For Detective Chris O’Neill (Kevin McKidd), a well-established career in the Scottish police force has taught him that missing person cases require both decisive action and utmost sensitivity.
In four-part drama Six Four however, Chris finds himself on the other side of an investigation when the missing person in question is his teenage daughter, Olivia, and suddenly the considered approach at the heart of policing protocol comes up against powerful parental instincts that will stop at nothing to get answers.
It’s not only Chris who is caught in a fight between head and heart. His wife Michelle (Vinette Robinson), a former undercover officer, is determined to get to the bottom of Olivia’s disappearance before it’s too late. It’s clear that the couple’s relationship is feeling the strain of the situation they find themselves in, not least because both are all too familiar with the heartbreak of an unsolved case and have vastly different ideas about how they should be carrying out the search.
As time goes by, and days become weeks and months since they have seen their daughter, the chance of a positive outcome feels like it is fading fast and desperation begins to take over.
Worried about his wife and in the midst of his own search, Chris also has a job to do, but his work begins to bear a startling resemblance to his own life when he is contacted by investigative journalist Sam Wishart (Selin Hizli) about the disappearance of a young woman a decade earlier. Sam believes that the disappearance of local girl Julie Mackie ten years prior was a cover up by the very people tasked with finding her and wants the case reopened.
It’s a call that piques Chris’ interest, but his brother, Assistant Chief Constable Philip O’Neill (Andrew Whipp) was involved in the original case, so complex family relationships and a personal history with Sam leaves him hesitant to dive into the past.
Michelle, like any parent, is willing to put herself in danger if it means getting closer to finding her daughter, but the past is a dark and confronting place for her too, and the secrets exposed there threaten to tear their family apart. Her work as an undercover police officer saw her involved with some of London’s most dangerous criminals, and though she has tried to leave that chapter of her life behind, there are unbreakable threads linking her to people who could put Olivia in harm’s way.
When the daughter of the Scottish Justice Minister is reported missing, presumed kidnapped, the possibility that Olivia’s case may be connected is impossible to ignore, and Chris is forced to consider that the Mackie investigation could also provide further clues. The lives and fates of three young women are now firmly in the forefront of Chris’ mind, and he is all too aware that a failure to make headway in finding out what happened to them could have dire consequences for all involved, including professional and personal repercussions for both Michelle and him.
There is also a deeper than usual understanding of the impact these disappearances have on the families involved; after all, Chris and Michelle are living it in real time. Chris’ interactions with Jim Mackie (James Cosmo), a father who has already lived out this same nightmare, reveal that time is far from a healer when it comes to a parent’s pain, and the uniquely traumatic reality of never knowing what happened to your child can fundamentally change a person.
Chris recognises similarities between the present-day kidnapping, and Julie Mackie’s disappearance, but the more he examines each case, the more clearly he can see the glaring gaps in the original investigation. They are gaps that mean putting loyalty and everything he thought he knew about those around him to one side to get to the heart of the reason for these crimes. When the mystery of Olivia’s disappearance also takes an unexpected turn, Chris realises that the circumstances surrounding his daughter’s case have clouded his judgement in not only finding her but solving either of the remaining missing person cases.
Based on the acclaimed Japanese novel of the same name, Six Four adapts the original narrative arc of the novel to its uniquely Scottish setting but retains the delicate balance of the protagonists’ internal struggle between institutional corruption and the distressing reality of their missing child. In searching for an answer to one unsolved case, assumed connections are proven irrelevant and unexpected truths reveal themselves instead. As Six Four unfolds, and more information comes to light, whether justice always accompanies the truth is up for debate.
Six Four doesn’t just surprise audiences with unexpected twists and turns; it plays with the very format of a crime drama, proving that the connection between cases is rarely straight forward if it exists at all. There’s no knowing what will happen next, and the whole concept of a ‘whodunnit’ is turned on its head, as conspiracies and corruption weave a tangled and far-reaching web that hides the real mystery from view.
Six Four premieres is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Episodes air weekly at SBS starting Wednesday 29 July at 9.30pm.
