DAMAGED SOULS (UNFORGOTTEN, SERIES 2)

 

There's a moment in the second series of 'Unforgotten' where TV's nicest detective duo actually fall out.

Nicola Walker's DCI Cassie Stuart and Sanjeev Bhaskar's DI Sunny Khan are tested by the grim details of their latest cold case and tempers begin to fray over different attitudes to one aspect of the investigation.

But this being 'Unforgotten,' their conflict doesn't last for very long, they soon patch it all up and they just get on with the work of establishing what really happened.

Having notched up an impressive first series, Chris Lang's police procedural for ITV faces its difficult second series by doing what it does best.

'Broadchurch' started to falter during its second run, with some viewers struggling with its focus on a trial relating to the events from the first.

The second season of Denmark's 'The Killing' also failed to match the potency of the original.

Series two of 'Unforgotten' has the same narrative structure that worked so well in the first and again it wades into some uncomfortable territory without resorting to the sensational.

The second series begins with the discovery of the remains of a man's body in a suitcase during the dredging of London's River Lea.

A watch is discovered on the body and also a pager.

Sunny's enquiries eventually establish that the watch dates back to 1990 and a missing man called David Walker, a troubled businessman and a Tory Party fundraiser.

The pager holds clues as to the circles the victim moved in prior to his death, with Cassie getting a tech wizz to help her recover the data.

Walker's wife, Lorraine Ashbourne's Tessa Nixon has long assumed he committed suicide, given his history of mental health problems and she is not as rattled as some might expect.

She has become a DI in Oxford since her husband disappeared and is rather bizzarely more focused on Cassie and Sunny's methods for eliciting information from her.

Now married to Douglas Hodge's Paul Nixon, her son Will Brown's Jason is socially awkward and worried about his inability to maintain relationships.

Jason is devastated to learn that his father was murdered and shows signs of strain.

Cassie, Sunny and their team's investigation increasingly starts to focus on Walker's predilection for sexual violence and his links to three individuals.

Mark Bonnar's Colin Osborne is a troubled, Glaswegian-born but Brighton based criminal barrister whose adoption of a six year old girl with his partner, Charlie Condou's Simon is jeopardised by a flash of temper in a supermarket car park.

Colin reacts after a homophobic insult is directed at his family while shopping and in a rush of blood to the head, he scores the individual's car with his own car key.

This, however, is witnessed by Josef Altin's Tyler who is the drug addicted father of the girl the couple are trying to adopt.

Tyler begins to blackmail Colin, threatening to alert the child adoption authorities to his temper and his act of vandalism.

It emerged Colin previously worked in the City of London but left under a cloud and evidence emerges of him meeting Walker.

Badria Timimi's Sara Mahmoud is a respected teacher who is married to Adeel Akhtar's Hassan with three boys.

She has ambitions to become a school head and attends an interview but the cold case investigation unearths links to the victim that could destroy her professional reputation, her standing in her local Mosque and her family.

Rosie Cavaliero's nurse Marion Kelsey works with children's cancer patients but has a strained relationship with her mother, Wendy Craig's Joy Dunphy and her sister, Holly Aird's Elise.

This impacts on her marriage to Nigel Lindsay's Tony who notices she has erected a wall around any discussion about her past.

She can be connected to Walker as the former resident of a house whose address is on the back of a business card of his.

As Cassie and Sunny diligently go about trying to establish links between the three suspects, they also juggle issues in their personal lives.

Sunny is regularly clashing with his teenage daughters following the breakup of his marriage.

Cassie's father, Peter Egan's Martin Hughes is behaving oddly too, with a number of mysterious payments on his credit card that he won't discuss.

As with the first series, Lang and his director Andy Wilson eschew the sensationalism of a lot of other British crime dramas and focus instead on getting the basics of a police investigative series right.

And boy, do they do it well.

Walker and Bhaskar remain an engaging detective duo - focusing on their business, rarely getting distracted and coming across as very human.

Indeed, the greatest strength of 'Unforgotten' is the grounded quality of Lang's writing which never runs away with itself and remains on the right side of credibility.

As with the first series, the characters who are the focus of the investigation are also well constructed and superbly portrayed.

Bonnar does a terrific job as Colin Osborne, whose increasingly rash behaviour threatens to upend the cosy life he has been building in Brighton.

He gels perfectly with Condou as his partner, while Altin is good value as Colin's blackmailer.

Timimi impresses as Sara Mahmoud is confronted by awkward questions about her past.

The always reliable Akhtar is excellent as her husband, particularly when the past is revealed to him.

Cavaliero is effective as Marion Kelsey wo juggles the stress of erratic behaviour at work, details of her youth being unearthed by the investigation and her fractured relationship with her family.

Lindsay and Aird capture the frustration of a husband and sister who feels she is not being open with them, while Craig has a particularly strong scene with Bhaskar and Aird in the final episode.

Ashbourne and Brown do a sterling job as the victim's complicated family, while Hodge succeeds in conveying his character's growing unease about the revelations that emerge over the course of the investigation.

Egan and Jassa Ahluwalia strike the right balance as they give us a peek into Cassie's home life, without diverting attention away from the investigation.

Mairead McKinley pops up as an Irish republican who provides an insight into Marion's past.

It is a joy to see Bill Paterson turn uop in a cameo as Colin's father back in Glasgow, while Maggie O'Neill hits all the right notes as a key witness.

There are moments when you fear Lang's story might veer into plot developments that may undermine its credibility.

But Lang and his director Wilson remain firmly in control, ensuring their story never strays off piste.

It comes as a relief that after two series, the no nonsense approach of 'Unforgotten' is still working.

Indeed, there is no reason to doubt that it will become a trusted fixture on ITV's schedules for many years to come.

(Series two of 'Unforgotten' aired on ITV from January 5-February 9, 2017)