Netflix has released a first look at its upcoming detective drama Dept. Q – and we can’t wait for this one.
The nine-part series, which arrives on screens in May, boasts an impressive cast, including Matthew Goode (Downton Abbey, The King’s Man), and Kelly Macdonald (Line of Duty, Operation Mincemeat), and follows a brilliant detective who is wracked with guilt after his partner is left paralysed. Upon his return to work, he’s assigned to an all-consuming cold case.
Intrigued? Keep reading to find out all you need to know.
© Jamie Simpson/NetflixWhat is Dept. Q about?
The series is an adaptation of the novels by Danish author Jussi Adler-Olsen and follows DCI Carl Morck, a “brilliant cop” but “terrible colleague”, whose “razor-sharp sarcasm” hasn’t made him popular in the Edinburgh Police.
After a shooting leaves a young PC dead and his partner paralysed, Carl finds himself exiled to the basement and the sole member of Dept. Q; a newly formed cold case unit.
The synopsis continues: “The department is a PR stunt, there to distract the public from the failures of an under-resourced, failing police force that is glad to see the back of him. But more by accident than design, Carl starts to build a gang of waifs and strays who have everything to prove.
“So, when the stone-cold trail of a prominent civil servant who disappeared several years ago starts to heat up, Carl is back doing what he does best – rattling cages and refusing to take no for an answer.”
© NetflixMeet the cast of Dept. Q
Matthew Goode leads the cast as DCI Carl Morck, while Chloe Pirrie (The Game, An Inspector Calls) plays Merritt Lingard and Jamie Sives (Annika, Guilt) portrays Detective Chief Inspector James Hardy.
Meanwhile, Mark Bonnar (Shetland, Unforgotten) plays Stephen Burns, alongside Alexej Manvelov (Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan, Chernobyl) as Akram Salim, Leah Byrne (Nightsleeper, Call the Midwife) as Detective Constable Rose Dickson and Kate Dickie (The Witch, Game of Thrones) as Detective Chief Superintendent Moira Jacobson.
Rounding out the star-studded main cast are Shirley Henderson (Bridget Jones’s Diary, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets) as Claire Marsh, Kelly Macdonald (Line of Duty, Gosford Park) as Dr. Rachel Irving and Tom Bulpett (Father Brown, Casualty) as William Lingard.
© NetflixDept. Q release date
Dept. Q comes to Netflix on May 29, 2025.
© Justin Downing/NetflixWhat have the cast and creatives said?
The series is penned and directed by Scott Frank (The Queen’s Gambit, Godless), who wrote the series with Matthew in mind as the lead.
“Matthew just felt like this guy,” he told Tudum. “I was writing with him in mind. I knew that he could do this and that he would lend this undeniable intelligence with his flintiness, but that he could also be emotional without being sentimental.”
On where we find Carl at the beginning of the series, Matthew said: “When we join the story, a 16-year-old case up in Aberdeen has been solved. The optics of that look really good, because right now they’re lacking finance and crime figures are going up.”
He continued: “So Kate Dickie’s character — the boss of the police force — her higher-ups say, ‘Let’s form a cold case unit.'”
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