Line of Duty, series 5 episode 2 recap: Did Cafferty just unmask Ted Hastings as “H”?
The hit police procedural picked up the pace with a packed hour of adrenaline-pumping action and gasp-inducing revelations. Here are all the talking points from the outstanding second episode…
No last gasp reprieve for AC-12 heroine
Viewers last saw PC Maneet Bindra (Maya Sondhi) with her throat cut, bleeding out on a jetty. We assumed she was dead but held out a glimmer of hope. This was extinguished in the opening scene, which found DI Kate Fleming (Vicky McClure) and DS Steve Arnott (Martin Compston) donning forensic suits to reluctantly identify their colleague’s body.
“Recognise this place?” asked Fleming. The harbour was where they’d found the corpses of ACC Hilton (Paul Higgins) in series four and the social worker who blew the whistle on the Sandsview paedophile ring in series three - further connecting the organised crime gang to previous cases.
The silver lining to this tragic cloud were sound files found on Maneet’s home computer in which she’d detailed her plan to carry out covert surveillance on the gang. Supt Ted Hastings (Adrian Dunbar) visibly melted when he heard evidence of Maneet’s honourable intentions, promptly announcing to the team that they’d “lost one of our own, a mother of two young children”.
Crucially, he rescinded the red notice against Maneet, ensuring she was still an AC-12 officer at the time of her murder and “died in the line of duty” - not just a reference to the show’s title but a callback to the final words of DCI Tony Gates (Lennie James) way back in series one. Like Gates’ family, Maneet’s would now receive death-in-service benefit and a police pension.
Maneet’s kidnapper unmasked
A bystander with a smartphone had filmed the gangsters bundling Maneet into a van. Tracking the vehicle on CCTV, AC-12 identified one of the culprits: Lee Banks (Alastair Natkiel), a career criminal with convictions for violence.
What’s more, Banks was a known associate of Robert Denmore - the “Balaclava Man” who stormed the AC-12 building in series four and was shot dead by Hastings. More evidence that the organised crime syndicate was linked to the network of corrupt cops which AC-12 has been investigating all these years. The conspiracy, as they so often do, went deep.
Corbett was anti-corruption too
When AC-12 were authorised to seize the files of Operation Peartree, we learnt more about enigmatic DS John Corbett (Stephen Graham). Sent undercover to investigate links between police and organised crime, he’d left his job and had his identity wiped a year ago. Under the new name of John Clayton, the ex-printer had become a master forger and a trusted member of the organised crime group - except he’d been out of contact for three months and was feared to have gone rogue.
When Arnott and Fleming visited Corbett’s wife Steph (Amy De Bhrún), she wasn’t exactly missing him, saying undercover work was: “The perfect job for a selfish arsehole who doesn’t give a toss about his family.”
Former undercover officer Kate didn’t take offence. Indeed, we saw her returning home to her own family: husband Mark, with whom she was now reconciled, and son Josh. Call me paranoid but whenever I see a happy family in a crime drama, I fear for their future safety.
Undercover cop wanted attention from top man
In the mob’s HQ behind a print shop, Corbett supervised the forging of fake passports and doctored documentation. He was seething that his underworld superiors hadn’t been in touch, despite him masterminding the theft of ￡10m worth of heroin and putting a rival gang out of business. If that wasn’t enough to win favour, he was plotting something that would.
However, he’d certainly attracted the attention of Arnott, who followed the instructions left by Maneet to make contact with Corbett’s crew. Despite Arnott dressing in civvies (what no waistcoat?), the gang sent their BMX-riding errand boy to snap him with a GoPro camera and rumbled that he was a copper: “Steve something. Arnold? He couldn’t be straighter.”
After getting his fingers burnt by double agent Maneet, Corbett wasn’t falling for entrapment again and decided to bring his plan forward: “Let’s make use of our asset before this muppet gets to them.” A muppet? Our Steve? Hi-ho!
Cafferty was crooked after all
That asset turned out to be DS Jane Cafferty (Sian Reese-Williams), the firearms officer who led last week’s “ED-905” heroin convoy and was the sole survivor of its hijack.
