“Smoke,” a nine-part AppleTV+ series about arson investigators, is created and scripted by bestselling Boston author (“Mystic River”) Dennis Lehane who was inspired by “Firebug,” a true crime podcast.

Taron Egerton (Elton John in “Rocketman”) stars as fire sleuth Dave Gudsen. “Smoke” is a reunion with Lehane following a previous fact-inspired series “Black Bird.”

“For any actor, an opportunity like Dave Gudsen is a very rich prospect. But I’m in a place where,” Egerton, 35, said in a Zoom interview, “if Dennis asks me to do something, I’m there! Because I’m in awe of his imaginative capabilities.”

“Smoke,” intense and unrelenting, charts how for two years, two serial arsonists have plagued the Pacific Northwest which Gudsen, the cocky arson investigator, has yet to catch, much less stop. Which is why Michelle Calderone, Jurnee Smollett’s detective, has been sent in.

That sets Dave spinning and we quickly see his complexities. How easily he’s given to explosions of rage and pathetic delusions. Is this one sick puppy?

“Yeah, all those things. The first thing that occurs to me about Dave is that he’s not connected to himself.

“Any healthy adult has got the capacity to be self-reflective, introspective. Able to evaluate who you are and aim for growth.

“Dave doesn’t have that ability. He sees himself in terms of crude archetypes and in absolutist terms.

“So if you ask me who I am, I’d probably say 10 quite conflicting things. If you ask Dave, he’d say, ‘I’m a hero.’ Who the hell says that about himself?

“He’s a creature ruled entirely by ego. He’s found this ridiculous coping mechanism for the lack of ability to reconcile the different facets of himself. That coping mechanism involves destruction. Dave is a tragic man.”

While the Welsh Egerton’s American accent is impeccable, to play this arson investigator was being more imaginative than exact.

“We had consultants on set who were invaluable in being supportive and showing us the right way of doing things. Only the character I play is a little bit off.

“So, I never felt that it was massively important for Dave to be the most well-observed arson investigator.

“Because when you really get a handle on who Dave is, he isn’t someone who’s playing by the rules.

“He has a certain skill set, which he describes in the early part of the show. But he’s also something else: Dave would love to see himself as a self-styled renegade.

“So I didn’t get too hung up on protocol or procedure. Frankly, what was always much more interesting was all of the weird ways in which his psyche is totally skewed.”

AppleTV+ streams the first two episodes of “Smoke” June 27