'The Tower' Returns for Season 3 with a New Case on "Gallowstree Lane"

The titular building of The Tower still looms over everything as the series returns for its third installment, entitled “Gallowstree Lane,” after the Kate London best-selling series of the same name it is adapted from. Despite now having moved on from that initial tragic incident on a high rise, in which both civilians and police died, life in the shadow of the giant block of flats is still the starting point for the key players and the issues of race, poverty, and crime that dominate the series. As the new mystery begins, two young men are mugged at knifepoint on the titular street, with one stabbed, Spencer Cardoso (Max Fincham). His panicked friend calls 999 using the phone of off-duty medic Owen Pierce (Chord Melodic).

The victim bleeds out before DS Sarah Collins (Gemma Whelan) and DC Elaine Lucas (Ella Smith) arrive, and his companion has disappeared with the phone, leaving Owen with a life he failed to save. He takes it out on the cops, shouting, “When are you going to stop this?” meaning putting an end to the casual gang violence that plagues the neighborhood. The technique – a stab wound to the femoral artery in passing, without breaking stride – is a gang favorite. Lucas identifies the victim, whose fingerprints are on file for cannabis possession. She is livid; she has sons at a local school, and she’s determined they will never be involved in gang violence.

DC Lizzie Adama (Tahirah Sharif) wakes as the sound of police sirens disturbs her baby son, Josh. She’s finding life as a single working mother exhausting, despite the father being in his life, Inspector Kieran Shaw (Emmett J. Scanlan), very much married with a wife who knows about the child, visiting every two weeks. However, one more kid takes a backseat to his primary focus: Kieran directs the underground Operation Perseus to bring drug lord Shakiel Oliver (Daniel Adegboyega) to justice.