The Vice
The Vice is an ITV police drama about the Metropolitan Police Vice Unit. Spanning five short series from 1999 and 2003, it follows the London Metropolitan police force's vice squad, where prostitution, underage sex, and such organised crime are regular occurrences. Most episodes end where the main villain is caught but often not in a 'naturally' concluded way expected from other TV dramas, and often ending with more unanswered questions than answered. Leader DI Pat Chappel struggles to manage the balance between his private and professional lives — as do the rest of the team. Working in the seedy underworld leads to a continual dilemma — the tension between the Vice Squad and vice-related crimes runs throughout the series and gives the show a rich viewing experience. The line of the team staying on the right side of the law is often blurred, as almost every member at different points submits briefly or permanently to the dubious temptations, sometimes with drastic consequences.
Seasons
1. Daughters (1)
Air Date: 1999-01-04
DI Pat Chappel finds himself involved in a turf war between two rival pimps when he investigates the murder of a prostitute. Whilst gathering evidence against his prime suspect, he takes the high-class Nikki under his wing and learns that her pimp is physically abusive towards her.
2. Daughters (2)
Air Date: 1999-01-11
Chappel resolves to help Nikki after she refuses to give a statement to the police, and gets personally involved trying to protect her from Hinkley, ostensibly, a respectable family man. Less than pleased at the attention he's receiving, Hinkley needs Chappel's help when his own daughter is kidnapped by a rival pimp.
3. Sons (1)
Air Date: 1999-01-18
WPC Cheryl Hutchins takes on more than she can handle while undercover, when she discovers that a nightclub boss has a side hustle in S&M films. This also brings back painful memories to Chappel.
4. Sons (2)
Air Date: 1999-01-25
Hutchins is making slow progress in her bid to find the young boy involved in a porn film, but believes his parents are hiding important information about his past. Meanwhile, Chappel's professional relationship with Dr Weir becomes personal.
5. Dabbling (1)
Air Date: 1999-02-01
Tasked with investigating an escort agency who are providing a sideline in drugs trafficking and prostitution to their more than satisfied customers, Chappel sends PC Dougie Raymond undercover as a punter to gather evidence. Dougie successfully manages to secure the intel, but soon finds himself hooked on prostitutes.
6. Dabbling (2)
Air Date: 1999-02-08
When Raymond falls hopelessly in love, he attempts to woo the one particular girl into a real relationship, instead of a business arrangement. However, when she subsequently leaves the country to traffic drugs, Raymond goes on the rampage and jeopardises the entire case... and his career in Vice.
1. Home Is the Place (1)
Air Date: 2000-01-10
When Chappel finds a young girl prostituting in Soho, he attempts to uncover her identity, learning that she absconded from a children's home in Sheffield. Paying a visit, he discovers all is not as it seems, that young girls are being lured away, with the promise of gifts and a life of luxury, in order to work the streets of London.
2. Home Is the Place (2)
Air Date: 2000-01-17
A huge web of lies and deceit covering up a dangerous child abuse ring is discovered to be limited not only to those now living in the children's home but to past residents as well. Chappel suspects the involvement of one of the staff members, and encounters a terrifying chain of events.
3. Walking on Water (1)
Air Date: 2000-01-24
Tasked with investigating an illegal gambling and prostitution ring operating out of a pub, Chappel and Hutchins posing as thrillseekers. However, after Chappel nearly blows his cover, he's shocked to discover that the haunt is frequented by former Vice officer Dougie Raymond.
4. Walking on Water (2)
Air Date: 2000-01-31
Chappel begins to use Raymond's connections as a means of gathering evidence, but when Dougie's level of enthusiasm – and hope that his efforts may win him his job back – backfire, Chappel's reliance is left in tatters.
5. Betrayed (1)
Air Date: 2000-02-07
When the team raid a brothel operating as a massage parlour, they discover that the young female employees have been smuggled into the country from Eastern European refugee camps. One girl offers to testify against the ringleader, but only if she is given round-the-clock protection.
6. Betrayed (2)
Air Date: 2000-02-14
Chappel assigns Joe Robinson to the case, unaware that the girl is actually harbouring feelings for Robinson. When his wife Shirley becomes suspicious of his interactions with the girl, Robinson finds his marriage on the rocks and the impending pressures of the job becoming too much. Chappel is forced to find new evidence after the girl reveals that she's pregnant and no longer willing to testify.
7. Lovesick (1)
Air Date: 2000-02-21
Robinson and Hutchins are on a stakeout, watching a violent pimp suspected of attacking one of his girls. When the pimp confronts him, Robinson, still wound-up from the last case, as well as the impending collapse of his marriage, attacks the john in front of several onlookers. When the pimp is found murdered the next day, the blame is soon directed to Robinson's door, with evidence of his run-in from the day before.
