The stars of BBC crime drama The Gold have explained why it won't get another season despite being a hit.
Based on 1983's Brink’s-Mat armed robbery, the show tells the story of six armed men who stole £26 million worth of gold, cash and diamonds from a warehouse near Heathrow.
Starring Slow Horses actor Jack Lowden and Paddington's Hugh Bonneville, season one ended with the police catching and convicting the gang, though it was later revealed that that half of the gold was unaccounted for.
Reprising their roles from season one for a second and final season are Charlotte Spencer and Emun Elliott, who play task force members Nicki Jennings and Tony Brightwell.
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Speaking to RadioTimes.com, Spencer and Elliott said that series creator Neil Forsyth always planned it to be a two-part story.
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"I think people don't realise that, even when I've spoken to friends and family who are like, 'Oh my god, it's got a second season?', and it's like, 'Yeah, because they only ever found half [of the gold]'," Spencer said. "So there's, like, a whole other storyline that people don't know about which I think they're gonna like."
Elliott added: "The way Neil writes often, because I've worked with him a couple of times, he always seems to know whether something's going to be a standalone thing, a two-parter, a three-parter.
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"So he has that kind of entire story arc in his head from episode one, season one. And obviously if the first season had been a disaster, there would be no season two, but luckily, there was such a great response, that we got to continue chasing this gold."
The Gold has been a hit among critics, receiving an impressive score of 92% on Rotten Tomatoes from 26 reviews.
The Sydney Morning Herald described the show as a "masterclass", calling it "both engrossing and poignant".
The Gold returns on BBC iPlayer on Sunday, 8 June at 6am with all episodes, while the first will premiere on BBC One the same day at 9pm. All episodes of season 1 are available to stream now on BBC iPlayer.
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Harriet is a freelance news writer specialising in TV and movies at Digital Spy.
A horror enthusiast, she joined Digital Spy after working on her own horror website, reviewing films and focusing largely on feminism in the genre.
In her spare time, Harriet paints and produces mixed-media art. She graduated from the University of Kingston with a BA in fine art, where she specialised in painting. She also has an MA in journalism from Birkbeck University.
