Our take
The second Christmas special swaps the usual sunny puzzle for a festive ghost story, and a cold case about a missing child gives it more weight than most island mysteries. The spooky set pieces are played for gentle shivers, and the twists keep coming right to the end. Les Dennis is good fun as a showy psychic, and the old case lets Selwyn carry real guilt, giving Don Warrington some of his best scenes in the role.
What happens
In 1977 a young officer, Selwyn Patterson, promised a boy called Marvin that he would find his missing twin, Linus Peters. He never did. Now true crime podcaster Jennifer Langan, who interviewed the Commissioner about the case the day before, is found shot dead, and both she and self-proclaimed psychic Danny Sheridan have been claiming Linus is alive. The grown-up Marvin, a recovering alcoholic supported by his sponsor Rakesha Lorde, finds a note from Linus begging for help, and talk turns to ghosts; Marlon Pryce even has to spend a night in a haunted house. Neville Parker's answer: Marvin has dissociative identity disorder and had taken on his lost brother's identity, and it was while he believed he was Linus that he shot Jennifer, coerced by a jealous Rakesha who wanted to stop Jennifer revealing Linus could be found. Danny, attacked and exposed as a fraud, admits he traced the adult Linus to Trinidad. In 1977 Rodell Weekes had hit the boy with his car, thought he had killed him, put him in the water and planted a sandal to mislead the police; a man called Winston found the unconscious child, who had lost his memory, and raised him. Linus is brought over for a reunion with Marvin. Neville, whose mother's visit is off, meets fellow Mancunian Sophie Chambers through a suitcase mix-up and invites her to Christmas dinner, and Darlene Curtis decides to train as a police officer.
Can the kids watch it?
Rated 12 by the BBFC on DVD for infrequent moderate threat, with a shooting and a few jump scares, so fine for most children from about 12 with the family.