Dept. Q Season 2 Shooting Started: It’s been almost a full year since Netflix quietly confirmed it, and fans of the brooding, foul-mouthed Edinburgh detective have had nothing but patience to hold onto since then. Well, the wait for actual news is over, even if the wait for the show itself is just getting started. Production on the second season of Dept. Q is officially underway, cameras rolling on the cobbled streets of Scotland’s capital once again. Matthew Goode is back in the wool coat. The rest of the misfit squad is back, too. And there’s already a hint about what kind of mess they’re about to walk into.
But before anyone starts marking a premiere date on the calendar — don’t. This one’s going to take a while.
The catch, because there’s always a catch with these things, is the timeline. Principal photography began in mid-July 2026, and the production schedule runs through December. Five months of shooting, followed by the usual months of post-production, editing, scoring, and all the invisible work that turns raw footage into a finished series. A 2026 release is out of the question. The most realistic estimates put the second season somewhere in the second half of 2027, with early 2028 being a possibility if the post-production process runs long. Netflix hasn’t set an official date, and they probably won’t for a while.
Dept. Q Season 2 Shooting Started: The Long Road From Renewal to Rolling Cameras
Netflix greenlit a second run of the show back in August of 2025, a decision that surprised almost no one, given how quickly Dept. Q climbed the streamer’s charts after it dropped. What took longer than some expected was actually getting the production machine moving. Cameras didn’t start turning in Scotland until the very end of June 2026, with the main shoot properly kicking off in mid-July, once again anchored in Edinburgh — the same city whose grey stone and damp weather became almost a character in its own right during season one.
The shoot itself is expected to run for roughly five months, wrapping sometime in December 2026. That’s a long production window, and it comes with an obvious consequence: post-production still has to happen after that. Editing, sound, color, visual effects, the works. Realistically, most projections now put the earliest possible release somewhere in the second half of 2027, and it wouldn’t be shocking if it slipped into early 2028 instead. Netflix hasn’t put an official date on the calendar yet, and given how far out the finish line still is, that’s not surprising either.
Who’s Coming Back
The core trio that made the first season click is fully intact. Matthew Goode returns as Carl Morck, the brilliant but famously prickly detective at the center of it all. Alongside him, Alexej Manvelov steps back into the role of Akram Salim, and Leah Byrne returns as Rose Dickson — the two colleagues who somehow manage to keep Morck functional despite himself. Jamie Sives is also confirmed to be back as James Hardy, rounding out the investigative unit that gave the show its offbeat, almost reluctant chemistry.
Beyond that central group, Netflix has also confirmed that Mark Bonnar, Kate Dickie, Aaron McVeigh, and Sanjeev Kohli are all returning in their previous roles, keeping much of the supporting cast consistent between seasons — something that tends to matter a lot for a show that leans as heavily on character dynamics as this one does.
Behind the camera, Scott Frank remains at the helm as the driving creative force, having co-created the series in the first place. Chandni Lakhani is back too, wearing both the writing and directing hats once again, which should help preserve the tone and pacing that made the debut season feel so distinct from the usual crime-procedural formula.
The New Faces
The list of new additions is substantial, and it suggests the second season is expanding its scope. Aisling Franciosi, who has been quietly building one of the more interesting careers in British television, joins the cast. Greg Wise, Nicholas Rowe, and Tony Curran bring significant experience and presence. Hamish Clark, Alex Ferns, Ross Anderson, Rebecca Root, Isla Johnston, and Amy Brenneman round out the new arrivals.
That’s ten new performers, which means the world of Dept. Q is getting bigger. Some of them will presumably be connected to the central mystery of the season. Others may be new recurring characters, expanding the department or complicating Morck’s life in ways that extend beyond a single case. Brenneman, in particular, is an interesting addition. She’s been a steady presence in American television for decades, and her casting suggests Netflix sees Dept. Q is a show with international reach.
What the New Season Might Actually Be About
Details on the plot are being kept close to the chest, as you’d expect this early into a five-month shoot. But one teaser has already made its way out: this season, Carl and his team are said to be digging into a disturbing crime that reaches into the upper echelons of Scottish society. The framing being used is that it’s a story about wealthy, powerful people who assume the rules don’t apply to them — and a detective who’s determined to prove they’re wrong.
