on BBC Alba and is on BBC iPlayer now.