Line of Duty thread 4 (No spoilers, please!)

[TedisnotH]

Ok, I've started a new one in anticipation of Thread 3 filling up tonight, part way through the episode!

Definitely Jo in the picture and we already know that AC12 know Jo’s been in the house with Farida. So the only mystery there is who the DNA matches to.
I don’t think Lakewell necessarily knew Chloe - I think he was just being a bit patronising. So when she was introduced as DC Chloe Surname, he just did a patronising “hello Chloe”.
What is Kate doing giving Jo info that she’d been specifically told not to??

@GrandmasNightgown

Ryan's like the problem with police masonry

He's junior to Jo in the police, but senior to her in the OCG, so can pull her strings.

Masons have only been mentioned once I think, when Kate went to the other AC unit for authorisation, and her overt explanation was because it was headed by a woman and therefore free of masons. I doubt it's going to come in as a plot theme (complicated enough already!)

BTW what happened to Deepak - the other one in the Gates team in S1?

Is the race angle because the OCG is white neonazi? With European links? And is that why the attrition rate of BAME officers is so high, because OCG doesn't want them - either in OCG or indeed at all?

The OGC probably isn't neo nazi as Lisa McQueen was black?

@Mintyt

Who was identified over the page pls

Not sure how many pages this thread is on, but I think that might be what people are trying to work out

It's got to circle back to S1. They have mentioned more than once that initial scene, the one Steve was in, where they shot the unarmed asian suspect. I'll watch that episode again I think.

Ha I actually think he’s being played brilliantly! The baby faced assassin! Though I must take issue with your suggestion he has a brummie accent I’m a brummie and can’t detect that at all. Is it just me?!

He's not as brummie as Buckells, but he does drop into it every now and then, also a midlanders and I noticed.

So Kate isn’t undercover for AC12 given her conversation with Ted last night. So she either did transfer to MIT OR is undercover for AC3 or 9?

" I’m a bit disappointed in Kate she has been totally taken in by Jo but the two senior women on a team working mainly with men I can understand why they have formed the close relationship I think Kate will get tangled up in this relationship dynamic and will want to help Jo rather than exposing the truth"

I’m not yet convinced Kate is totally taken in by her - I’m wondering if the tip off about Ryan was a ploy to earn her trust, albeit possibly (rightly) mixed with genuine concern

Or Kate is deep deep undercover for one of the other AC units (the one who gave her the authorisation in S5?) because the possibility of a leak from within AC-12 is being investigated? So AC-12 said don't warn, that info gets back, other AC says hint. But Ryan got at her, regardless, so it's a salutary reminder

(Other possibility is simply that she takes preservation of life very seriously , as paramount duty)

"That was a really good shot by Steve wasn't it? hmm. He's supposed to be in such pain with his back, and thrown about in that van, yet still managed to off that marksman with one shot. Great focus and skill shown there, Steve?"

It was a great shot, possibly not totally realistic but he had used to be a firearms officer in series 1 so you’d expect him to be a good shot

I can believe adrenaline overcoming pain, but I can't believe the accuracy over that distance with a pistol.

But I'll suspend disbelief on that point

I’m soooo confused.

@TolkiensFallow

To be honest I’m so confused that I’m at the point where I’m thinking it’s Carol Baskin

Properly laughing at that 👏👏

The masonry angle has come up a couple of times. There was a lot of funny-,looking handshaking going on at one point particularly between Ted and Fairbank. Except Ted can't be a Mason as he's Catholic. . Wise can't be a Mason as she's a woman (I think there was a reference to this whe' she was appointed to replace (I think) Hilton.

I quite like the thought of masonry being a factor but I don't think it's going to be.

I think Ted has been kept on as a stooge for Wise and Sindwani. There's no way IMHO he'd be allowed to continue in the force after the debacle of S5. He's waaay past his sell by.

