WHEN it was announced that Trust Me (BBC1, Tuesday, 9pm), the drama that starred Jodie Whittaker as a nurse impersonating a doctor, was returning, the pulse quickened to a worrying rate.

“How can this be true?” I asked myself, given there was no one else around at the time. “Whittaker has become an international icon, starring as Doctojodfir Who? She won’t have time, even if she is a Time Lord, to leap back to Edinburgh to pretend she’s an A&E specialist.”

Further thoughts ran into the mix, such as: the first series wasn’t that great anyway. As well as having a fairly unbelievable premise, it didn’t go close enough to develop the paradox between a woman who cares deeply about her patients/mankind – yet was prepared to risk their lives at any moment.

In any case, a read of programme notes provided the sedative my overactive imagination badly craved. The title of the second series is all that remains from the first.

What we have instead is a new hospital and a new cast and it’s much more of a conspiracy thriller. Corporal Jamie McCain (played by Harry Potter’s Alfred Enoch) has been injured in combat and taken to a Glasgow hospital where he meets eccentric patient Danny Adams (Elliot Cooper), who has a shrine to Doctor Who above his bed (a playful nod to Whttaker’s departure, even if it made creator Dan Sefton have kittens at the time, given he’d written the second series for her).

The pair come to share worrying thoughts on realising mortality rates are higher than they should be for this type of accident and the paralysed patient becomes way more than impatient when he looks suspiciously in the direction of Dr Archie Watson and physio Debbie Dorrell. These two seem too happy with their lot, considering they’re in the life and death business.

Okay, we can assume these two won’t be the killers because they’re played by John Hannah and the wonderful Ashley Jensen, and they’re never going to be cast as bad guys. But there was enough about the first series to check the new one closely for a heartbeat.