Grantchester

It's 1956 and with Amanda long gone, Sidney's life now revolves around the church services and the interminable meetings of the Parochial Council and their plans for a village fete. He yearns for some excitement, and Geordie has noticed that Sidney's devil-may-care attitude feels increasingly like a death wish.

Sidney Chambers attends a talk by the Reverend Nathaniel Todd, a key part of the Civil Rights movement in America. During the event, protesters disrupt Todd's speech and release fireworks, causing the audience to panic and leading to a crush as dozens of people try to escape through a locked door. In the chaos, a man is stabbed and killed by an unseen assailant. The murder sees racial tensions spike and Geordie is called in to investigate.

With Violet gone, Sidney loses himself in drink. He wakes on the vicarage couch after a seriously heavy drinking session. It transpires that he was the last person to see a young woman alive but Sidney struggles to remember her final words. Mrs C and Leonard worry about his behaviour but Sidney shrugs off their concern. On his own, his smile fades – he feels wretched, lost and badly misses Violet.

Geordie suspects foul play when computer laboratory head Professor Simms keels over and dies from mercury poisoning. It seems the deceased recently spent the night in the lab with someone other than his wife, possibly a fellow educated man. Geordie seeks advice from Leonard, and the pair start to uncover the surprisingly messy love lives of Simms' colleagues. Elsewhere, Cathy is brutally tricked, Will returns to Grantchester and Mrs C makes a shocking discovery.

Will is preparing to be installed as the new vicar of Grantchester and Mrs C is anxious about his relaxed attitude. But that's just Will's nature – as he tells the Archdeacon, he's never been more sure of anything. The clock is ticking for Will to uncover the truth and help the family heal, but his own troubled past threatens to colour his view of the case – and Geordie realises his new friend has demons of his own.

Will is settling into the new routines of his life in Grantchester: sermons and services in the church, working the punch bag at the gym, and suffering sniping comments from Leonard in the vicarage.

But then an unexpected phone call summons Will back home, and he asks Geordie for his help: Will's father has got himself into some trouble. It's a chance for Geordie to discover where Will really comes from, and it's not what he expected, taking him into a very unfamiliar – and unfriendly – world.

Will hasn't been home in a while, running from a past he wants to forget. But you can't outrun it forever, and when one vicious beating leads to a grisly murder at a sprawling ancestral home, scandal threatens to engulf the Davenport Family, and life will never be the same for Will again.

Will, reeling from his family tragedy and daunted by the choice he now faces, seeks distraction in Geordie's world. A curious new case unfolds: the murder of a Teddy Boy at a dance hall, which Geordie concludes is proof that the country's truly gone to the dogs. It's a view fuelled by the impotence he now feels regarding Cathy's troubles at work and his daughter Esme's teenage rebellion.

Away from her life at the vicarage, Mrs C is feeling lost, while Cathy is left shaken by another encounter at work. Leonard is adrift, hiding at Daniel's house and reeling from his encounter with Will. Can Grantchester's new vicar, already dealing with demons of his own, calm Geordie's anger long enough to uncover who was really behind the boy's death?