Death in Paradise's executive producer Tim Keys has promised tears during Ardal O'Hanlon's exit from the hugely popular show, and admitted that even he was in tears watching the final version of the episode! Season nine will see Ardal's DI Jack Mooney be replaced by a new detective, played by Ralf Little.
Will you be sad to see Ardal go?
Chatting to HELLO! about what viewers can expect from the final episode, Tim explained: "He's on fire this series and it's fantastic. We were in the final mix of this last episode this morning and it's great, he really is wonderful in it, it's really moving and you're so used to him as a comedian you forget he can really act! He's brilliant.
He continued: "I honestly cried this morning! I was really moved by it - and I've seen the episode so many times - but there were three little moments in it and this morning was the first time I'd watched it on a big screen with music... and there were three scenes that got me. One is a scene with Don [Warrington] actually in the police station. Something happened and it moved me! And if I got emotional having watched it several times - it's really sweet, it's really lovely... It has quite a dark story and not quite what people were expecting, and that's thrilling."
READ: Death in Paradise season 9: everything you need to know ahead of the new season
Ralf will be taking over as the new detective
He also opened up about deciding that season nine would be Ardal's last, saying: "We've always spoken to Ardal about the rough amount of time we'd be working with him, and we chatted to him again when we were planning the series - so it was a very mutual thing and he nails it!" Speaking about why they decided to change the detective, he continued: "As a huge compliment, Ardal's character is very nice and very loveable, so we wanted a character who was a bit more challenging for people to bring a bit of friction into the mix."
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