When Lisa McQueen (Rochenda Sandall) posed as a nurse to visit the convalescing cop’s home, it was clear they’d met before and the gang had leverage over Cafferty. She protested “I’ve done my bit” but McQueen threatened her family and said she was there to “talk business”. What could Cafferty do for them from her sickbed?
Second hijack was a bullet-ridden miracle
This was the inside intel that Cafferty gave the gang. When a police convoy left Midlands Forensic Ballistics Laboratory, Corbett’s crew lay in wait. They cut the streetlights and laid a spike strip, or “stinger”, across the road. When the convoy came to a halt, Balaclava Men went in all guns blazing, peppering the support cars with bullets and making off with the police truck. When Banks took aim at a firearms officer, Corbett roughly barged him aside and shot at the cop himself.
In a warehouse, the gang examined their haul: a cache of automatic rifles which had been en route to be destroyed. “Drinks are on me, lads,” said a jubilant Corbett - while exchanging dark looks with Banks, still smarting from the shoulder barge.
Miraculously, there’d been no casualties in the hijack. It appeared Corbett had ordered his men to aim low, taking out the cars’ tyres and hitting their armoured doors. Pushing trigger-happy Banks aside, he’d deliberately missed the firearms officer. Wait, was he actually a good guy?
Corbett is a family man after all
When we saw Corbett return to his flat, he retrieved a hidden burner phone from his balcony and called wife Steph. They said they loved and missed each other, before Corbett listened to his young daughters sleeping - an emotional scene that reminded us what a fine actor Stephen Graham is.
Steph, whose bitterness towards her husband had been a bluff, said she’d been visited by AC-12, including Steve Arnott. That name again. Corbett was intrigued and looked up his adversary’s police personnel file, noting that Arnott was an exemplary officer who indeed “couldn’t be straighter”. You could almost see Corbett’s cogs whirring.
Cautious superiors had driven cop rogue
Meanwhile, Arnott was making enquiries in the other direction. He tracked down Corbett’s former handler, Inspector Denise Cameron (Jasmine Stewart), who revealed that Corbett had gone off-grid because he “wasn’t happy with how the operation was being led” and believed it was “showing signs of mission drift”. What’s more, she agreed.
Operation Peartree boss Det Supt Alison Powell (Susan Vidler) preferred to pursue low-level targets, whereas Corbett wanted to climb through the gangland ranks and make contact with the highest echelon of corrupt officers. He believed he was onto the top man - cue dramatic music - codenamed “H”.
“H” reached out to Corbett
Talk of the one-initial devil. Attention attracted by the second heist, H finally got in contact with Corbett via an online instant messaging service - staying tantalisingly anonymous, naturally.
H wasn’t happy about the “unauthorised hijack” but Corbett argued they were now in possession of untraceable firepower, which he planned to use in an audacious raid on Eastfield Depot - where the police store seized drugs, cash, jewellery and precious metals. “This could be bigger than Brink's-Mat,” he said.
H immediately disconnected the call. “Guess he’s going to think about it,” said McQueen, stowing the laptop in a locked safe.
Familiar faces resurfaced
A pair of characters from previous series made comebacks. When PCC Rohan Sindwhani (Ace Bhatti) introduced Hastings to his senior legal counsel, it was no less than former AC-12 lawyer Gill Biggeloe (Polly Walker), who hit on Ted in series three and was manipulated by “The Caddy”. In the interim, she’d turned from blonde to brunette.
Her presence unsettled Ted and after he’d gone, the ever-politic Biggeloe said: “That’s the trouble with corruption inquiries. There’s always a danger that you’ll find some.”
The other old face was trickier to spot but bonus points if you recognised Ryan Pilkington (Gregory Piper), the scally on a bike who ran errands for Tommy Hunter’s gang in the debut series and is now doing likewise for Corbett. Indeed, it turned out that Corbett is running Hunter’s old organisation - yet another link tying all the series together.
