BBC crime drama tries to regain the freshness of its first season

When the 'evil' King John, retreating during the First Barons' War, reached The Wash, a tidal estuary in the Midlands, he was in a state of devastation. The Crown Jewels were lost in the water during his crossing and shortly afterwards he died in Newark Castle in Nottinghamshire. John's wickedness may have been punished by Nottingham's topography, but his image was shaped by local mythology. This is a land that rejects authority, that challenges the rich and is full of lost treasures – all themes that recur throughout the second series of James Graham's novels. Sherwoodwhich returns to BBC One.

Rumours circulate in Ashfield and elsewhere about plans to reopen a mine in Nottinghamshire's coal belt, causing new sheriff Lisa (Ria Zmitrowicz) to clash with sleazy tycoon Franklin Warner (Robert Lindsay). This may be the big picture for the area, but more pressing issues arise between local crime families when drug-addicted hothead Ryan (Oliver Huntingdon) summarily executes the son of a rival dynasty, sparking a full-blown turf war. Quick trigger fingers bring in a host of returning characters – including David Morrissey's detective St Clair, Lesley Manville's grieving widow Julie and Lorraine Ashbourne's peddler Daphne – and many new characters, played by an all-star cast of British TV talent: David Harewood, Monica Dolan, Sharlene Whyte and Stephen Dillane.

The first series of Sherwood saw a community grappling with generational trauma. Old wounds from the closure of the mines resurfaced, alongside a very modern story of disenfranchisement. Despite a premise that wasn't afraid to veer into cliche – a crime spree perpetrated by an archer through the forests of Nottinghamshire is not a new idea – it felt urgent, something all too rare in prime-time crime dramas. This second chapter of Sherwoodis struggling to regain that freshness. “After years of deindustrialisation. Everywhere else there are jobs in technology or science. Can't we invest in that instead?” argues the sheriff, faced with the prospect of a mine reopening. But the link between the failure to buy new computers for local schools and the gunshot deaths on Nottingham's seafront seems never to have been fully explored.

There is no doubt that Sherwood strives to be more spiritual than Exercise of dutya series whose specter looms over all BBC prime-time thrillers. Writer James Graham cut his teeth on political dramas, and that's reflected in this series. But this second series is at its strongest when it focuses on the human impact of street violence. Attempts to force contemporary politics into it – a critique of the doomed 'levelling up' agenda – ring hollow. Lisa, a “very modern”, queer Sheriff of Nottingham, which will no doubt entice certain viewers, is served up some seriously clunky dialogue. “It feels like a gimmick,” she says to Lindsay's cartoonish, goatee-wielding Baron. “Throwing a bit of red meat on the Red Wall.” Perhaps the commissioners didn't expect the Tories to be in electoral Siberia by now when they conceived this second series.

Real, boring, cumbersome topics – like questions about the complexity of decarbonising the grid while maintaining energy security, or the economic challenge of balancing growth and tax increases – are given only brief treatment. Instead, the drama revolves around three families. The floundering Sparrows, still struggling with the fallout from season one; the Bransons, led by a fearsome Dolan and Dillane; and the Warners, the landowning class who may have been involved in Thatcher’s machinations. And although the season begins as a bumpy rehash of the subject matter covered in season one, soon the mouths start flaring and the blood starts flowing. If it had any aspirations of being a “tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime” version of Exercise of dutyit ends up being something like Top boy for Guardian Reader.

Which is no bad thing. The ripples caused by a single crime – spreading out in concentric circles, getting bigger and bigger – make for a thrilling backdrop. Even if the politics are simplified, the political banter between the clans is anything but. “Come to Nottinghamshire,” growls Lindsay, “where the outlaws are back and doing well!” It's this sense of an outlaw country that Graham conveys beautifully in bloody, brutal tones.