Long Time Dead

It is the annual Strathclyde CID Dinner at the Crawford Hotel, with the Sweet Muffins, also known as the Oddballs, on stage, and somewhere in the middle of the forced cheer the hotel owner is strangled and dumped in the rubbish. A murder at the police's own party is a good opening image, and the show makes the most of it. Everyone in the room is a detective, which means the murder lands among an audience of professionals, and nobody is fooled for long.

The case gets complicated fast. The main suspect is found murdered before the police can question him, and then the husband of one of the hotel employees is killed as well. The team starts wondering what all of it has to do with something dark going on at the hospital. The suspects multiply faster than the team can interview them, and the hospital thread starts to look like the real story.

But the dinner party never quite leaves the frame. Jardine is affected by this one in a way he cannot yet expect, which is the episode's way of saying the personal cost is coming. The forced laughter of the evening hangs over the whole investigation, and it is the right atmosphere for the case. The episode uses its feature length to let the case breathe instead of rushing it.

Glenn Chandler and Steve Griffiths wrote it, Danny Hiller directed. James MacPherson and Blythe Duff lead, with John Michie as Ross, Colin McCredie as Fraser and Robert Robertson as Dr Andrews. Patricia Ross's Marsha Erskine, Martin Ledwith's Jay and Thomas Erskine, Frances Carrigan's Elaine MacGregor, John McGlynn's Mackie and Duncan Bell's David Sutherland complete the cast.

A police dinner with a dead hotel owner in the bins is the sort of black joke Taggart does well, and the episode stretches it to feature length without losing the balance. It is grim and properly disturbing at the edges, with the black humour kept to the right places.