Blue Lights spoilers follow.
Blue Lights has given us a second season that charged right through to the end, with a violent Mount Eden stand-off, a surprise murder confession and even a dash of romance thrown in. It's more than enough to whet appetites for season three, which is already on the way.
The Belfast police procedural's sixth episode wrapped up the question of who would go down for murdering Dixon and showed what's in store next for the Thompson siblings after little Henry found that gun.
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We left episode five just as Henry had shot a bullet out the window of their Mount Eden home – only for it to rip through the rear-view window of Grace and Stevie's cop car.
The finale begins by revealing that while neither were hurt, a tense stand-off with a dumbstruck Henry, gripping the gun, ensues.
Lee is tipped off via video and does a Frankenstein-style editing job on the footage to distil it down to the worst bit, which makes it look like his nephew was threatened by a mass swarm of armed police – while also spreading that Henry had only been holding a toy gun.
In response, the police turn the Thompson house upside down in search of any shred of evidence to connect him to the Dixon murder – after learning the gun was not the weapon used after all. Worse yet, it's not even an illegal firearm, because they find a certificate for it.
As predicted, the video causes an uproar in Mount Eden. On the street outside the house, it all starts to kick off. The response team establishes a cordon in the face of agitated locals, who thump their police shields and lob petrol bombs behind the line.
Back at the station, things are finally starting to go their way once they realise the face covering worn by Dixon's killer is identical to one found with the dead body of military veteran Ian 'Soupy' Campbell. His ex-Army comrade Lee Thompson asked to have an identical scarf as a token of their time serving in Afghanistan.
The scarf, hunted down in the Mount Eden home, is finally something to link Lee and Craig McQuarrie to Dixon's murder. With the forensics proving a connection, McQuarrie fesses up. But he also crucially says he acted alone. So Lee is off the hook.
Or is he? Because something is brewing back at the Loyal pub as the similarly-named episode draws to a close. Although Lee has got away with his involvement in Dixon's death, his sister Mags ousts him from the community and seemingly blames him for the death of their uncle Rab, who went into cardiac arrest during the police stand-off.
Back at the police station, Murray's underhand intelligence tactics are catching up with him. He's been found out for striking backroom deals with dodgy characters in an attempt to keep the peace.
He's told a preliminary investigation has been launched into the fact he never officially logged his visit to Lee at the Loyal. While we don't see exactly how this all pans out, he doesn't appear to be on the path to glory.
With the nitty-gritty case of Lee and the Dixon murder tied up, the Belfast coppers retreat to the pub to drink over another crisis averted. A number of Blue Lights couples are starting to emerge – most notably Grace and Stevie, who finally decide to give things a go after a kiss in the precinct earlier in the episode.
Although the finale might feel like everything has been neatly tied together with a ribbon of police tape, we already know the Blue Lights gang will be back for not only a third, but a fourth season. So, could Lee Thompson return? Given that the police never nailed him down for any of his wrongdoing, there's every possibility this isn't the last we've seen of him.
Blue Lights airs on BBC One and is available to stream on iPlayer.
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Previously Deputy TV Editor at Digital Spy and, before that, a TV Reporter at The Mirror, Rebecca can now be found crafting expert analysis of the TV landscape, when she's not talking on the BBC or Times Radio about everything from the latest season of Bridgerton or The White Lotus to whatever chaos is unfolding in the various Love Island villas. When she's not bingeing a boxset, in-the-wild sightings of Rebecca have included stints on the National TV Awards and BAFTAs red carpets, and post-match video explainers of the reality TV we're all watching.