8. Lovesick (2)
Air Date: 2000-02-28
With Robinson's increasing aggression and temperament, it seems to paint him the prime suspect. However, Chappel believes otherwise and sets out to find the real killer.
1. Out of Mind
Air Date: 2001-01-17
Chappel's former boss Frank Vickers is found lurking in the basement during a raid on a Soho brothel, and the team learn that Chappel has a more-than-shady past involving former prostitute Jane Farrell, with whom he fell in love. Vickers is determined to clear his name, and Chappel's life looks set to be blown apart when Vickers reveals some very sordid secrets to his colleagues in Vice. Chappel goes in search of Jane, and discovers that one of her friends, whom he was friendly with, disappeared some years previously and has never been found. When Chappel finds the body in the basement of the brothel, he becomes determined to prove Vickers' involvement in her death.
2. Into the Night
Air Date: 2001-01-24
Attending the trial of a prostitute accused of murdering her pimp, Chappel tries a little gentle persuasion in an attempt to get the prosecuting barrister to press harder to gain a conviction, unaware of his own personal troubles. When the barrister is caught with a prostitute in a car park by Cheryl and Kirsty, he uses the excuse that he is 'gathering first-hand research' for Chappel and is let off with a caution. However, when caught again, Chappel realises he's unleashed a more dangerous beast than he ever could have realised. Meanwhile, Joe and Kirsty start to develop an explosive relationship, and when Jane loses her new job and goes back on the game, Chappel soon has new problems.
3. Force of Nature
Air Date: 2001-01-31
Chappel goes undercover in a prison for sex offenders in order to flush out the ringleaders of a prostitution racket, which involves both the inmates and the prison staff. Reports suggest that inmates are being threatened with violence unless they allow the ringleaders to have group sex with their wives and girlfriends. However, it turns out to be a far more sinister conspiracy. Robinson, unhappy with the situation, tries to get Chappel out, but being so close to collecting the vital evidence, Chappel decides to stay undercover. Posing as Chappel's girlfriend, Hutchins is targeted, while Chappel's behaviour becomes increasingly erratic.
4. Falling
Air Date: 2001-02-07
Chappel hopes to resume his relationship with Jane despite her descent into prostitution, but his plans are threatened when Vickers begins sniffing around. The team are visited by DC Damon Hills, who informs Chappel that he suspects Vickers of being bent, and wants to bring him down by whatever means possible. Using Hills, Chappel sets up a secret sting operation, soon realising that not only is he being double-crossed but Vickers has sent Hills to trap him. Determined to give his enemy the treatment he deserves, with Jane's help, he invents a fake, but believable, rape claim in order to ensure that Vickers goes down for as long as the law will allow.
1. Trade
Air Date: 2002-02-18
When prostitutes are murdered in the financial heart of London, Chappel reaches out to working girl Sandra, warning her to stay away from the unit's prime suspect, arrogant financier Gordon Ellis. Chappel uncovers a link between the murder victims and Ellis, but Hutchins isn't so sure that CCTV footage supposedly capturing the second victim with Ellis is concrete. As Chappel grows dangerously involved with Sandra, he becomes obsessed with nailing Ellis, and sends PC Kirsty Morgan undercover in an attempt to prove his involvement. Meanwhile, a sceptical Robinson receives news of his promotion, and announces he is leaving.
2. No Man's Land
Air Date: 2002-02-25
Chappel is delighted when retired prostitute Clara comes forward and offers to give evidence against Keith Beaumont, a former porn baron whom Chappel suspects is still operating. However, past encounters with Beaumont begin clouding his judgement and enthused by her boss' take on the task, Morgan offers herself as bait in a dangerous undercover honeytrap. Suspecting that Morgan may well have slept with Beaumont, Robinson persuades his new boss to allow him a week's secondment back to Vice to give Chappel a hand in his quest to prove Beaumont's guilt.
3. One More Time
Air Date: 2002-03-11
Chappel goes undercover as an insurance-broking lodger to investigate a suspected porn merchant, who makes a sideline in dirty movies whilst running his own above-board video rental shop. However, when he learns that the residence is in fact the base for a paedophile ring, the case is recategorised and taken from Vice, leaving Chappel furious upon discovering that the case has been handed to Robinson – his first assignment since his promotion to Inspector. Meanwhile, as Hutchins begins questioning her loyalty to Chappel, the latter—unable to continue allowing the repeated abuse of a 12-year-old girl—attacks the prime suspect, eliminating any chance of bringing down the ring.
