‘Endeavour’ returns to ITV for final series this month – Entertainment Focus

‘Endeavour’ returns to ITV1 this month for its ninth and final series with Shaun Evans reprising his role as DS Endeavour Morse.

Alongside Evans is Roger Allam who will return as DCI Fred Thursday. The first film of the new series, ‘Prelude’, is directed by Evans and the final series has once again been written by the show’s creator Russell Lewis.

The new series, set in the early 70s, finds Endeavour and Thursday entering a new era of change both professionally and personally with the return of some familiar faces along the way including Sam, played by Jack Bannon (Pennyworth), who arrives back from Northern Ireland following his service in the British Army.

Filmed in and around Oxford the strong ensemble cast reunited with Shaun and Roger includes Anton Lesser (‘Killing Eve’, ‘Game of Thrones’) who returns as CS Reginald Bright, Sean Rigby (‘Gunpowder’) as DS Jim Strange, James Bradshaw (‘Close to The Enemy’) as Dr Max DeBryn, Abigail Thaw (‘Miss Scarlet and the Duke’) as Dorothea Frazil, Caroline O’Neill (‘The A Word’) as Win Thursday and Sara Vickers (‘Watchmen’) as Joan Thursday.

In the opening film it’s Spring, 1972. Two unexplained deaths seem to lead to the Oxford Concert Orchestra, while a body discovered in a derelict warehouse stokes fears that ‘London business’ involving the criminal underworld has again found its way to Oxford. Thursday and Endeavour’s investigation unearths some unsettling connections to cases the duo believed were well and truly behind them.

Series nine is produced by Charlotte Webber alongside co-producer Joe Shrubb. Chief Creative Officer and Founder of Mammoth Screen Damien Timmer is the executive producer alongside Russell Lewis, Shaun Evans, Roger Allam, Mammoth Screen’s Director of Television Helen Ziegler and Susanne Simpson and Rebecca Eaton at Masterpiece.

Following the final film of the series, ITV1 will broadcast a special one-off documentary, ‘Morse & the Final Endeavour’, to mark the end of the epic tale of Inspector Morse, featuring behind the scenes interviews with all the main cast members who discuss the huge global appeal of this iconic Oxford detective who is celebrated the world over.

‘Endeavour’ the final series begins Sunday 26th February at 8pm on ITV1. Series 1 to 8 are currently available to watch on ITVX.