It took me an embarrassingly long time to get the titular pun.

It strikes me that my enjoyment of Inside No. 9 lives or dies on the strength of its twist; while I don’t see the twist as the main reason to watch the show – I find it consistently well-written, well-acted, well-made generally – I do find that a badly-done twist can ricochet back through the episode, rendering it a poor experience overall.

Which brings us to The Stakeout. Another well-written, well-acted episode, tense and mysterious, intriguing and exciting. Initially, I was sure we were being primed to believe that Reece Shearsmith’s PC Thompson was S/PC Varney’s dead partner: we had seen him with, seemingly, his throat cut; they were in a graveyard; the Controller supplied them with a description contrary to their location, suggesting something spooky was afoot; and the off-camera gunshots, followed by the two men getting back in the car and seemingly having had their relationship reset in a mirroring of the opening scene. None of this is a coincidence – Pemberton and Shearsmith were playing with our expectations around life, death, afterlife.

Which brings us to that utterly bizarre twist. It’s in the ballpark of afterlife, sure, but vampires are a supernatural, out-there twist in the way that some sort of afterlife is not. It just seems so utterly random, and the bizarre list of clues that Thompson braggingly expounds upon confirms that. When one thinks about chicken tikka, one doesn’t jump to garlic, and Thompson’s complaint of the smell is a much more logical and satisfying explanation than his reacting to the minute scent of garlic in a curry. Why not choose something actually garlicy? Garlic bread, maybe? And Thompson’s suggestion that he’s a flexitarian, eating meat once a month, is only a clue if you squint at it and close one eye – a vampire doesn’t eat meat, they drink blood!

And what’s even the whole point of it all? Why does a vampire pretend to be part of the police? Why spend several nights on a stakeout? Why reveal himself now? As I’ve complained in previous reviews, this twist doesn’t add anything to the story, it doesn’t explain anything, it doesn’t make you look at the episode in a new light; it just doesn’t make sense. And it ruins the episode, when you know it’s leading up to such a pointless conclusion.

It’s such a shame the series ended this way. It started with huge promise, but these last few episodes squandered that promise. I think, of all of them, Love’s Great Adventure was the best, and a classic Inside No. 9 episode at that. Still, it’s excellent news that the BBC has ordered another two series. Despite its missteps, it’s still one of the best shows on television. There’s nothing else quite like it.