'Ridley' Will Sing Another Song for Season 2

Though D.I. Ray won the right to air as part of the 2024 Summer of Mysteries, getting a double punch lead in of Professor T Season 3 and Grantchester Season 9, its main rival, Ridley, also gets to return to PBS for Season 2. Once again, the Adrian Dunbar-led show will act as the 8 p.m. E.T. lead-in ahead of a double dose of Masterpiece programming, with the highly-anticipated Moonflower Murders (aka Magpie Murders Season 2) and fan-favorite Van der Valk Season 4 following it.

Dunbar returns as Alex Ridley, a retired detective who can't stop helping his colleagues, especially his former mentee DI Carol Farman (Bronagh Waugh), whose department is understaffed, overworked, and needs his wisdom and experience. Between his adventures, he'll check in to the jazz club he's invested in, and most likely pop up on stage to sing a few old chestnuts, giving Dunbar a chance to remind those watching at home that he's a multi-talented star.

Like Season 1, PBS is breaking the series, which airs as four feature-length mysteries in the U.K., into eight 45-minute episodes to fit the Masterpiece schedule. Ironically, this move to fall means Ridley will air with Van der Valk, the other major mystery series that breaks its feature-length episodes into two parters. Hopefully, putting them together like this will make the format change feel less jarring. However, viewers should note Ridley is eight episodes to Moonflower and Van der Valk's six, so the final two episodes of Ridley will act as a lead into Masterpiece's late fall arrival, The Marlow Murder Club, which takes over the 9 p.m. berth from Moonflower at the end of October.