BLUE MURDER

Stars of last year's breakout crime hit tell why the job isn't getting easier for the not-so-new recruits

- HEATHER GREENAWAY

IT'S the most talked about cop drama since Line of Duty and now shock hit Blue Lights is back for a highly anticipated second season - which promises to be even more explosive than the first.

Set in Belfast, the show follows three new Police Service of Northern Ireland recruits as they navigate the turbulent and violent streets of a city still living in the shadow of The Troubles.

With murders, riots, extortion rackets, petrol bombs, drug deaths and beatings galore - the fast-paced first series, with its cast of likeable characters, became an overnight hit and left global audiences begging for more.

Viewers' prayers have at last been answered with season two of the drama, written and directed by Declan Lawn and Adam Paterson, hitting our screens this week and a third and fourth series commissioned and in the pipeline.

The new series, on BBC iPlayer now, is set one year on from constable Gerry Cliff's death and sees Belfast city centre awash with drugs and beset by street crime.

Response officers Grace Ellis, Annie Conlon and Tommy Foster are no longer wide-eyed rookies, and are beginning to feel the personal and psychological effects of relentless and punishing police work. As the episodes progress the truth behind the city centre crime wave is slowly revealed - Lee Thompson, a young man from a Loyalist background, has decided to make a play for absolute power within his community, pushing aside the godfathers who have ruled it for a generation.

Writer Lawn. said: "Series two is bigger, bolder and more dramatic. Series one was about our recruits having their feet held in the fire and in series two they are firmly in the fire. The city is under siege with drugs and petty crime, and they can't work out what's going on nor do they have the resources to deal with it."