Bust Up is a six-part buddy-cop-crime series set in the wild and beautiful New Zealand North. At the heart of the series are ex-lovers MIHI and DEB who, unexpectedly, after ten years apart, are thrown together as reluctant cop partners in the small town of Waitote. Mihi, now married (to a man), has returned home. Deb has made this her patch for the last eight years and hasn’t seen Mihi in all that time but the truth she is forced to face is that she’s never really got over her. Neither of them expected to have to work together but despite the initial tension, it turns out they’re a great team.
The long working hours demand trust and instinct, especially under fire. That’s a lot of time in a car denying they still care about each other, and trying not to remember how good they used to be together. Each episode resolves a local crime, while a slow-burning mystery simmers beneath the surface until the final episode.
The episodic crimes range from a shark-masked bank robber with asthma, to two children left alone while their mum runs meth, to a bride’s ‘hen’ party gone feral, and a terminally ill man with murder on his bucket list. All while something weightier builds in the background throughout the series.
In the final episode Deb is taken hostage by a wanna-be gang prospect. Mihi tracks her to the home of the drug queenpin. They solve the case, make sense of all those pesky gnomes the town is full of —and finally confront the feelings they’ve been trying to bury. They still love each other. That’s clear. What they’ll do about it is the enticing question for Season 2.
