No Orchids for Missing Blandisch

The episode closes Series 3 and it is built from a tip-off. A hired killer is the first side of it and two arms dealers the second, joined by information the squad receives, and the two lines are worked together. The title echoes the James Hadley Chase novel No Orchids for Miss Blandish, though no source states that the episode adapts either the book or its film and the story as described does not follow them.

The squad's method is its usual one, working from information rather than from a crime scene, with Bulman going into disguise to reach people the police cannot question openly. Ray McAnally, Richard Wilson and Kenneth Cranham lead the guest cast in a story about contract killing, and the billing also gives the episode a fuller supporting list including Ralph H. Lawton, John Pickles, Diana Flacks, Tina Robinson and George Hagan. The guide at mediagems picks the episode out as having everything the series is known for, particularly its humour and its performances, and instances the comedy in a kettle line and a bowler-hatted tax man, which are characteristic of the programme rather than a softening of the case.

The theme the sources best support is institutional overlap. Special Branch is working the same ground, which means the case is not the squad's alone, and the arms dealers mean it runs into the same traffic the season opened with in Retribution. Over Series 3 the programme moved steadily towards cases where the squad's authority overlaps with other services, whether the Foreign Office through Dugdale or, as here, Special Branch, and where Lambie's objections about who should handle a matter become part of the story. This episode places the overlap inside a criminal case rather than a political one, which is a quieter use of it than the Dugdale episodes make.

Ranks are as billed. Bulman remains a detective sergeant, Willis a sergeant, Bennett a detective constable and Singer a detective inspector, with Lambie the chief superintendent commanding the squad. No regular is promoted within the episode; Bulman's promotion comes with Series 4, and the move to Friday nights and the DCI rank follow from this point rather than form part of it.

The limitation is that the sources give the episode a large cast and a clear premise and no content on how the strands meet. Special Branch's involvement is noted and not explained, and no source consulted states how the case resolves, whether Miro Blandisch is found, what becomes of Glass-Eye Jackson or the two arms dealers. What the hour does have is a shape the sources describe clearly even where the resolution is not recorded: a contract killer on one side, two arms dealers on the other, and a tip-off joining them. Its significance within the season is that it returns the programme to arms dealing after a run through fraud, espionage, race-fixing and drug smuggling, and that it is the last episode before the series changes its night, its format and its lead's rank.