If you thought Marcella’s return last week was dark, things just got a whole lot more sinister as ITV’s crime noir continued on Monday (26 February) night.
While Marcella and her team appeared to be nowhere nearer cracking the case of murdered schoolboy Leo Priestley, viewers learned a lot more about the various strands of the story that were introduced last week.
Some of these plotlines could obviously still turn out to be red herrings (anyone who watched the first series will know what we are talking about), but these are the burning questions we were left with after episode two...
What’s the meaning of the wooden discs?
At the beginning of the episode, we saw the mystery assailant, who has been kidnapping boys and holding them hostage, creating wooden discs with various symbols on them, which it was later revealed were being surgically inserted into the victims.
But what is their significance, and what to do the engravings on them mean?
Is something going on between Tim and Maya?
We’ve had a feeling for a while that Tim is a slippery customer, and this episode practically gave us confirmation, when it appeared he’d been having an affair with Maya, despite being in a relationship with Marcella.
Could this also hint his romance with Marcella is an attempt to get close to her in order to investigate her?
What was Edward scared about?
When Edward recounted the day of Leo’s disappearance, he confessed to his mum about feeling scared, but didn’t reveal what about. Was he confronted by Leo’s abductors? Could he have been groomed himself?
Whatever happened, it’s certainly had a lasting effect on him, and by the end of the episode, he’d killed his sister’s pet mouse, which hinted there’s a lot more ahead for this character.
How was the car salesman killed?
After the car used in a hit-and-run was revealed to be carrying the body of the schoolboy killed in last week’s episode, Marcella and Rav headed to the car dealership where the vehicle had been purchased just hours earlier.
However, when they arrived, they found the car salesman dead and the office on fire, but it remained unclear how he had been killed.
It could be that he was shot, therefore pointing the finger firmly at Eric, given we know he was in possession of a gun.
Why was Mike watching Marcella?
After last week’s cliffhanger, where we discovered someone was watching Marcella through a secret webcam in her living room, her colleague Mike was seen checking the footage at his desk.
Does this prove the team are investigating her, or does it suggest he has developed an infatuation with her?
What happened to the girl who went missing after Reg’s concert?
When Reg was seen flicking through his mysterious Silver Linings book, he burnt a newspaper article about a missing girl who disappeared after one of his band’s concerts back in the day.
We’re probably safe to assume this was the same girl the paramedic told Marcella that Reg was talking to Alan about after his panic attack, but what do they have to hide about her disappearance, and is it connected to the current case?
What happened to the disabled boy?
At the end of the episode, we discovered one of Gail’s patients was a victim in the case, bearing a scar where the wooden discs are inserted in the stomach
This leads us to question if the boy was disabled when he was abducted and abused, or whether his condition was the result of what he was subjected to.
Is Gail involved in the case?
There could be nothing to this theory, but the way the scene of her feeding the disabled boy was cut into the one which showed the Adam discovering he had been operated appeared to paint her in a more sinister light compared to how we’d seen her before.
The boy also appeared to be frightened of her, which could suggest she is implicated in this apparent paedophile ring.
‘Marcella’ continues next Monday at 9pm on ITV.