It’s a premise that feels deliberately timely, tapping into a broader cultural appetite for stories about accountability and privilege. And it fits naturally with the source material. Dept. Q is adapted from the novels of Danish author Jussi Adler-Olsen, whose Department Q book series follows a cold-case unit digging up investigations everyone else gave up on. The first season transplanted that story from its original Copenhagen setting to Edinburgh, while keeping the emotional backbone intact — a gifted but difficult investigator, paired with an unconventional team, cracking cases that seemed permanently unsolvable. Season two looks set to keep pushing forward both the case-of-the-season plot and the ongoing personal storylines that helped the show stand out from more conventional procedurals.
A Bigger Bet on the Franchise
The decision to move forward with production says something about how Netflix is thinking about Dept. Q long-term. Adler-Olsen’s source material isn’t short on story — there are ten novels in the original series, more than enough to sustain multiple future seasons if the streamer wants to keep going. And Netflix appears to be doing exactly that. Beyond the flagship series, the wider Department Q universe is already expanding, with additional television adaptations in the works, including The Scarred Woman, Victim 2117, The Shadow Murders, and Locked In.
No release date has been locked in yet for season two, and there’s still a long stretch of filming and post-production ahead. But the fact that cameras are finally rolling — with nearly the entire original cast, the same creative leadership, and a noticeably expanded ensemble — is a strong signal that Netflix is leaning hard into this franchise as one of its most reliable European crime exports. For fans, that’s reassuring news, even if it comes wrapped in the reminder that the wait isn’t over yet. It’s really just entering its next, longer phase.
The Team Behind the Camera
Scott Frank remains the creative force behind the series. He co-created the project with Chandni Lakhani, who returns as both writer and director for the second season. Frank’s involvement is one of the reasons the first season worked as well as it did. He’s the creator of The Queen’s Gambit, and before that spent years writing films like Out of Sight and Logan. He understands character. He understands pacing. He understands that the best crime stories are never just about the crime.
Lakhani’s role as writer and director gives the second season a unified creative vision. The first season benefited from having a clear sense of what it was trying to be, a crime thriller that valued atmosphere and character development as much as plot twists. Lakhani’s return suggests continuity on that front. The show isn’t being handed off to a new team. The people who built it are still running it.
Where the Franchise Is Headed
Netflix isn’t treating Dept. Q as a one-off experiment. The streaming platform has already announced plans to adapt several more of Adler-Olsen’s novels, including The Scarred Woman, Victim 2117, The Shadow Murders, and Locked In. The ambition is clear. Netflix wants Dept. Q to become a long-running franchise, the kind of series that returns season after season with new cases and evolving character dynamics.
The model makes sense. Crime procedurals with strong central characters have been the backbone of television for decades, and the streaming era hasn’t changed that. What’s changed is the scale and the production values. Dept. Q is being treated as a premium drama, with location shooting in Edinburgh, a cast that includes established film and television actors, and source material that provides a deep well of stories to draw from.
The ten Adler-Olsen novels represent years of potential content. If the show continues to perform well, there’s no reason it can’t run for as long as the creative team wants to keep making it. The English-language adaptation has already proven it can translate the essence of the stories while making them feel specific to their new setting. Edinburgh in Dept. Q is moody and atmospheric and slightly menacing, a city of old stone and dark secrets. It’s a perfect backdrop for the kind of stories the series tells.
The Waiting Game
None of this makes the wait easier. A 2027 release, or possibly early 2028, means fans will have gone two years or more between seasons. That’s becoming more common in the streaming era, where production schedules are longer, and post-production is more complex. But it’s still frustrating, especially for a show that ended its first season with the promise of more to come.
The consolation is that the show is actually happening. Cameras are rolling. The cast is assembled. The scripts are written. Dept. Q season two is not stuck in development hell or waiting for a green light. It’s being made, right now, in Edinburgh. The finished product is a long way off, but it’s real. Carl Morck will be back. The cases will be investigated. The rich and powerful who think they’re untouchable will find out otherwise. It’s just going to take a while.