Published: 12:01 am, 10 December 2025
Robin Ellacott (Holliday Grainger) and Cormoran Strike (Tom Burke) (Image: BBC/Bronte Film & TV/Justin Downing)
Tom Burke and Holliday Grainger return for the next instalment of Strike in The Running Grave, the seventh (5x60min) story of the BBC’s hit crime drama in co-production with HBO and Warner Bros. Discovery and based on J.K. Rowling’s best-selling crime novels written under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith.
Strike is one of the BBC’s most watched dramas, with the most recent instalment – The Ink Black Heart – averaging 7.1 million viewers across its run in 2024 (28-day figures).
Burke (Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, The Souvenir) as Cormoran Strike and Grainger (The Capture, The Stolen Girl) as Robin Ellacott lead a cast of acclaimed British actors including James Fleet (I, Jack Wright, Bridgerton), as Sir Colin Edensor, Nichola McAuliffe (Living, The English) as Shelley Heaton, Keeley Forsyth (Poor Things, Happy Valley) as Mazu Wace, Fabian McCallum (The Narrow Road to the Deep North, The Witcher) as Will Edensor, and John Lynch (Tin Star, Blue Lights) as Jonathan Wace.
Ruth Sheen (Unforgotten, It’s A Sin) will return as Pat, Strike’s office manager, alongside fellow returning cast members Jack Greenlees (The Trial of Cristine Keeler, Payback) as Sam Barclay, Tupele Dorgu (The Full Monty [TV series], Alma’s Not Normal) as Midge, Natasha O’Keeffe (Peaky Blinders, The Wheel of Time) as Charlotte, Sarah Sweeney (The Bastard Executioner, Cider with Rosie) as Lucy, Ben Crompton (Game of Thrones, Lockwood & Co) as Shanker, Stephen Hagan (You, Hope Street) as DCI Richard Murphy, and Caitlin Innes Edwards (Silo, Black Mirror: Smithereens) as Ilsa.
Robin Ellacott (Holliday Grainger) (Image: BBC/Bronte Film & TV/Susie Allnutt)
When Sir Colin and Sally Edensor approach Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellacott, they are desperate to reconnect with their estranged son, Will. The Edensors enlist the detectives to gather evidence to discredit the Universal Humanitarian Church, a religious cult who have indoctrinated Will and siphoned off his trust fund.
Led by the charismatic Jonathan Wace, the church is shielded by a charitable façade, celebrity backers and aggressive lawyers who have silenced critics. To investigate allegations of ill-treatment and abuse, Robin goes undercover at the cult’s secluded Norfolk headquarters, Chapman Farm. At the centre of the church’s twisted mythology is the story of the Drowned Prophet, Daiyu, believed to be divinely reincarnated.
While Strike gains valuable insights from former members on the outside, Robin finds herself facing unprecedented psychological and physical duress on the inside. Solving the mystery of the Drowned Prophet’s death becomes key to the case but leads the detectives into dangerous, unchartered territory.
Sue Tully returns to direct Strike – The Running Grave, her fourth time working on Strike. Her credits include Strike – The Ink Black Heart, Strike – Troubled Blood, Too Close, Maryland, Line of Duty, Tin Star, The A Word and The Musketeers.
Cormoran Strike (Tom Burke) (Image: BBC/Bronte Film & TV/Susie Allnutt)
Strike – The Running Grave is adapted for the screen by writer Tom Edge (Vigil, You Don’t Know Me) who also adapted previous Strike instalments The Ink Black Heart, Troubled Blood, The Silkworm, Career of Evil and Lethal White. Alex Rendell returns as producer. Executive producers are J.K. Rowling (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Strike, The Casual Vacancy), Neil Blair (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Strike, The Casual Vacancy) and Ruth Kenley-Letts (Joan, Strike, Mrs Wilson) alongside Nick Lambon for the BBC.
HBO has North American rights and Warner Bros. is selling the show internationally. The previous six series of Strike are available to watch on BBC iPlayer.
Cormoran Strike is one of the most popular detectives in crime fiction today and J.K. Rowling as Robert Galbraith is among the genre’s most celebrated writers, shortlisted for the prestigious CWA Gold Dagger in 2015 and the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year in 2016. The Cuckoo’s Calling was published to critical acclaim in 2013 and went on to be a global bestseller, followed in 2014 by The Silkworm, Career of Evil in 2015, Lethal White in 2018 and Troubled Blood in 2020. The Ink Black Heart was published in August 2022 and The Running Grave, was published in September 2023. The eighth book in the series, The Hallmarked Man, was published in September this year.
All eight Strike novels topped the national and international bestseller lists and the series has sold in total more than 20 million copies worldwide across all editions. Troubled Blood won the 2021 British Book Award for Book of the Year: Crime and Fiction. The books are published in more than 50 countries across the globe and to date have been translated into 43 languages.
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