When Jack Wright, a wealthy businessman (Trevor Eve), is found dead at his mansion, it opens up a tangled web of mystery in a six-part series that’s recently aired on BBC One.
In the gripping show, the police must decide whether he took his own life or was murdered. The motive for murder becomes apparent at the reading of his final will, when the gathered beneficiaries are blindsided by sudden, dramatic changes to the bequests. His two sons by his first marriage to Rose (Gemma Jones) expected substantial inheritances, but Gray (John Simm) and John (Daniel Rigby) receive only £10,000 each, while Gray’s daughter Emily (Ruby Ashbourne Serkis) inherits control of the family business they’d expected to get. Jack’s third wife Sally (Nikki Amuka-Bird) is also blindsided, both by her own reduced bequest and by the fact that while their daughter Daisy (Eden Hollingsworth) gets £10 million, her son Josh (Samuel Small) gets nothing. We hear of Asha, a daughter from his deceased second wife, but we never meet her. The family decides to challenge the will, with Gray and John claiming it’s unfair and disproportionate, while Sally argues Jack had dementia and that an earlier version, which named her the main beneficiary, should stand instead.
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It sets up an intriguing, tightly intertwined mystery that unspools slowly across the six episodes. How did Jack die, and why did he change his will so dramatically in the weeks before his death? Adding to the intrigue, writer Chris Lang tops and tails each episode with short video clips of the main characters two years after the events we’re trying to unravel, and the differences in their demeanour and costumes are quietly telling. How have they ended up where they are, and what does it say about their motives and involvement in the mystery? It’s a clever, effective device for keeping us guessing.
The fine cast bring the core characters vividly to life, although some of the peripheral characters feel underused and could have been fleshed out further, such as Emily’s boyfriend Reuben, Jack’s executive assistant Annie, estate manager Derek, and housekeeper Mary among them. We don’t see them interviewed much, yet they surely know more about the circumstances than we’re shown. What’s more frustrating is that although the sixth episode ties up some loose ends, it leaves the show open for a second series in 2027. We’re still yet to know who really did it, with perhaps these characters, and the missing daughter Asha, having more to say when it returns.