Shax prepares to storm Fell’s bookshop as the shopkeepers gather for an unconventional meeting.

The Minisode asides make way for the main plotline as all focus is on the big question – who will get hold of Gabriel?

Shax (Miranda Richardson) is only able to muster 70 blood demons to join her on her sortie (she wanted 1,000, and these are hardly Hell’s finest), and by the end of the episode the stakes are at the highest they’ve been all season. Meanwhile, Aziraphale is tempting local traders to attend his shopkeepers’ meeting – one is even offered the impossible 1965 Doctor Who Annual!

There’s still a lovely dose of humour, with the meeting taking the form of a ball, the traders talking and dancing like they’re in a Jane Austen novel. But the harmony is shattered when Shax and her not-quite-a-legion of hellspawn crash the party.

Verdict: The episodic structure is forsaken for a laser focus on the central storyline and the promise of a significant final battle. 7/10

Nick Joy