@Heyha

I'm.still stuck on what Lakewell said in his Vella podcast about there being a racial motivation...I know lots of POC have had awful things happen to them especially last two series but not from one particular group. I'm wondering if Jimmy mis-spoke and meant nationalist motivation which would take it back to being something to do with Northern Ireland (Scotland at a push). Just seems an odd detail to include if they aren't going back to it. But I prefer the idea of it all going back to the care homes and recruiting vulnerable youngsters into OCG that way and by wider association. Makes more sense as the common thread throughout the whole programme.

Good possibility. Though he wasn't saying there was a racial element. I just tried to find the dialogue between Gail and Jimmy, because like you I thougg Jimmy waa saying there it was racial motivated. I wanted to know what waa said exactly because I waa struck by the fact that Gail said she hadn't noticed any race element, and i thought that was odd, because if the situation was racial than Gail, as a black woman would probably notice a situation as having a racist element better than Jimmy might.

Anyway, I got this (from the Radio Times)

In the clip, Jimmy first discusses the events of season one – when Karim Ali was shot in a counter-terror raid, and all the police officers except Steve agreed to a cover-up. Steve was subsequently transferred to AC-12, and his old boss (the author of the cover-up) is now Chief Constable. Jimmy points out that there was clearly a cover-up, to prevent "reputational damage". He then adds: "But sometimes the reasons for the cover-up are more obscure... well it's got to be something pretty bad if you'd rather go with the story that you're basically a bunch of racists." This baffles Gail, who says she didn't detect a race element and asks about "balaclava man", to which Jimmy responds: "Not balaclava man, balaclava men.

To me "if you'd rather go with the story that you're basically a bunch of racists.", doesn't mean Jimmy thought there was a racial element but more that there was an accusation of racial motivation (that Gail hadn't heard about - so had been made internally not in the press?) which they didn't deny because they didn't want the real motivation found out.

The DNA thing is clear in my own mind so I’ll have a stab at explaining it.

Cops give “elimination” DNA samples when they join the force so that if they get involved in a messy crime incident the investigators can quickly tag DNA samples found at the scene as
X: the victim
Y: PC Smith, who as we already know found the body and attempted CPR
Z: somebody else - prime suspect.

What they don’t give consent to is a full search which would, amongst other things, tell their employers whether they were a blood relative of any known criminals. But the fact that these samples exist is the reason why the OCG found it so easy to blackmail male police officers using their brothels - once they had the DNA, if they planted it on a murdered body the database would immediately give a match.

But the search on Farida’s flat wasn’t meant to be looking for Jo’s DNA, because she had denied being there (I wish we’d seen that scene though). Steve authorised it on the basis that if Farida was OCG it was worth trying to find her other contacts, although secretly he was expecting to see Jo. So because they were doing a full search that wasn’t meant to include any police officers (apart from Farida) legally present at the scene, they just looked at everything, matched against all the databases they have and the search returned two matches for one of the samples- a 100% match and also a partial match. The 100% match was Jo, and the partial match has to be a blood relative.

Increasing numbers of criminals are being caught because although they’re not on the database themselves, their nephew gets done for a mugging on the other side of the country twenty years later and suddenly pings up as a partial on an unsolved crime list.

I'm going to have to re-watch the exit interview - who was it that decided the announcement would be made in one month?

Because it's a bit weird to leave someone newly sacked in situ for a month with enormous policing powers and access to just about anything. So that person can't keep Ted indefinitely, but is perhaps really hoping that Ted can make that breakthrough in the time he's found for him

I think Ryan's really menacing. Baby faced new boy with an illegal weapon threatening his superior and knowing she can't do anything about it. I know Buckles' accent makes him sound soft rather than a hard man, but I've watched all of Peaky Blinders, looks and accents mean nothing

I like the idea that the young betting shot robber is related to Jo in some, undetected, way. That'd be a good reason to coerce her, because that initial shout to stop the convoy enroute in episode one is so far fetched, no way could she have seen that van and spotted a risk to life in the blink of an eye. It's reminiscent of Maneet being coerced because of her cousin, despite Maneet being a good person and a good copper.

