Blue Lights is still a police drama unlike the rest with season 2 (2024)

The first season of Blue Lights generated the type of word-of-mouth buzz to guarantee it not only a second season – which arrives on BBC One this week – but a third and fourth to boot. The Beeb's faith in the Northern Ireland drama's creators Adam Patterson and Declan Lawn, ex-Panorama journalists turned writer-directors, speaks for itself.

The gritty police procedural returns with six new episodes, which immediately throw us back into the Belfast cop cars a year on from where we left off. The team are still reeling from the death of Gerry (Richard Dormer). Reluctant constable Jen (Hannah McClean) has inevitably fallen by the wayside and retrained to be a solicitor.

Our class of rookie response coppers – which gave the show its fresh take on a well-worn genre – is weathered and more experienced than when we last saw them. Each episode is an exercise in the officers being beaten down by the Belfast streets, which are awash with a wave of crime.

The problem, we're told, is "fewer cops, more crime". It's easy to comprehend, when a meeting at the precinct is populated with as many empty office chairs as there are full ones.

But this season also sees some new cast additions, including a much-needed officer transfer in the form of braggadocious Shane (Frank Blake). While he yells silly things like "Showtime!" when they get a call in, he also comes to embody a bend-the-rules approach to policing to get the job done. It sort of fills the gap left by Gerry.

In a TV landscape where shows are often stripped of idiosyncrasy for a punt at global appeal, Blue Lights is still proof that hyper-specificity can translate en masse. The complex political and historical situation of Belfast looms large, like its own character in the show.

The Blue Lights season two premiere takes a beat to get going, largely sticking us in the dreary office instead of out on the streets, where the show's trademark tension takes place.

When we do start to jivy along, Blue Lights is back to the careful balancing act of office gallows humour, the legacy of sectarian violence and punishing police work – as well as the newer component this season of the rampant drugs trade.

The glut of police procedurals on TV is such that we can't even begin to name them all here, for fear of the word count becoming unmanageable. But this one is worth your time, as long as you can stick out what are occasionally unbearable moments of suspense.

Post Gerry mortem, Blue Lights has teeth. Moments like a screwdriver being wielded at Grace's (Siân Brooke) face are additionally fraught because there is the very real possibility Patterson and Lawn may kill her off.

The nature of the job has slightly shifted, on account of our trio of rookies having rubbed off much of the green behind their ears. The naivety of Tommy (Nathan Braniff) and Annie (Katherine Devlin) has gone in place of something closer to grizzled goner Gerry.

Even Grace has dimmed her doe-eyed season one hopes of joining law enforcement to change things. "What in the name of god are you doing all day?" a civilian barks at her. "We're doing the best we can," she replies with a look of desperation.

Blue Lights shares much of its DNA with The Responder, which is also returning with a second season this spring. There's less emphasis on the case-of-the-week template, although there are already ominous rumblings of another organised crime gang told through the Loyal pub in Mount Eden, and more focus on the grinding uphill battle of Belfast policing.

The hammered police resources overshadow most of the officers' interactions with the public. In the first episode alone, after Grace has been berated by a bystander for the police's failings, Annie and Shane respond to an incident involving someone who has been waiting over seven months for a mental health assessment.

"Is everything just f***ed?" a despairing Annie asks. As the six episodes unfold, the answer time and time again is yes – but it's still impossible to look away.

Blue Lights is available to stream on BBC iPlayer now, and airs weekly on Mondays at 9pm on BBC One.