The Sweeney displaying "1979". In "Sweeney 2" (1978), George and Jack eventually find themselves going to the island of Malta in order to track down a group of particularly violent armed robbers who have been committing bank and payroll robberies all over London and kill anybody that gets in their way, even members of their own gang, Jack & George were assigned the case by their recently convicted chief inspector as his last order, as he is about to be charged with corruption. In "The Sweeney" (2012) the setting moved to the present day, with Regan being played by Ray Winstone, Carter
The Sweeney programme was shot on 16mm film by Thames Television's film division, Euston Films. It was originally broadcast on ITV between 2 January 1975 and 28 December 1978 at 21:00–22:00 on weekdays (usually Mondays), with repeated screenings at the same time until the early 1980s. The series was created by writer Ian Kennedy Martin, brother of the better-known Troy Kennedy Martin, who wrote several episodes and also the second film. It was developed from a one-off TV drama entitled "Regan", a 90-minute made-for-TV movie that Ian Kennedy Martin wrote for Thames Television's "Armchair Cinema" series in 1974. The part of Regan