Happy Valley new year. Finally, Sally Wainwright’s multi Bafta-winning northern noir has returned for its long-awaited third and final series. If you wanted your Hogmanay hangover eased by some gentle viewing, this probably wasn’t it. Here’s your full recap of a blistering comeback episode …
The story so far
It’s more than six years since we visited West Yorkshire’s drug-ravaged, poverty-ridden Calder valley, so that two-minute catchup montage was most welcome. The headlines? Since her teen daughter Becky took her own life, police sergeant Catherine Cawood (the mighty Sarah Lancashire) and her sister, recovering heroin addict Clare (Siobhan Finneran), had brought up Becky’s son, Ryan (Rhys Connah), the product of her rape by Tommy Lee Royce (a star-making scary turn from James Norton).
When Catherine heard that Royce was out of prison in series one, she hunted down her nemesis, unaware he was involved in the kidnapping of Ann Gallagher (Charlie Murphy). Despite a near fatal beating by Royce, she rescued Ann, saved Ryan from his clutches and the thug was imprisoned again, this time receiving multiple life sentences for murder.
He was forbidden from any contact with Ryan but, in series two, from behind bars, Royce used a prison groupie to pose as Ryan’s teaching assistant, groom his biological son and exact revenge on Catherine. We ended with Ryan increasingly worrying his family by asking about his father, suggesting that he should be forgiven, and Catherine fearing that Ryan had inherited some of Royce’s psychopathic traits. And that brings us up to speed. Cue Trouble Town by Jake Bugg and bring on the trilogy’s final chapter.
Slime scene investigation
We rejoined “Miss Trunchbull”, as she’s semi-affectionately nicknamed by her station co-workers, at the wheel of her squad car, dispensing trademark sarcastic wisdom to colleagues on the radio. She was dispatched to a drained reservoir where a skeleton had been discovered. Catherine swiftly deduced that it was the dumped remains of Gary Gogowski, who was executed by gangland associates and buried in concrete eight years ago. She ran rings around patronising DSI Andy Shepherd (Vincent Franklin) and his sexist sidekick with her encyclopaedic knowledge of local ne’er-do-wells. “I’ll leave it with you,” she said, squelching off through the mud. “Twats”. Welcome back to one of TV’s most indelible characters.
After 30 years at the coal face of crime, the stubborn sheriff of Hebden Bridge was due to retire in “seven months, one week and three days”. She was in denial about having a leaving party – despite the efforts of longsuffering colleague Joyce (Ishia Bennison) – but was doing up a Land Rover, planning to drive to the Himalayas and start her second act. A screen cop on the verge of retirement? What could possibly go wrong?
All roads led to Royce
The evidence trail led straight to Tommy, as trouble tends to. Still banged up, he was working a Jesus-meets-Charles Manson look with an unsightly forehead scar from a recent “altercation” – but as preeningly vain as ever with the same chillingly childlike demeanour. In his cell, a photo of Ryan had pride of place. Halifax detectives arrived and carted him off to be questioned about Gogowski’s 2014 murder.
Clad in a green-and-yellow boilersuit, Royce cockily denied all knowledge. However, he’d boasted to another inmate and the prison chaplain that he’d witnessed the murder and helped dispose of the victim. His St Christopher necklace had been found with the body. What’s more, Gogowski had been shot with the same 9mm Glock used in the murder of Royce’s criminal boss Ashley Cowgill (Joe Armstrong) in series one. Prime suspects for that crime? Local crime kingpins Darius Knezevic and his brother, who ran a drug-running and people-trafficking operation. As Catherine put it: “New Jersey has the Sopranos. Halifax has the Knezevices.”
Darius had since distanced himself from dirty work and was running for election to Bradford city council. Shepherd salivated at the prospect of nailing him for double murder – especially after hearing that Knezevic had ordered Royce killed for his silence but the hit had failed, hence that forehead scar. Bang to rights, Royce now had motivation to grass. He made a statement admitting they were only supposed to scare Gogowski but that it had escalated. Who pulled the trigger? Not Knezevic, he claimed, but rival gangster Chris Oxley, who “runs Oldham”. Back in the police van, Royce smirked. He was plotting something. His schemes rarely end well.
Mismatch of the day
Six months later, retirement now five weeks away, Catherine’s grandson Ryan was playing in goal for the school football team. Now an angsty teen, he was cheered on by the touchline trio of Catherine, Clare and her boyfriend, Neil (Con O’Neill) – a fellow recovering alcoholic but stable enough to build a long-term relationship and have Clare move in with him. As the team lost 6-0 and Ryan gave his defence the hairdryer treatment, PE teacher Rob Hepworth (Mark Stanley) called him a “little shitstain” – a confrontation clocked by eagle-eyed Catherine.
