Sherwood, BBC1 review — a homicidal archer is on the loose in James Graham’s new drama

When a man is murdered in a Nottinghamshire village by a bow and arrow, the temptation among the investigating officers is to brand the unknown perpetrator “the Robin Hood killer”. But the detective overseeing the case chastises his staff for turning a community’s tragedy into something “tacky”.

The serious, sombre and un-sensationalised tone that DCS Ian St Clair demands is the one adopted by the writer James Graham in his new BBC series, Sherwood — a brilliantly absorbing six-part drama inspired by two killings that shook a small, ex-mining locale in the Midlands in 2004.

This fictionalisation has brought the action to the present day, but roots of the story lie all the way back in the miners’ strike of the mid-1980s. An opening sequence comprising archive footage transports us to that febrile period — the confrontations between protestors and the police; the picket lines that split apart neighbourhoods, colleagues and families; the venom with which the word “scab” was shouted at workers who couldn’t afford to strike.

Forty years on and an atmosphere fraught with animosity still hangs over the village of Ashfield. Much of the hostility is whipped up by Gary Jackson (Alun Armstrong), one of the few men who had downed tools in an area that largely kept the mines open. An incendiary figure, he makes sure to remind perceived traitors what side they were on whenever he crosses paths with them. At a local miner welfare club, a cry of “scab” leads to a snooker ball being thrown inches above his head. On his way home that night, an arrow is shot straight into his heart.

The incident brings St Clair (David Morrissey) back to the area where he grew up and where, as a rookie cop, he was dispatched to quell the picketers. Believing that the murder may have had something to do with a night in 1984 when Gary was arrested and mysteriously released, St Clair reaches out to the officer who exonerated him, DI Salisbury (Robert Glenister), to try to glean more information. Soon enough, the bowman strikes again, narrowly missing a solicitor who Gary had asked to investigate his theory that a “spy cop” not only infiltrated his union, but settled permanently in the region.

Sherwood is an adeptly executed crime drama, driven by tight, deliberate plotting, genuinely unforeseen turns, and a palpable friction between its two detective protagonists. But in a sense, it’s not really about the crime, the investigation, the victim or the killer. As with the excellent Mare of Easttown, the murder serves as an entry point into a broader story about a downtrodden community that feels inhabited by real people. That’s especially true of Lesley Manville’s turn as Gary’s widow Julie. The depth in her shock, sorrow and exhaustion is enough of a reason to watch the show alone.

★★★★☆

On BBC1 from June 13 at 9pm

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