Jim Burns

Jim Burns is a senior Belfast police officer overseeing the hunt for a killer terrorising the city, uneasy at having a high-profile outside detective, Stella Gibson, brought in above him. He is guarded, territorial about his patch, and carrying an unspoken history with Stella that complicates every professional exchange between them.

John Lynch plays Burns as a man perpetually calculating what a room already knows about him, which makes ordinary briefings feel loaded. The character works because his authority and his discomfort are always visible at once — a boss who can't quite command the one person he most needs to impress or avoid.