Episode 6

As AC-12 struggles with the repercussions of tragic events, Hastings makes one final bid to uncover institutionalised corruption before his time runs out. The episode is driven by the sense of a clock, and Hastings is the man hearing it tick. The unit has been battered, but it is still standing, and Hastings means to use whatever time he has left. The tragic events have left the unit smaller and more careful, and the change shows in every room. Hastings has spent years chasing the rot, and this is the last chance to prove how deep it goes.

The episode is about endings, and it is not sentimental about them. But the corruption Hastings is chasing is structural, and he knows it will outlast him. The scope of the fight is larger than any one case, and the episode lets that scale show. Around him, the team deals with the wreckage of recent events, and the mood is heavy with the knowledge that this is the last push. The episode does not let the scale turn abstract; it keeps the fight in specific rooms, with specific people. The interviews are the battlefield, and the questions are the weapons.

Jed Mercurio wrote it, Jennie Darnell directed. Adrian Dunbar gives Hastings the dignity of a man who has decided the price is worth paying, and the cast around him is strong: Martin Compston's Arnott, Vicky McClure's Fleming, Gregory Piper's Pilkington, Shalom Brune-Franklin's Bishop, Anna Maxwell Martin's Carmichael, Kelly Macdonald's Jo, Michael Yare's Rix, Colette Lennon Dougal's OFC and Trevor Kaneswaran's AFC. It is a cast that has grown into itself over the season, and the farewell suits them. Carmichael's presence keeps the tone exact, and the exactness matters.

There is a particular kind of tension that comes from a man who has stopped caring about the consequences, and Hastings has reached that point. The episode leaves the viewer little room to breathe, and it earns that relentlessness. But this is the last bid, and everyone knows it. The final bid is not a stunt; it is a conviction, and the show treats it as one. The price, whatever it is, will be paid in the open, which is the only way Hastings knows how to work. The only question is what it costs.