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Blue Lights is filmed locally and on set in east Belfast you can spot the attention to detail, right down to the information leaflets at a police station reception area and case folders on officers’ desks. <\/p>\n
“It’s really lovely just to see the amount of people who see themselves in the characters,” Devlin says. <\/p>\n
“And [mention] how complex the characters are. How real and human they are.” <\/p>\n
It’s something McKinney considered in how she plays Aisling Byrne. <\/p>\n
Aisling struggled with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in the last series, something Dearbh\u00e1ile says she spoke to real-life officers about. <\/p>\n
“They’ve had to witness some horrific things and been left with PTSD and trauma that they just have to learn to live with,” she says.<\/p>\n
“It’s the reality here. It would be ignorant to not think about that.”<\/p>\n
Aisling’s condition puts a strain on her relationship with Tommy Foster, played by Nathan Braniff, who is then faced with the decision whether to report her to their bosses so she can get help. <\/p>\n
And while Braniff says Blue Lights often deals with heavy themes, he believes it does a good job at showing what Northern Ireland is really like. <\/p>\n
“It shows that Northern Ireland’s moving forward and changing all the time.” <\/p>\n<\/div>\n