PBS Sets 'D.I. Ray' Season 2 Premiere Date

Since 2015, PBS' Summer of Mysteries has been headlined by two hit series headlined by two white guys: Grantchester and Endeavour. Whatever happens for the summer of 2024, that won't be the case, as the current lead of Grantchester, Tom Brittney, is out the door, due to be replaced by Rishi Nair in Season 9. However, Endeavour's conclusion had multiple shows vying for the new open slot. So far, fans know that Professor T, the Ben Miller starring English language remake from Eagle Eye Drama, aka Walter & Friends from Walter Presents, will be stepping up to fill the gap. But there had been no announcements about the other two candidates introduced in the summer of 2023 — Ridley, starring Adrian Dunbar, and D.I. Ray starring Parminder Nagra. Though both had issues in their first seasons, D.I. Ray was clearly the superior series, and PBS has apparently agreed, as it has been given the nod to return in June 2024.

Hailing from Jed Mercurio, the man behind the BBC's enormous hit Line of Duty, D.I Ray was, much like series from Mercurio's HTM Television (Hat Trick Mercurio Ltd) studio like Bodyguard, Trigger Point, and Bloodlands, a show that features actors now out of work since the flagship series ended. However, D.I Ray was the only one that directly tied back to Line of Duty, set in the same fictional Birmingham Police Force. It is also, notably, the only one to come to PBS, as the others were quickly snatched up by streaming services like Netflix, BritBox, and Acorn TV. However, it was also the only one to grab onto policing's third rail, race, and hold on with both hands despite the discomfort it brought.

Nagra plays the titular D.I. Rachita Ray, a British South Asian detective who endures daily microaggressions for the color of her skin when she's not enduring them for being female. The first season begins when she is assigned to a case involving South Asian suspects, not because she's more qualified, but to cover the butts of her white male superiors, something she simply accepts as the ladder she's handed. Ray herself has a lot of baggage around her own heritage, having turned her back on much of her upbringing, including dating exclusively white men. In the first season, she's forced to face both of those choices in ugly ways while also trying to solve a case that won't quit escalating, the way Murcurio cases tend to do.  By the end of the season, she's put on enforced leave to deal with her issues, but with a Season 2 already in production, it won't be long until she's called back to cover someone else's butt once again.