How to spot a criminal in one easy step
Surely there’s an easy way for AC-12 to crack this case: simply arrest anyone driving a black Range Rover. They seem to be the only vehicle gangsters ever travel in.
Good and bad news for Hastings
Just me or when you saw Hastings greeting a brunette in a bar, did you fear it was Gill? Instead Ted met estranged wife Roisin (Andrea Irvine) for what he hoped were reconciliation talks. He admitted their problems were his fault, down to one bad investment, but they shouldn’t throw away 37 years of marriage. Heartbreakingly, Rosin had another agenda. She’d met someone else and wanted Ted to sign the divorce papers. Their farewell embrace was poignantly tearful.
In more promising news for the poor Ulsterman, he was tracked down by retired DCI Mark Moffatt (Patrick Fitzsymons) - former union rep to series four’s DCI Roz Huntley (Thandie Newton), now working for an investment firm.
Back in series two, Ted lost a fortune in an Irish redevelopment project, the Kettle Bell Complex. It was failing to consult Roisin over this gamble that caused the first crack in their marriage. Moffatt told Ted there was now a chance of compensation for the original investors. Too good to be true? It was worrying this offer was coming from a man last seen in the company of a corrupt cop.
When Ted returned to his hotel room to gaze thoughtfully at the investment brochure and those divorce papers, he was seen to be in possession of a laptop - with the same messaging service onscreen that “H” had used. Uh-oh, say it isn’t so.
Corbett and Arnott teamed up
Seizing somebody at gunpoint is one way to bond, I suppose. Having decided Arnott was “straight as an arrow”, Corbett broke cover, put a pistol to Steve’s head, cuffed him in his car and took him for a drive so they could talk confidentially. Cue an electrifying scene between actors Graham and Compston, last on-screen together playing Leeds United team-mates in The Damned United.
Corbett explained that the two hijacks were bids for attention from the top tier of corrupt cops. He was after a big fish and going rogue was the only way to catch him. If he could get hold of the laptop with the messenging service on it, they might be able to trace “H”.
He swore he’d never hurt an honest copper and that Cafferty’s team were all corrupt. He insisted that “top brass” like Powell and Hastings were handicapping the operation because they feared what he might find. Corbett hinted that Hastings might be “H” by suggesting he’d hung Maneet out to dry and shot Denmore to secure his silence.
It was head-spinning stuff but Corbett wanted to know if he could count on Steve to secretly work with him: “Let’s go after the bent b******s, whatever it takes. Once you’re in, there’s no turning back. Are you in?” Of course Arnott was in.
Line of Duty lingo decoded
A less acronym-heavy script this week but still some work for our regular jargonbuster. The van was tracked using ANPR (automatic number plate recognition) and Moffatt was introduced as a former “Fed Rep” (representative of the Police Federation, the force’s staff association).
There was also more talk of UCOs (undercover officers) , OCGs (organised crime groups), COMs (covert operations managers) and AFOs (authorised firearms officers). TTFN.
Did Cafferty just unmask Hastings as “H”?
Acting on Corbett’s tip, Arnott set up surveillance on Cafferty’s house. When Corbett sent Banks to pay her a sinister visit, an armed response team moved in and arrested them both.
In another of Line of Duty’s trademark interview scenes, Cafferty admitted the crime gang had blackmailed her with photographs of her illicit affair, which they threatened to send to all her phone contacts. She’d been complicit in the heroin hijack but her team were only supposed to get minor injuries.
In a dramatic late twist, Cafferty divulged that she’d been recruited to the clandestine network by a fellow cop. Fleming ran from the room, retrieved mugshots from the AC-12 evidence board and laid them in front of Cafferty. As cameras cut to Hastings looking twitchy in his office, Cafferty pointed out one of the photos - but the credits rolled before we saw who she’d identified. Agonising.
Conspiracy plot thickens next time
The six-part series reaches its midway point next Sunday with Corbett’s most daring plan yet and AC-12 making a shock discovery. See you back here to pin it to the evidence board and point at it.