This City Is Ours plays a twisted trick on viewers in season 2 – but the truth is no less devastating

This City Is Ours season 2 lands a crushing blow in the final scenes of its third episode – only to send us reeling all over again in the very next shocking chapter.

It's a widely understood rule of screen storytelling that, when killing off a character, one final shot of the victim is generally required to cement that they have, in fact, popped their clogs.

This component is absent from the execution of Banksey (Mike Noble) in This City Is Ours, but the devastating moment is still likely to fool many people – this writer included.

The suspenseful hour of television puts a knot in the pit of your stomach and cruelly holds it there, as Michael (James Nelson-Joyce) is backed into a corner by sadistic cartel boss Felipe (Álvaro Morte).

Our tortured antihero is ordered to kill his best friend as retribution for Banksey's own hit-and-run murder of Felipe's brother, Ricardo (Daniel Cerqueira), at the tail-end of season 1.

As Felipe demands a video recording of the dark deed – and holds Michael's girlfriend Diana (Hannah Onslow) as his hostage – there appears to be no way out of this truly nightmarish scenario.

Where the lack of a conclusive 'kill shot' would usually be a dead giveaway that something is amiss, screenwriter Stephen Butchard conveys the gravity of the situation in a sombre last (ever) orders.

Over several old-fashioned whiskeys, Michael mournfully explains to his longtime confidante that he's been backed into an impossible position and, because of that, Banksey's time is up.

Co-stars Nelson-Joyce and Noble sell the scene beautifully, leaving no shadow of doubt; put simply, your heart shatters for both characters, as well as for Banksey's son, Freddie (Adam Abbou).

In a bid to keep his teenager from a life of crime, Banksey has withheld precisely how much trouble he's in, but a fleeting phone call from his father sets Freddie's alarm bells blaring.

As the clock runs down, Banksey smashes a paper towel holder in the gents toilets and looks upon a sharp piece of plastic as his saving grace.

It's wishful thinking, if not outright deluded, but it hammers home the utter desperation of this flawed figure; hardly a 'perfect victim', but someone we know to be loyal and caring to those he loves.

Of course, whatever his John Wick-style aspirations were, they come to nothing, and Michael (with help from a couple of henchmen) bundle a restrained Banksey into the back of a car.

In pitch-black woods, he appears to meet his end, with Michael firing two shots into his closest pal, while streaming the distressing scenes on a video call to Felipe.

The episode cuts to black, leaving you torn over whether to barrel straight into episode four or spend some time breathing slowly into a paper bag.

Once again, Butchard, Nelson-Joyce and Noble must be praised for delivering an unforgettable and emotionally gruelling instalment in this sublime crime thriller. But the turmoil is only just beginning.

Given how affecting Banksey's 'death' in episode 3 proved to be, you might think the stunning reveal that Michael faked his murder for Felipe would come as relief. Oh, if only life were that kind.

Sure enough, a bruised Banksey appears in the very next episode, prompting jaws to crash to the floor with high velocity, but this is no simple victory.

In a lesser show, a fake-out death like this could provoke an eye-roll, but Butchard prevents such a reaction by orchestrating even more harrowing consequences.

Banksey must remain exiled for the foreseeable future, lest Felipe catch wind of the deception, with Michael even banning him from making contact with his increasingly panicked son.

Neither of them realise just how effectively Ozzie Thompson (Shaun Evans) has set about grooming Freddie into doing his bidding.

The conniving crook doesn't know all the details of Banksey's sudden disappearance, but plays on Freddie's fears to manipulate him into committing the very acts of violence that his father never wanted for him.

First, a series of arson attacks on properties owned by the Phelans, and later, a deadly shooting outside their brand new nightclub as they leave a raucous engagement party for Jamie (Jack McMullen) and Melissa (Darci Shaw).

Butchard utilises the same playbook in episode 5 as he did in the third, eerily building the tension as the night draws in, with an unstable Freddie nearing closer and closer to the Phelans.

There's a palpable sense that someone isn't going to survive this imminent collision, but the mystery of who exactly will end up in the crosshairs creates an intensely disquieting experience.

As the Phelan family prepare to head home from the venue's front steps, Freddie finally emerges and takes his shot.

He aims for belligerent brute Jamie – having been led to believe that he was the one who killed his father – but mistakenly hits the Phelan firm co-leader Rachel (Laura Aikman) instead.

The severity of the injury quickly becomes clear to everyone except her, as she rapidly bleeds out en-route to the nearest hospital.

It's a twisted bait-and-switch that bereaves viewers all over again, only this time the grief is compounded by a far larger pool of victims.

Rachel loses her life, robbing the Phelan family of a beloved niece and cousin, and widowing Bobby (Kevin Harvey), who had spent his wife's final days in a feud that had just showed signs of abating.

This acute pain also reverberates back to Banksey himself, who is spared death in episode 3, only to stumble into an even more torturous fate.

The son he loves so dearly, and once held such high hopes for, is left broken; chewed up and spat out by the malevolent world from which he had strived to protect him.

Now, Freddie faces a very different future to anything that either of them would have wanted. And, in a sense, Banksey only has himself to blame.

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