Later, at Ryan’s 16th birthday meal, the extended family came together. Ann was now shacked up with Catherine’s son Daniel (Karl Davies) in a Grade II-listed fixer-upper. Ann’s widowed father, Nev (George Costigan), was dropping unsubtle hints about grandchildren – and had asked Catherine out on a date (“What first attracted you to the millionaire Nevison Gallagher?”). Her ex-husband, Richard (Derek Riddell), was having marital problems. Catherine and Clare took a quiet moment to marvel at how happy they’d been these past few years. More ominous portents that the family’s hard-earned peace was about to be shattered.
Those who can’t do, teach
Strutting bullyboy Hepworth was allegedly “knocking off” female colleague Mrs Oats (arf) and didn’t take kindly to being teased about it. When a school mum faux-innocently asked if Rob’s wife, Jo (Mollie Winnard), had been drinking, hence her failure to pick up their two daughters, Rob’s red mist matched his flashy Audi, going on to aggressively accuse Jo of relapsing into diazepam addiction. In a distressing scene, he became violent and attempted to sexually assault her. What a scumbag.
Realising she hadn’t got the pills on prescription, he called the police on his wife. Naturally, Catherine was the officer to show up. She immediately spotted signs of coercive control: a padlocked fridge, bruised arms, financial dependence, isolation and infantalision. She arrested Jo for possession, to get her away from her abusive husband as much as anything else. Despite Catherine’s offer to take her to the safeguarding unit, Jo stuck to her story that she’d found the pills in a pub toilet and returned to her unhappy home. I never did like PE teachers.
Mr Pharmacist, can you help me out today?
Living a few doors down was family man and crossword fiend Faisal Bhatti (Amit Shah). The unassuming pharmacist looked spooked by news of Jo’s arrest, so snuck around to pay her a visit. She’d been trading sexual favours for under the counter diazepam but reassured him she’d got rid of all the packaging so the pills couldn’t be traced back to him. This was a lie. They were still in their blister packs when Catherine seized them.
At his shop, Faisal took a weekly kickback of £1,200 from a methadone addict for a consignment of “jellies”. Illegal business was booming and had attracted unwanted attention. Faisal was paid a threatening visit by gangland enforcers Matija (Jack Bandeira) and Ivan (Oliver Huntingdon). Posing as builders with a “personal problem”, they pulled a gun, threatened Faisal’s family and reminded him “we run these postcodes”. He now needed to turn over £1,800 a week, which he’d hand directly to them.
The duo departed in a black SUV driven by the mysterious Viktor (Anthony Flanagan). Was this one of the “Teflon-coated Knezevices”? Either way, hapless Faisal was in over his head, inhabiting the “hapless novice criminal” role filled by accountant Kevin Weatherill (Steve Pemberton) and DS John Wadsworth (Kevin Doyle) in previous series.
‘I’ve got some intel. You’re not gonna like it’
Ryan clearly had his own ideas about his relationship with Royce – who Catherine refuses to even acknowledge as his father. Lo and behold, Insp Mike Taylor (Rick Warden) informed her that Ryan had been visiting Rovce in prison. She was unaware Royce had been transferred from Gravesend to Sheffield and realised the court order forbidding contact might have elapsed. Ryan had been accompanied by “a man and a woman”. Catherine was baffled by this betrayal.
It couldn’t be Clare and Neil, could it? Richard and Ros? Surely not Nev? Catherine refused to ask Ryan in case it wasn’t true, reluctant to “put ideas in his head”, so asked boss Mike to find out more. Cut to Royce learning Spanish in his cell. Was he planning to abscond abroad with his son? After all, as Ryan said earlier: “Revenge is a dish best served cold.” He claimed he’d heard this in a film but they could well have been Royce’s words.
Before the credits rolled, Mike reluctantly told Catherine: “I’ve got some intel from the prison in Sheffield. You’re not gonna like it.” Perhaps it had been foreshadowing when Clare remarked: “I never know when to tell you stuff and when not to.” I foresee sisterly trouble ahead.
Line of the week
“Yoga’s dangerous. Someone came to do a session for us at the nick one dinnertime. We were all farting like billy-o after the first few moves. We gave off enough methane to melt a polar icecap. Greta Thunberg had to come and speak to us” – Catherine’s rather Victoria Wood-esque reason for not taking up yoga.
Notes and observations
Impressive to see how Rhys Connah has grown up on-screen over the past nine years – the same period as Gregory Piper, AKA tearaway turned PC Ryan Pilkington, in BBC stablemate Line of Duty.
“The Phantom Fridge Thrower” diversified by throwing a microwave from a tower block. An air fryer next?
Just me or is actor Mark Stanley a dead ringer for Ray “bloody” Purchase from Toast of London?
What’s Tommy’s game? Will the vile Hepworth get his comeuppance? Who are Ryan’s prison visit enablers? And does yoga really result in planet-threatening flatulence? Please share your thoughts and theories below …
