Episode 2 (The Casual Vacancy) praised the cast, in particular Abigail Lawrie, Rory Kinnear and Rufus Jones Ceri Radford of "The Telegraph" gave the episode 4 out of 5 stars, despite some reservations about the digressions, saying: Episode 2 (The Casual Vacancy) "Episode 2" is the second episode of the British miniseries "The Casual Vacancy" based on the novel of the same title by J. K. Rowling. The parish council election approaches and Pagford is on tenterhooks awaiting the next post from 'the Ghost of Barry Fairbrother'. Who is the Ghost, and what will they say? Is anyone in the village safe from humiliation? As
BBC television drama and Controller of Continuing (i.e. year-round) Drama Series John Yorke (who also acts as Head of Drama for the BBC's in-house production arm), with David M. Thompson of Film & Single Drama overseeing one-offs. Sarah Brandist and Polly Hill are the commissioning editors for independently-produced drama programming. Having been Head of Serials from 1997 to 2000, Jane Tranter was made Head of Drama in 2000. Tranter's era from 2000–06 saw a return to longer-run episode series, with programmes such as "Spooks" being given longer second runs following successful debut seasons. Recent years have also seen a huge increase in continuing