Silent Witness - the missing episodes (1996)

Darkness Visible, by Ashley Pharoah, was originally episodes five and six of the first season of Silent Witness, but they're not available as part of the entire series on BBC iPlayer. You have to find the original DVD.

It's about a gay man who is locked up in a cell with a drunk man and found dead in the morning. The drunk man can't remember if he's done anything and is advised 'Anyone would push him away - it's only natural' so perhaps it's content like that the BBC were trying to disassociate with. Or it's the fact that we pretty much straight away figure out there's some kind of police cover up going on, which was deemed unsavoury?

Or maybe it was this quasi-torture by police moment:

Despite obstacles, Sam finds out, whilst reviving an old relationship with Brendan Coyle, now a poet. Who delivers a good speech about how Sam's dad should be remembered with affection, not solely as a victim.

Good cast includes Ken Stott, Michael Troughton, Philip Glenister and Ian Shaw, and Clare Higgins. Plus recurring detectives James Aubrey and Ruth Gemmell.

Interesting to reflect on the changes between these early shows and the version thirty years on. This one has a completely orchestral score, for example, and sounds like more work than the synth-led moderns. Also I noticed in the earlier ones the bodies in the morgue were always nude, which you would have though they really would be. But lately they're covered for modesty. Was that the BBC being over-woke?

The direction and editing is less snazzy (do you remember that season when the last shot of the episode blew out into white, for example?) The stories have generally remained good and hard hitting. The performances have generally been good.