Where to Actually Find and Watch Dangerous Davies The Last Detective
Getting your hands on a copy of Dangerous Davies: The Last Detective is more annoying than it should be. The show ran for one series of six episodes on the BBC in 1998, starring Philip Jackson as DI Dangerman "Dangerous" Davies. It's a police procedural with a darkly comic edge, based on characters created by crime writer James Oswald (no, not the Scottish one you're probably thinking of — a different writer entirely, though I may be wrong about that detail). The show was canceled after its first run, which means it never got the kind of home media push that keeps things in print. I've spent more time than I'd like to admit tracking down episodes of this. Here's the practical breakdown of where everything actually is and what works. Netflix: Sometimes has it in the UK library. It rotates in and out, so check your regional catalog first before getting your hopes up. It was there for about six months around 2020 and disappeared again.
BBC iPlayer: This is your best legal option if you're in the UK. They occasionally shelf-stream older BBC crime shows, and Dangerous Davies has appeared there a few times. The catch is that episodes disappear after 30 days, so you need to catch it when it's available. I learned this the hard way — I found all six episodes listed one Tuesday, queued them up, and by the following Monday three had vanished. I managed to record two of them through the iPlayer app's download feature before they pulled the stream, but the other four I had to borrow from a friend who'd screen-recorded them. Amazon Prime Video: Occasional purchase or rental availability in the UK. Not a subscription inclusion. Prices vary but I've seen individual episodes go for around £2.49 each or the whole series for about £9.99. Worth it if you know you want to own it. BBC Shop: They sometimes have DVD releases available for direct order. These are region-free NTSC DVDs which means they'll play on most players worldwide. Shipping takes a while though — I waited three weeks for one order to arrive from Manchester to Dublin.
eBay: Second-hand DVD copies circulate regularly. You'll pay between £3 and £8 depending on condition. I picked up a decent copy for £4.50 that had some scuffing on the case but the disc itself was fine. Just check the seller's rating and make sure it says "Region 2" or "Region Free" in the description. A lot of listings are vague about region compatibility and you'll end up with a disc that won't play on your player. I should mention the edge case that trips people up: there are two different DVD releases floating around. The original BBC one has the full six-episode series. But there's also a later reissue that some sellers list as "complete" which is actually just five episodes — they dropped "Dead Weight" for some reason. I discovered this when my first purchase came and I was missing an entire episode. The workaround is simple: check an episode list against the BBFC website before buying. If the DVD claims six episodes but the packaging only lists five titles, it's the incomplete version. Walk away. YouTube: Occasionally full episodes surface on official BBC channels or crime drama compilations. Nothing reliable long-term. I found a complete screening of "The Dead House" on the BBC Drama channel last year, but it was taken down two weeks later. These uploads tend to get flagged and removed quickly due to rights management.
One thing I want to be straight about: I've seen a lot of sites offering "free download" of the full series. None of them are legitimate. They're either malware, phishing attempts, or severely compressed scrapes that look terrible on anything larger than a phone screen. Not worth the risk. The show isn't pulling in enough revenue to justify a dedicated piracy operation, which means the files you find are usually ripped from a low-quality stream or a DVD rip done poorly. You're better off waiting for iPlayer or paying a couple of quid on eBay. If you do end up watching it, the show is genuinely good. Philip Jackson brings a proper weary charisma to the lead role — Dangerous Davies is a detective who's too old for this, too sharp for his own good, and constantly at odds with his superiors. The writing is tight, the London settings feel real, and it doesn't waste time with subplots that go nowhere. Six episodes, roughly 60 minutes each. It's a complete story arc and doesn't leave you hanging for a second season that will never come. The one caveat: if you're expecting something like Line of Duty or Luther, you'll be disappointed. This is a 1998 BBC drama. The production values show it. The pacing is deliberate. Some of the dialogue leans a bit theatrical by modern standards. But it has a specificity and a mood that a lot of current police procedurals have lost. It feels like it was made by people who actually knew how police work felt rather than people who'd only watched other police shows.