1. Hooked
Air Date: 2003-05-26
Disgraced Chappel has been transferred to a desk job following the events of the operation into the paedophile ring, and Vickers has been drafted in to head-up the vice squad as his replacement. When Chappel discovers that Hutchins has disappeared during an undercover operation into a pornographer, he becomes obsessed with finding her. Using his informants, Chappel manages to locate Hutchins, only to see her destroying herself with a powerful addiction to crack cocaine. Risking everything to save her, and under a watchful eye from Vickers, Chappel takes Hutchins to a safe house. But when he discovers that the pornographer raped her, Chappel finds himself up on a murder charge.
2. Control
Air Date: 2003-05-27
Following Vickers' promotion to Chief Inspector, Robinson makes a welcome return to Vice, and on his first day back, he becomes determined to nail a violent pimp, who is involved with the disappearance of two of his girls. As he and rookie Johnstone interview Miles Wilson, the mother of his latest victim is brought in to sit with her daughter during questioning. When she recognises Vickers from their past dealings, she threatens to reveal their lurid past if he doesn't personally deal with her daughter's case. As he persuades Robinson to get both the mother and daughter to testify, Robinson goes to visit Hutchins in rehab, and is stunned to discover that her way of controlling her addiction is to watch punters buying drugs on the street.
3. Gameboys
Air Date: 2003-06-03
The team investigate an amusement arcade manager suspected of recruiting young runaways as rent boys, and PC Adam Parkes is sent undercover in an attempt to gather evidence. While Parkes is drawn into the deep end, Robinson is led on a wild goose chase by one of the boys involved. When Parkes' attempt to trap the prime suspect fails, and the boy whom he is trying to encourage to give evidence starts to ignore him, he suddenly realises that he is being drawn into a whole other ball game. Meanwhile, Morgan becomes jealous when Hutchins returns from rehab and immediately applies for promotion to sergeant. Morgan confides her emotions to Vickers, who suggests that she too should apply for promotion.
4. Untouchable
Air Date: 2003-06-10
The licence of a pole-dancing club is up for renewal, and Robinson is determined to bring down the manageress, who is thought to be running the club as a front for a prostitution racket. Vickers goes undercover to collude with the club's owner, while Parkes and Cole are tasked with being punters for the night. When Johnstone decides to stay-on after hours, she notices Vickers on CCTV returning to the club and taking a woman with him into the toilets. Robinson then becomes suspicious after he appears to be colluding with the chief suspect — and using the club's services for himself. Meanwhile, after being left off the operation, Morgan begins to feel that she's becoming more and more outcast from the team.
5. Outcast
Air Date: 2003-06-17
Robinson and Morgan are called to the scene of a prostitute found dead in a skip, only to discover that the Serious Crime Group have taken on the case. When DI Delaney requests one of the Vice squad is seconded to his team, Robinson has no reluctance in sending out the ever-increasing problem that is Morgan. As Hutchins' instinct proves to be Vice's key in gathering evidence on the suspect, little does Morgan know that she's out of her depth where her new senior officer is concerned. When he tries to force her to have sex, Morgan realises he has been manipulating her from the start. Robinson is the only one who doesn't fall for her seductive charms, while Delaney is secretly trying to deliberately ruin her career.
6. Birdhouse
Air Date: 2003-06-24
While Vickers and Morgan are away from the office on an official home office jaunt, Parkes and Cole go undercover in a club in an attempt to gather information on the owner, suspected of dealing drugs. Parkes realises that their only hope is through the VIP lounge, but upon gaining entry, the pair stumble upon much more than a drugs outfit, and discover that the owner is the ringleader of a human trafficking gang. Parkes tries to rescue a foreign girl, for whom he's developed an interest and becomes involved in the debacle, leading to a stern warning from Robinson. Family man Cole struggles with the undercover lifestyle and comes head-to-head with his wife, who forces him to choose.
7. Lust
Air Date: 2003-07-01
Robinson and Cole are trailing a suspect whom they discover has involvement with a major drugs and prostitution racket, but are shocked when they find his boss having dinner with Lorraine. Vickers is desperate to use Johnstone's relationship with the pimp for his own ends when he realises if publicly known, it would have a deleterious impact on Vice, and is determined to sacrifice her while there's still time. As he strikes a deal with the pimp, Robinson unknowingly sends Johnstone undercover to gather information. Meanwhile, Morgan's relationship with Vickers becomes treacherous, and Robinson is quickly catching up. Determined to nail Vickers to the wall, Morgan lodges a sexual harassment complaint.
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Rating
5.6/10
Release Date
1999-01-04
Episodes
28 (5 seasons)
Status
Ended
Cast
Videos
Production Companies
Carlton Television
Touchpaper Television