End of the Night (1)

The case at the centre of End of the Night is twelve years old and already bitter. Gemma Morrison was raped when she was a girl, by two men, and the original investigation went nowhere. Now she has tried to take her own life, and the attempt is what brings Boyd and the team back to the file. No new leads have surfaced, and no fresh evidence either. What remains is the feeling that somebody missed something the first time round.

But reopening a case with nothing to work from is the show at its purest. There is no body to exhume and no witness left to shake; the team has to rebuild a night from old records, and the title says what kind of night it was. Gemma's trauma is handled without voyeurism, and her suicide attempt is treated as what it is: the sound of a case that was never properly closed.

Barbara Machin and Ed Whitmore wrote it, and Dan Reed directed. Trevor Eve leads as DSI Peter Boyd, with Sue Johnston as Dr Grace Foley, Tara Fitzgerald as Dr Eve Lockhart, Wil Johnson as DI Spencer Jordan and Stacey Roca as DS Katrina Howard. Michelle Dockery plays Gemma Morrison, Kate Fleetwood Zoe Morrison, Simon Wilson Andrew, Noah Hedges Shaun Morrison and Ian Mercer Jason Bloch.

The episode leans on its guest cast, and it is well served. Dockery's Gemma carries the weight of a woman who has spent twelve years being defined by one night, and Fleetwood's Zoe gives her someone to push against. The inquiry has to move carefully, because every question the team asks is a question about the worst night of her life.

This is a quieter kind of cold case, and the quiet works in its favour. The mystery is human rather than mechanical: a night that two men ruined and everyone else failed to solve. The show has done louder stories. This one earns its keep by being patient with a victim who has already paid enough.