They're all bent in one way or another, even if not for personal gain, like Steve and Kate saying Gates died in TLOD even though he took his own life.

Mother of God I’m so confused now that when someone mentioned masonry, I did actually start to think of stonemasons and was trying to remember who that related to

@Mintyt

Who was identified over the page pls

Have you not watched the episode or read a single post on the thread?

Okay, in the recap:
You hear Lakewell saying on the tape that there are some people you can’t challenge.

Cut immediately to Osborne outside the court room talking about having pride in counter terrorism officers.

They keep showing him and talking about him and he’s now in the top job.

It has to be him at the top of it all surely.

On the longer tape he’s then talking about that case again.

Then Steve and Ted are talking over the tape.

Then Lakewell says they must be covering up something pretty bad if they’d rather be accused of being a bunch of racists. And Vella says she didn’t detect a race element in balaclava man.

So he wasn’t actually saying there was a racial element - he was saying that this was a sign of something big being covered up.

TLDR version - the complicated stuff with the different databases in the final scene was just Jed’s way of explaining why although the cops had had both Tommy’s* DNA and Jo’s DNA in their possession for ten years or more, they’d never been able to see the relationship.

*or whoever

Went back and watched the armed robbery scene.

Jo’s face and reactions from the car could definitely be someone worried about their child / loved one being shot but her actions after that don’t really add up.

@GrandmasNightgown

I'm going to have to re-watch the exit interview - who was it that decided the announcement would be made in one month?

Because it's a bit weird to leave someone newly sacked in situ for a month with enormous policing powers and access to just about anything. So that person can't keep Ted indefinitely, but is perhaps really hoping that Ted can make that breakthrough in the time he's found for him

Ted hadn’t been ‘sacked’ though; he’s been strategically and forcibly ‘retired’.

Booting him out that immediately would raise all sorts of suspicions and attract attention that Andrea and Rohan are obviously not keen to attract.

Because it's a bit weird to leave someone newly sacked in situ for a month with enormous policing powers and access to just about anything. So that person can't keep Ted indefinitely, but is perhaps really hoping that Ted can make that breakthrough in the time he's found for him. I think that the fiasco with Jimmy Lakewell would mean Ted would be marched out of the office immediately. But this being a drama, he will probably remain in post long enough to solve the case and be allowed to continue.

That episode was a stonking one wasn't it? It made up for the previous three 'slow burner' ones.

Still not sure what Kate is up to. She seems to be playing everyone!

Kate has really been annoying this series. Wouldn’t be surprised if she’s H at this rate. I just hope it’s not Ted.

I can believe adrenaline overcoming pain, but I can't believe the accuracy over that distance with a pistol.

But I'll suspend disbelief on that point

In amidst an avalanche of massively implausible events in last nights episode, Steve’s impressively sharp shooting probably irked me the least!

I love LOD, I truly do, but JM veered dangerously close to the absolute limit of possibility in that episode on multiple occasions.

Interesting point about why Ted's being kept on after having been basically sacked. There MUST be a motivation for keeping him in situ - to self- sabotage, to give Wise time and rope to flush him out as bent, or for some other reason?

Sadly I think he's bent as a nine-bob note but not so bent that he's part of the OCG. Steve is onto him, Ted knows Steve is onto him (hence making Steve DI) and now Ted is even more certain due to Steve's visits to Chicken Licken.

I can't see Steve being undercover but I DO think that he's easily led, potentially misguided and basically an idiot who let himself be taken in by Lindsay and who can't keep it in his pants. he's not clever enough to be undercover,

I think if anyone is undercover it's Kate. She's smarter than Steve, corruptible imho and has already shown capacity for bentness in her relationship with Rich Akers. I don't think she's loyal either and doesn't value relationships.