Episode 2

DCI Tony Gates has been duped into covering up Jackie Laverty's hit and run, and now he wants out. Jackie is the kind of entanglement that doesn't end politely. Gates is desperate to sever ties with her, but the connection keeps pulling him back, and every attempt to wriggle free only tightens the knot. Meanwhile Arnott and Fleming are closing in on his secret, and Gates is being plunged into a situation more dangerous than the one he started in.

The episode is a slow burn about consequence. One mistake, buried under another, until the whole structure starts to groan. Arnott and Fleming chase the details of the cover-up with the patience of people who know the paperwork will eventually trip someone up. Every interaction between the officers feels loaded, because nobody can be sure what the other person knows. The pressure on Gates mounts steadily, and his options quietly run out. There is a grim pleasure in watching a man who thought he was clever discover that he wasn't, and that the cover-up has started to cost more than the crime ever would.

Jed Mercurio wrote it, David Caffrey directed. Martin Compston and Vicky McClure make a good double act as Arnott and Fleming, and Craig Parkinson's Cottan, Neil Morrissey's Morton and Faraz Ayub's Kapoor give AC-12 its usual flavour of watchful colleagues. Lennie James's Gates carries the weight of the episode, with Gina McKee's Laverty, Alison Lintott's Bennett, Toni Midlane's Burton and Dylan Duffus's Wesley Duke around him. It is an ensemble that knows how to hold a silence.

This is a study in how one attempt to bury a mistake can uncover a dozen more. Gates is not the first bent copper on television, and he won't be the last. But watching the trap close, one interview at a time, is still a pleasure. The episode trusts its audience to wait, and that trust is repaid.