Skip to main contentSkip to footer

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn commission. Read our full commerce guidelines here.

When will BBC’s hit crime show Strike return for season 5?

The sixth book in the series, Ink Black Heart, is also being released very soon

tom burke holliday
Emmy Griffiths
TV & Film Editor
Share this:

The BBC crime series Strike has been hugely popular with critics and fans alike, and with the release of the sixth book in JK Rowling’s series, The Ink Black Heart, being right around the corner, when will we be seeing the return of our favourite detective duo onscreen? Here’s what we know so far…

MORE: Call the Midwife melts fans' hearts with touching tribute amid major cast news

Tom Burke and Holliday Grainger, who play Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellacott, shared a snap of themselves on set for the fifth series back in January, and so we think that the show’s release date is likely to be right around the corner in either late 2022 or early 2023.

WATCH: Catch up with Strike on BBC iPlayer

So what will it be about? The series will tackle the fifth novel in the series, Troubled Blood, with follows Cormoran take on a cold case. The synopsis reads: "Private detective Cormoran Strike is visiting his family in Cornwall when he’s approached by a woman asking for help finding her mother, Margot Bamborough, who went missing under mysterious circumstances in 1974.

"Strike’s never tackled a cold case, before let alone one 40 years old, but despite the slim chance of success he’s intrigued and takes it on, adding to the long list of cases that he and his partner in the agency Robin Ellacott are currently working on. And Robin herself is also juggling a messy divorce and unwanted male attention, as well as battling her own feelings about Strike.

ink black heart
PRE-ORDER THE INK BLACK HEART

It continues: "As Strike and Robin investigate Margot’s disappearance, they come up against a fiendishly complex case with a psychopathic serial killer and witnesses who cannot all be trusted. They learn that even cases decades old can prove to be deadly." Sign us up!

MORE: Meet the cast of Shetland series seven 

MORE: Nicola Walker drops biggest hint yet that The Split could return

Tom and Holliday are set to be joined by a series of guest stars including Call the Midwife’s Linda Bassett, Harlots actress Anna Calder-Marshall, Only Fools and Horses actor Daniel Peacock, and It’s a Sin’s Ruth Sheen.

tom holliday 6

We can't wait for this pair to return to our screens!

Meanwhile, the sixth novel in the series, The Ink Black Heart, is set to be released on 30 August. The synopsis reads: "When frantic, dishevelled Edie Ledwell appears in the office begging to speak to her, private detective Robin Ellacott doesn't know quite what to make of the situation. The co-creator of a popular cartoon, The Ink Black Heart, Edie is being persecuted by a mysterious online figure who goes by the pseudonym of Anomie. Edie is desperate to uncover Anomie's true identity.

"Robin decides that the agency can't help with this—and thinks nothing more of it until a few days later, when she reads the shocking news that Edie has been tasered and then murdered in Highgate Cemetery, the location of The Ink Black Heart. Robin and her business partner Cormoran Strike become drawn into the quest to uncover Anomie's true identity."

Like this story? Sign up to our What to Watch newsletter to get other stories like this delivered straight to your inbox.

More TV and Film

See more