Martin Compston has teased the return of Line of Duty, saying he is sure there will be another series “if there’s still a story to be told”.
The Scottish actor, who plays Steve Arnott in the hit BBC programme, appeared alongside his co-star Vicky McClure, who plays Kate Fleming, on Good Morning Britain ahead of Sunday’s Soccer Aid charity event.
The sixth series of the police drama, which aired from March to May in 2021, was a ratings success, with its dramatic finale revealing the identity of the mysterious corrupt officer H.
Compston recently prompted speculation among fans when he posted a photo of himself having dinner with co-stars McClure and Adrian Dunbar and show creator Jed Mercurio, captioning the image ‘Talking tattoo designs’.
He told GMB: “We did say if we ever got 12 million (viewers) we would get tattoos of ‘AC-12 million’. If we ever do another series I think it will be something we all do together then.”
Asked whether there was another series in the works, McClure said: “Nothing’s planned as yet – we just went out for a nice meal.
“I’m telling the truth. Nothing planned and set in stone. Like Martin said before, we always have a long break in between series so it’s not really too abnormal to what we normally do.”
Compston added: “We’re chuffed that people still want us to come back. We’ve done 10 years now.
“The fact that people still want to see the show is amazing and if there’s still a story to be told, I’m sure Jed will bring us back.”
McClure added: “We adore working with each other. Jed’s writing is phenomenal.
“We’ve been working together for over 10 years now and the last series was incredible in terms of the response that we got.
“It was really quite tough to shoot because it was in Covid so it would be lovely to go back and not end that kind of way.”
The final episode of the BBC One series saw DSU Ian Buckells, played by Nigel Boyle, unmasked as the mysterious H, the corrupt police officer at the top of a criminal conspiracy.
Since then, Mercurio has taken his writing skills to another medium, penning a graphic novel called Sleeper with the writer and actor Prasanna Puwanarajah.