The second season of “Dept. Q” is officially underway, with the Netflix crime series starting production in Scotland and adding 10 cast members.
Matthew Goode is set to return as DCI Carl Morck alongside his rag-tag team of Alexej Manvelov as Akram Salim, Leah Byrne as DC Rose Dickson and Jamie Sives as DS James Hardy. Season 2 will once again be filmed and set in Edinburgh.
Joining the cast for Season 2 are Aisling Franciosi (“Speak No Evil,” “The Nightingale”) as Kimmie; Greg Wise (“The Crown,” “The Buccaneers”) as Derek Powell; Nicholas Rowe (“Red Eye” S2, “Spy Among Friends”) as Thomas Fulton; Tony Curran (“Outlander: Blood of My Blood,” “Mary and George”) as Winnie Calderwood; Hamish Clark (“Monarch of the Glen”) as Christopher Herron; Alex Ferns (“Waiting for the Out,” “The Batman”) as Phil Allenbeck; Ross Anderson (“Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” “The Rig”) as Ricky Daddario; Rebecca Root (“Heartstopper,” “The Wheel of Time”) as June Lovesay; Isla Johnston (“The Queen’s Gambit,” “The Carpenter’s Son”) as Agnes; and Amy Brenneman (“The Old Man,” “Judging Amy”) as Helen.
Other returning faces from Season 1 include Mark Bonnar as Stephen Burns, Kate Dickie as Moira Jacobson, Aaron McVeigh as Jasper and Sanjeev Kohli as Martin Fleming.
Written and directed by Scott Frank (“The Queen’s Gambit”) and produced by Left Bank Pictures (“The Crown”), the show follows Morck as as he “heads up the maverick Dept. Q from the basement of an Edinburgh police station, charged with cases previously deemed unsolvable,” according to its synopsis. “This darkly humorous, propulsive show delivers all the pleasures of a procedural, but takes us into the complex mysteries not just of the cases but of the detectives themselves.”
Executive producers include Frank, Rob Bullock and Charlotte Moore, with Manda Levin and Jessica Burdett overseeing for Netflix.
“This season, Carl and his band of misfits tackle a terrible crime hidden in the highest echelons of Scottish society,” Left Bank’s Bullock said in a statement. “It is a story for our times: rich and powerful people who believe they are above the law. Carl, of course, knows otherwise. It’s a joy to be working with master storyteller Scott Frank once again, along with the rest of team dolally. We applaud Netflix’s courage for letting them loose once again.”
Added Netflix’s Levin: “Season 1 of ‘Dept. Q’ made us laugh and cry; it shocked and intrigued us; we fell in love with the characters and with the incredibly vivid and iconic world that Scott Frank and his amazing team conjured up in one of our very favorite cities. That it was embraced so wholeheartedly by an audience in Scotland, in the rest of the U.K., and across the world, was thrilling. The story of Season 2 is as darkly delicious as you’d expect, and Carl and his glorious gang will have their work cut out pinning down the perpetrators as we launch back in for more!”