Last year, Netflix’s thriller series Department Q took over the internet, and has since had fans begging for another season (hi yes, we’re fans.) The good news is, it’s just been renewed for an exciting season 2, where the group of misfit investigators will take on another cold case. Yes!
Season one followed grumpy Detective Carl Morck (Matthew Goode) who was assigned a new department at the police station in Edinburgh, where he’s given cold cases to solve. For his first job he chose to solve the mysterious disappearance of prosecutor Merritt Lingard (Chloe Pirrie) who went missing four years previously.
The series spent six weeks in the Global Top 10 shows on Netflix, and quickly became renowned as an unbeatable crime thriller on the platform. And the good news is, the gang will be back for more! On 25th June 2026, the streaming platform confirmed a season two of the series was about to go into production. Here’s everything we know so far.
When was Department Q renewed for season 2?
On 25th June 2026, Netflix announced a new season of Department Q was on its way, and production is already happening in Edinburgh. Woohoo!
Department Q season 2 cast
Of course the show doesn’t exist without Matthew Goode as Detective Carl Morck, alongside his team of misfits – Alexej Manvelov (Jack Ryan, Top Dog) as Akram Salim, Leah Byrne (But When We Dance) as DC Rose Dickson and Jamie Sives (Guilt, and Chernobyl) as DS James Hardy.
Kelly Macdonald is also returning as Dr Rachel Irving, as well as Kate Dickie as Moira Jacobson, Aaron McVeigh as Jasper and Sanjeev Kohli (Still Game, River City) as Martin Flemming, alongside Mark Bonnar from Line of Duty and Ludwig as Stephen Burns.
Excitingly, season two will also welcome a stellar new cast, although details of their characters are being kept under wraps:
- Aisling Franciosi (Speak No Evil, The Nightingale) as Kimmie
- Greg Wise (The Crown, The Bucaneers) as Derek Powell
- Nicholas Rowe (Red Eye S2, Spy Among Friends) as Thomas Fulton
- Tony Curran (Outlander: Blood of my blood, Mary and George) as Winnie Calderwood
- Hamish Clark (Monarch of the Glen) as Christopher Herron
- Alex Ferns (Waiting for the Out, The Batman) as Phil Allenbeck
- Ross Anderson (Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, The Rig) as Ricky Daddario
- Rebecca Root (Heartstopper, The Wheel of Time) as June Lovesay
- Isla Johnston (The Queen’s Gambit, The Carpenter’s Son) as Agnes
What have the cast said about Department Q season 2?
Speaking to Yahoo back in 2025, series lead Matthew Goode told the publication he wanted to see more of Alexej’s Manvelov’s character Akram in season two, saying: “I was saying to Scott [Frank, the show’s creator] the other day, what we really need to do is, A, season 2, and we need to get Alexej into eight weeks of Krav Magar training so the fight scenes in season 2 can be amazing. It’s going to be a sort of Syrian Bourne.”
What could happen in Department Q season 2?
Rob Bullock, executive producer for Left Bank Pictures reveals season 2 will see “Carl and his band of misfits tackle a terrible crime hidden in the highest echelons of Scottish society. It is a story for our times: rich and powerful people who believe they are above the law. Carl, of course, knows otherwise.”
Another executive producer Manda Levin added: “The story of Season 2 is as darkly delicious as you’d expect, and Carl and his glorious gang will have their work cut out pinning down the perpetrators as we launch back in for more!”
Department Q is based on a series of books by Jussi Adler-Olsen and so there’s already a number of existing plots and angles the show could carry on exploring. The first series is inspired by the novel Mercy, which follows a similar plot-line to the TV series. If the Netflix show were to then follow the order of the Department Q books the next one to be adapted would be The Absent One.
The Absent One is about Detective Morck solving another cold case, this time involving the double murder of a brother and sister who were killed two decades ago. One of the suspects for the crime is serving time, however Carl suspects everything is not quite what it seems and there are still some questions that need answering.
We also never get a proper answer as to what happened with Carl during the initial shoot-out and who was responsible for the death of the police officer at the beginning of the season, and so we’d hope to get some answers to this too!
Department Q season 1 is available on Netflix now
