Defending The Guilty to return for second series

BBC Two has commissioned a second series of Defending The Guilty.

“The BBC Two audience have loved this brilliant first series. We can’t wait to get lost again with Will, Caroline and the gang in the moral maze that is Britain’s Criminal Justice System.” – Kate Daughton, Head of BBC Comedy

The series follows Will Sharpe as Will Packham – an idealistic pupil barrister being shown the ropes by his cynical, worldly-wise pupilmaster Caroline, played by Katherine Parkinson. Initially believing his role is to serve justice, Will is regularly disillusioned as he learns to manipulate a tricky and underfunded system that refuses to fit his moral assumptions.

At the same time, he’s dealing with his fellow pupils, each of them after the same single job and happy to stab each other in the back to get it.

Additional cast includes Mark Bonnar (Catastrophe) as Miles, Gwyneth Keyworth (Black Mirror) as Danielle, Prasanna Puwanarajah as Ashley, Hanako Footman as Pia and Hugh Coles as Liam.

Episode one has consolidated (28 day) to an audience of 1.5m / 9.2 percent share, an increase of +31 percent on its Tuesday night slot average. The second series has been commissioned for six episodes.

“We’ve been overwhelmed by the response to the series and are thrilled that the BBC is allowing us to spend more time with our talented gang as Kieron expertly ties their moral fibre in knots.” – Saurabh Kakkar, Executive Producer, Big Talk