The new series of the BBC’s Life And Death Row will be an interactive online-exclusive, mixing video footage with clips of police interviews and witness statements.
Instead of sticking to the previous format of one 60-minute film, season four of the BAFTA-winning film, will consist of eight 10-minute films supplemented by a brace of extra evidence material.
The upcoming series, subtitled Love Triangle, will focus on events surrounding the murder of Heather Strong, for which Emilia Lily Carr has been found guilty and sentenced to death. Both women were involved with Joshua Fulgham, who was later found guilty of the murder and kidnapping of Strong – but has been sentenced to life with the chance of parole.
Related: BBC Three is dead – Long live BBC ThreeLike previous seasons, Life And Death Row will invite viewers to review events and make up their own minds. Inspired by the success of Netflix’s Making a Murderer and the hit podcast Serial, Life And Death Row will this time around help viewers draw their own conclusions with the help of a digital case file.
While BBC Three has been shoved off of the airwaves due to a series of budget cuts, the new digital-only world has given programme makers more room to innovate.
Life And Death Row’s director and producer Francine Shaw said: “Making it online only was liberating as the content dictates the length of the story, and we could include as many scenes as needed to do it justice. The story world we created around the episodes gives the audience a much more direct connection with the characters and events, as they can choose to explore it in more detail if they want to.”
BBC Three’s controller Damian Kavanagh says that upcoming series Unsolved: The Boy Who Disappeared will follow a similar format, offering additional content alongside the main narrative.
Episodes of Life And Death Row: Love Triangle will be available to watch at the new BBC Three site from Monday, April 25 onwards. Two episodes will be dropped at 11:00am and 4:00pm every day throughout the week, with the documentary concluding on Friday, April 29. All eight films will be available to watch on BBC iPlayer once the run on BBC Three has finished.
You can watch the trailer for the new series of Life And Death Row below.
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