Father Brown (2013)

Mark Williams plays G. K. Chesterton's Catholic priest as a kindly busybody in the fictional 1950s Cotswold village of Kembleford, cycling between tea, gossip and murder scenes. What sets it apart is that Father Brown cares as much about the culprit's soul as about the arrest, which gives the endings a gentle, forgiving warmth. Daytime-friendly by design, it airs in the afternoon on BBC One and has run for thirteen series, with Sorcha Cusack's Mrs McCarthy back in the most recent one.