Episode 3

The forensic evidence keeps shifting under AC-12's feet. While the team wrestles with new doubts about Tim Ifield, Kate Fleming is approached by another woman who claims she was assaulted by Michael Farmer. The testimony complicates everything. Steve fumes over it, while Kate uses her growing standing inside the Trapdoor team to push deeper in. The new claim lands in the middle of an already crowded case file, and nobody is quite sure which direction it pushes. Michael Farmer's fate is hanging on testimony that keeps changing shape.

The episode then turns on Roz's husband. Steve challenges Nick to vouch for his wife's whereabouts on the night Ifield went missing, and Nick's evasiveness tells its own story. But it is the moment the investigation finds a new angle, and the show makes the most of it. The Huntleys are starting to crack, and the cracks are visible from the outside. Every conversation in the household carries a second meaning, and neither of them can stop it. The interview is the quietest scene of the week, and the most dangerous one.

Jed Mercurio wrote it, John Strickland directed. Thandiwe Newton and Lee Ingleby are well matched as the Huntleys, each hiding something from the other, and Vicky McClure's Kate and Martin Compston's Steve work the case from opposite directions. Mark Stobbart's Twyler, Claudia Jessie's Taylor, Nigel Boyle's Buckells, Vineeta Rishi's Pandit, Anneika Rose's Jatri, Adrian Dunbar's Hastings and Paul Higgins's Hilton complete the cast. It is a strong cast doing steady work, and the episode lets the story do the shouting.

There is a special pleasure in watching established facts crumble under new testimony, and the episode delivers it. The woman's claim is a complication rather than a solution, which is exactly right. The show is not in the business of tidy answers. It is in the business of watching people carry the weight of the questions, and the Huntleys are carrying plenty. The episode understands that a good investigation is mostly patience, and it practises what it preaches.