London-born Chris Vance has been kicking around American television for a few years now, and though he rejects the title "action hero," his best-known roles have involved enough explosions to make it unavoidable.

With typical British modesty, he told "Collider" magazine that, "I don't consider myself an action hero at all. My domestic life is the same as anyone else's ... If you take yourself too seriously, you're dead in the water."

Actually, it may be the "hero" part that hasn't always fit. Some of his best-known roles prior to his current one have been villains, in such hits as "Burn Notice" (playing Mason Gilroy in season 3), "Dexter" (as Cole Harmon in season 5) and "Prison Break" (playing James Whistler in the third and fourth seasons).

That's not to say it's been all bad. He had a recurring role as a soldier (and love interest to Jane Rizzoli) on TNT's "Rizzoli & Isles" and starred in his very own feel-good medical drama, "Mental," playing a brilliant psychiatrist solving medical mysteries.

That brings us up to today and his role as a reluctant hero on "Transporter: The Series." Well, not quite to today. The episodes being seen now on TNT are actually two years old, having aired in Canada and elsewhere in 2012.

The series was originally produced by another American channel, Cinemax, along with Canada's Movie Network and Movie Central, and companies in Germany and France. Cinemax decided not to air the finished product, though it did air in the other three countries.

TNT has picked up Cinemax's slack and started airing the show's first season, and has already agreed to air the second (which is airing now in the other markets).

The "The Series" part of the show's title is there to differentiate it from the film franchise on which it's based. Vance's role, Frank Martin, a former special forces soldier turned delivery man to high-end criminals, was played in those films by his fellow Brit, Jason Statham.

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