Shameless actress Anne-Marie Duff will lead the cast of BBC One’s new psychological crime drama, From Darkness.

Written by Katie Baxendale (Sugar Rush), the four 60-minute episodes follow ex-police officer Clare Church (Duff), who left the Greater Manchester Police (GMP) in the mid-90s after the impact of violence became too overwhelming for her to continue.

Anne-Marie Duff commented: “Katie Baxendale has created a beautifully complex character in her female protagonist. As soon as I started to read episode one I felt excited at the prospect of being involved. It’s a world in which all of the characters have real stories to tell. Also I loved the BBC series The Village and one of its directors, Dominic Leclerc, will be our director on this. I couldn’t be happier.”

From Darkness begins filming in Manchester and Scotland this month.

The official synopsis reads: “Clare Church decided to turn her back on a world of misogyny and chauvinism, where it seemed you had to think and act like a man to succeed. Finding herself ignored in the office and second place in her relationship with her married DI, Clare instead found solace instead in the remote Western Isles, with her new man, Norrie, and daughter Megan.

“As four bodies from Clare’s past investigations are unearthed, she finds herself getting pulled back in to a world she’d long since left behind and a case that only she can solve. Battling her own demons, Clare feels the dual pull of a vocation that sustained her and a man she once loved, but can she protect herself from the darkness this time?”

Katie Baxendale added: “I’m a huge fan of Anne-Marie Duff. In Claire, I hope I’ve created a psychologically complex lead female character and I can’t wait to see all that Anne-Marie brings to the role.”

Are you looking forward to From Darkness? Let us know below…