There’s no denying it: ‘Rellik’ is pretty tough to get your head around. But if you are tuning in and managing to keep track of the events, a carefully-crafted, backwards mystery is currently unfolding.
Episode two saw the narrative continue to move in reverse - as it will for the next four hours worth of shows - and while some answers were revealed, most of them Christine-related, we were left scratching our heads on more than one occasion.
Here are 10 questions we have following the show…
1. Can we talk about *that* ending?
In a nod to the show’s unconventional story-telling, we’re going to begin our analysis by looking at its closing minutes. Yes, we mean Christine’s filmed confession.
While we still can’t be sure if she was the person who set fire to the police station’s IT department, the fact footage of her confessing to the murders was on Dr Taylor’s laptop - which she had also stolen - means she clearly had a motive.
Have we discovered the real killer? Or could there be more to the apparent confession than meets the eye? As we still have four hours to go, we’re leaning towards the latter.
There’s also her conversation with Gabriel, which took place after the terrifying car stunt, to consider. Was her story about her dad yet another lie, or was there another video which showed her telling Isaac about that too? We’re not convinced.
2. What was Elaine’s relationship with her dad?
The DI clearly had a troubled relationship with her father, though the fact wellwishers were phoning her to share condolences suggests they were at least on talking terms when he died. So what on earth did he do to warrant her selling his car to spite him and declaring, “If anyone deserves to die alone, it’s him”?
3. What’s Gabriel’s story?
Episode one of ‘Rellik’ hinted that there was still plenty for us to learn about the DCI, and Monday, we saw a much darker side to his personality.
First up - so the event which actually happened last in real time - there was the car stunt, which saw him drive along a very busy road the wrong way, in a bid to convince his passenger Christine to start telling the truth.
Later - so earlier technically, yes, our heads hurt too - he lost his temper with Christine during an interview and had a hostile exchange with his wife. And on that note…
4. What did his wife do?
It’s clear that Lisa must have made a pretty huge mistake, as he flipped the tables on her after being confronted over pictures of him and Elaine having sex.
As Lisa appeared to be trying to keep their relationship together, insisting she still loved him, Gabriel couldn’t let go of the fact she “lied to me the way you did”.
5. Who took the photos?
We saw Elaine putting them in a envelope, but why did she have them in the first place? Who took them?
6. Who was the woman Elaine was smoking with?
While the scene they shared was relatively short, the two women seemed close, so what’s the relationship between them? Could they be more than friends?
7. Why did the newly-engaged character want to dump his fiancée?
This is the first time these two have been introduced and we soon learnt that the male character - who works on reception at the station - was actually planning to break off the relationship. We know the reason why he didn’t is her pregnancy revelation, but why did he want to end it?
8. Who is Gabriel’s therapist?
In the world of crime dramas, what you don’t see is often just as important as what’s on screen so we couldn’t help but notice that while we heard his female therapist speak, her face was never seen.
9. What’s going on with Gabriel’s daughter?
While Hannah wasn’t seen in the episode, she got two mentions. The first came when Lisa told her husband “Hannah saved you” after “all that shit you went through years ago”.
Later, when he went to Elaine’s flat and decided to break things off, he told her: “We can’t start this again, not after Hannah”.
10. What happened to the guy on the plane?
Last but not least, last week’s episode saw one character appearing to flee the country - but he was nowhere to be seen this time around.
