Family Unit

The most dangerous man in this episode never raises his voice. He is a widower, a father of four, and fond of a drink or two, and his sin is the oldest one on the books: he comes between Inspector Jean Darblay and her husband Tom. No handcuffs are going to solve this case, because the case is inside the Darblay marriage itself.

The episode turns the show's usual machinery on its head. Instead of a crime to investigate, there is a domestic entanglement to unpick, and Jean has to do it while the station keeps running around her. Sergeant Joseph Beck, Sergeant George Parrish and PC Roland Bentley carry on with the day's work, and Sergeant Margaret Cullinane appears at the edges, a new face in the ranks. The trouble is brought home by John Murphy, whose sister Maeve is part of the story, with Mrs. Argent watching the neighbourhood the way neighbours do.

Ian Kennedy Martin wrote it, Jonathan Alwyn directed. Stephanie Turner and David Hargreaves carry the strain of the marriage between them, and the strain is the point: Juliet Bravo was never shy about showing that the woman in the big office had a home life with cracks in it. David Ellison, Noel Collins and Mark Drewry hold the station side, with Maggie Ollerenshaw as Sergeant Margaret Cullinane, Rio Fanning as John Murphy, Rebekah Blair as Maeve Murphy and Sheila Raynor as Mrs. Argent.

What makes the episode work is that nobody is a villain. The widower is lonely, Tom is wounded, and Jean is caught in the middle trying to hold everything together with the same composure she uses at work, only with less success. The show's willingness to let its heroine be vulnerable was always its quiet radicalism.

Family Unit ends without a tidy verdict, which feels right. Some damage cannot be processed through the charge office.