TV’s battle of The Freaks — Can Wentworth’s Pamela Rabe out-menace Prisoner’s Maggie Kirkpatrick

CAN Wentworth’s Pamela Rabe out-menace Prisoner’s Maggie Kirkpatrick in infamous role?

Pamela Rabe joins Wentworth as Joan “The Freak’ Ferguson. Supplied by Foxtel

AND she’s supposed to be on the side of the good guys?

From the moment new governor Joan Ferguson stalks into Wentworth Correctional Centre it’s clear here is a formidable force.

Maggie Kirkpatrick as the original The Freak.

Pamela Rabe as Joan “The Freak’ Ferguson.

In the original Prisoner series, “The Freak”, played by Maggie Kirkpatrick became a fearsome, merciless and terrifying icon.

Which gives acclaimed stage and theatre actor Pamela Rabe big shoes to fill in The Freak’s reimagining for Wentworth.

But her version of The Freak is pure steel, calculation and menace from the outset.

“Society has deemed these women defective and it’s our job to fix them,” The Freak says in her opening address to staff.

“Not to pander, to befriend, to indulge or accommodate. We exist to correct.”

The delivery is more than chilling. It’s positively arctic.

■ Wentworth, Tuesday, 8.30pm, SoHo

Maggie Kirkpatrick and Julianne Newbould in scene from <i>Prisoner</i>.