Review by C.J. Bunce
This is the ninth season (series for UK readers) for what has become the best British police procedural of the past decade. Shetland. And it’s the second season not based on the exploits of Ann Cleeves’ hero Jimmy Perez. Last season the BBC One series saw stars Douglas Henshall and Mark Bonnar replaced by series newcomer Ashley Jensen as DI Ruth Calder and Alison O’Donnell’s Alison “Tosh” MacIntosh, Perez’s former Number One. This season Tosh stepped up to become full detective inspector of the department. All of Season 9 is streaming now on BritBox via Prime Video.
So how does the ninth outing for this Scotland Noir series compare to the past?
This season started out with a bang–almost. DI Calder has again returned to Shetland, and she explains why in the very first scene. Who’s she explaining it to? A man holding a gun to her head. Turns out she thought it was a positive gesture to fit into her morning a local welfare check–a job for the uniforms–but instead she stepped in on a guy who just shot his brother. It set the tone for the season–Shetland needs her. Calder doesn’t quite have any other place to go but return to her hometown and her brother Alan, a local reverend played by Steven Miller. Alan becomes tangentially involved in this year’s big crime, the disappearance of Tosh’s friend Annie and her son. Shetland really isn’t that small of an island–the population is 23,000. Yet everything and everyone is connected.
Those local connections have been a staple of the series, and this is the first season where the viewer is placed in a new position. Most UK police procedurals spend a lot of time on the routine of policing, and this season really embraced that concept. Perez was loud and animated and brash–he stood out in this relatively quiet, stark, primarily rural setting. Without his angst and the unique relationship he had with Mark Bonnar’s quirky step-father to his daughter, the series is far less… quirky. Which means the viewer is getting Shetland from the vantage that is more of the standard UK police drama.
O’Donnell’s take on Tosh this season is one of a cop who has finally arrived. She may not look like the typical co-star of other UK cop series, and that’s part of why we love her. Viewers in the States aren’t just here for the various Scotland dialects, but she and all the dialect variants really add an element to the color of the show. And Tosh works as boss, sharing the stage with the familiar staff, Steven Robertson (Luther, The Bay, Doctor Who, Ashes to Ashes) as DC Sandy Wilson, Lewis Howden (Annika, Monarch of the Glen) as Sgt. Billy McCabe, and Anne Kidd (Outlander, Monarch of the Glen) as coroner Cora McLean, with Angus Miller back as Tosh’s husband. It’s been nine seasons of detective work, the same drudgery of the job, and a little bit less of the pull of home life. Tosh’s husband wants her to be careful when accusing good friends of committing crimes, but she continues to take it all in stride.
Jensen’s DI Ruth Calder took no time to fit in. She’s likeable and even funny with her own brand of dry humor, both disinterested and willing to apply her expertise if only to just keep busy and occupied. For once two cops in a show, Tosh and Ruth, work off each other and their strengths, like professionals must do in real life to succeed. The best banter comes from Tosh pulling some humanity out of Ruth, jibing her about her decisions or her choice in ex-boyfriends.
Among the guest stars of the season are Sarah MacGillivray as Annie Bett, playing both the victim and an intriguing ex-spy in flashbacks. Annie would have been a great recurring character, but another constant of Shetland is it always gives the most interesting supporting characters only one season. Part of Annie’s backstory is her former drug-addled spy boss, Euan Rossi, played by Ian Hart (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.). Upon her death he arrives to avenge her. Familiar face Vincent Regan (Snow White and the Huntsman, Traces, The Bay) plays a mussel farmer who provided space for Annie and her son. Tara Lee plays Lisa Friel and Jimmy Yuill is “Campervan” Angus Wallace–both may have information that lead to Annie’s disappearance and death. Red herrings abound, but unfortunately the writers selected one of the more bland possible outcomes, sticking with true crime drama over more interesting side plots.
The season is the second story to depart from Ann Cleeves’ novels (see my review of the last Shetland novel here). Cleeves recently announced she is bringing back Perez in a new novel, The Killing Fields: The Return of Jimmy Perez, coming in October 2025. Readers will rejoin Jimmy and wife Willow who are now living in the Orkney islands. But it seems unlikely we’ll see Perez again in the show. Paul Logue returned in the lead writing role this season, and he knows the characters and the territory, but it’s time for something to throw some action and excitement into the series. The good news? It has the chance. The series has been renewed by BBC One for a tenth–and possibly an eleventh–season.
Shetland continues to succeed at the detective mystery genre like those classics of the 1970s and 1980s when syndication was the big deal. Catch all nine seasons of Shetland now exclusively on BritBox in the U.S. via Prime Video.
