When Kevin McKidd's Glasgow detective Chris O'Neill reports his daughter missing, the call dredges up the unsolved 1990 disappearance of Julie Mackie, a case that cost his wife Vinette Robinson's undercover career and still haunts Police Scotland. Four episodes track the couple's frantic search through CCTV dead ends and locked school gates while a parallel thread exposes Justice Minister Richard Coyle's bid to bury the original investigation before his SNP leadership vote. Burke's script keeps the Japanese novel's structure but swaps Kyoto rain for Glasgow fog, letting the Clyde and Tenement flats stand in for the bureaucratic maze that nearly swallowed the earlier inquiry.
The cast lean into the grey-scale mood: James Cosmo's bereaved lawyer keeps files in biscuit tins, Alex Ferns' local plod knows every pub back room, and Brian McCardie's ex-Special Branch contractor sells silence by the hour. Williams directs in muted palettes so even the red school blazers look washed out, while Luke Richards' score pulses like overhead motorway traffic. Each hour peels back institutional complicity until the two abductions lock together in a deserted ferry port, proving the cover-up was always personal rather than political.
Production Details
ITVX / 1 Season / 4 Episodes / 2023
Created by: Meta Description: Gregory Burke Clare McQuillan
Showrunner(s): Tessa Ross, Juliette Howell
Writer(s): Meta Description: Gregory Burke Clare McQuillan
Producer(s): Clare Kerr
Music: Luke Richards
Main Cast
Kevin McKidd as DC Chris O'Neill
Vinette Robinson as Michelle O'Neill
Richard Coyle as Robert Wallace
James Cosmo as Jim Mackie
Iona Anderson as Annabel Wallace
Andrew Whipp as Philip O'Neill
Brian McCardie as Bill Martin
Nalini Chetty as DS Shereen Rahman
Saskia Ashdown as Bryony Davis
Peter Hannah as Cameron
