“Apparently, the MOD [Ministry of Defence] asked for me,” DCI Amy Silva says in the early minutes of the new series of Vigil.
“Well, either that's a vote of confidence or someone’s got it in for the Air Force,” replies DI Kirsten Longacre.
Given the success Silva, superbly played by Suranne Jones, had in solving a murder in the claustrophobic setting of a Navy submarine in the acclaimed first season of Vigil, it’s likely the witty reply from Longacre (Rose Leslie) is true on both counts. This time, Silva has been called in to investigate a multiple-fatality incident at a Scottish Air Force facility.
“I was honestly quite surprised and excited about how they were going to do Vigil series two because the first series was so specific and such a ride,” Jones says. “Tom Edge [series creator] and the writers have done a brilliant job at putting a new world together for the second series.”
Here, Jones talks about the twists and turns of the new season, why she loved working with Rose Leslie again, the new additions to the cast and why she loves the “maverick” in Amy Silva.
Where do we find Amy at the start of series two?
We left series one with Amy and Kirsten picking up Poppy [Amy’s daughter] after the trauma of the submarine and we saw that they decided to give their relationship a go. In this series, Kirsten is pregnant, they are very happy together and very much in love and Poppy is now living with them. So we see Amy really happy and in a very secure place in her life.
Can you tell us about the story in the new series?
Rather than the navy, which we saw in the first series, we’re now in the world of the air force. It’s clever as we stay in the ‘Vigil’ world and we have a blueprint of this police officer – my character – who has got form about investigating the military. At the start of this series, there has been an awful incident involving 'malfunctioning' military drones killing multiple people at the Dundair Air Base and, due to her work on the submarine, Amy is called in to investigate whether these drones really have malfunctioned or have in fact been used to attack their own.
We’ve got four returning characters – Amy, Kirsten, Poppy and Gary Lewis back as Robertson – which is quite unusual to jump into a second series with because usually you meet more characters again, but it feels very fresh and exciting, and fully grounded in the world that we know from the first series – albeit with a brand new story and a brand new mystery for Silva to unravel.
Season 2 brings more tense times for detectives Amy Silva (Suranne Jones) and Kirsten Longacre (Rose Leslie). Credit: BBC
Would you say series two has lots of twists and turns, as the first series did?
Yes, absolutely! I think the magic of Vigil is that Amy is the audience in a way. In series one on the submarine, she kept pointing a finger at different people but every time she had a lead, that person had something but it wasn’t the main crime so it led her to something else. We’ve managed to do that again in this series. There are lots of ways that Amy could go with the investigation and it leads her to meet various characters in Wudyan, which is our fictional country in the middle east and the secondary world in this series – similar to how the submarine was the secondary world in the first series. We shot the Wudyan scenes in Morocco which was really fun. Even that is still kind of sticking with the blueprint of the first series, one that World Productions and Tom Edge, our writer, really found exciting. The first series was of course land and sea and this series sees Amy go to two different worlds within the same investigation. I think that in itself sets Vigil apart from anything else on TV.
I also think it’s brave to tackle the issues and ask some of the questions that you see in the series, certainly as we come into the later episodes. It’s done in a way that keeps you in a populist, blockbuster entertainment show but is really quite intelligent and thoughtful about what’s going on in the world and I think they’ve done a really good job with that.
What can you tell us about Amy’s relationship with Kirsten in this series and what it’s been like working with Rose again?
One of the pulls to come back to Vigil was working with Rose again. We got on so well in series one so to come back and then have our relationship, both on and off screen, be more settled was such a joy. We could dive straight back into it and just assess where we were at. Rose was actually pregnant while we were filming which was lovely, though perhaps not for Rose on many occasions - it must have been really tiring! It was lovely though as she really had the bump that we see in the series.
There are exciting new additions to the cast this series. What was it like working with Dougray and Romola?
DCI Amy Silva (Suranne Jones) and Acting Squadron Leader Eliza Russell (Romola Garai). Credit: World Productions
I love Romola Garai, I always have. So when I found out she was cast I was so excited and we just got on straight away. Romola plays Eliza Russell, the Squadron Leader in Wudyan, who Amy goes to see as part of her crime scene. Eliza is assigned to help Amy out, which no-one wants to do as she’s infiltrating their world and works in a different way to them. Romola and I managed to have a laugh somehow, amongst the quite traumatic and full-on scenes.
Dougray is fantastic and, as with Romola, I was so excited when I heard he was cast. Dougray plays Air Marshall Marcus Grainger and he is one of the first people that Amy meets. He seems to want to help her on the face of it but, as any good investigation goes, Amy digs deep and he wants rid of her. However, he allows her to go to Wudyan but he knows that is going to bring up some problems so, by signing Amy up to do that, it actually causes him a world of pain.
Dougray Scott joins the series as Air Vice-Marshal Marcus Grainger. Credit: Jamie Simpson
In series one, Amy had some big challenges to face in the submarine – one of them being claustrophobia. Were there any challenges for this series?
One of the things I love about Vigil is the stunts. In series one, Amy was picked to go and do this extraordinary thing that she would never normally get to do; involving her landing on the submarine and having to quickly assess the situation and face her own fears. It was a very unusual and extreme situation.
This time, we have another extraordinary situation where Amy ends up in a place where she shouldn’t be because her investigation has taken her there. She is so out of her depth but the maverick in her allows her to beat the system she’s in and I love that about her. There are some brilliant stunts and – spoiler – some brilliant fight scenes this time. I had four great stunt women for this series as we were in different locations. All of them allowed me to do as much as I could and we had a lot of fun with it – I ended up with lots of bruises, but they were so worth it! That’s the fun part for me, that I get to do that as well as portray the brightness and intelligence of Amy’s character.
Vigil seasons1 and 2 are streaming at SBS On Demand. Season 2 is also airing weekly on SBS on Thursday nights (see TV Guides for times).
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Vigil
series • drama
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series • drama
MA15+
THE NEW SEASON OF VIGIL
Suranne Jones is out of the submarine, but still trapped as ‘Vigil’ returns
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