Mickery, who had previously written the first three series of the similarly themed Messiah,[1] described Instinct as a character-driven whodunit, which placed the emotional lives of the characters at the forefront of the drama.
[5] Mickery opted to set Instinct away from the anonymity of a large city, choosing the Lancashire Pennines to provide an atmospheric backdrop to the plot.
She added: "While Flynn might be able to glance at a bloody crime scene and leap to some helpful conclusions, audiences might find this dark new drama a little bewildering.
"[10] James Walton, reviewing the first episode for The Daily Telegraph, commented that the drama had been "bogged down" by its emphasis on the psychological, adding that the "solemn pondering of fathers and sons has so far got in the way of the thrills – but without being fresh, gripping or indeed believable enough to justify its position at centre stage.
"[11] Digital Spy's Dek Hogan described the plot as "unnecessarily convoluted", and said the serial was "downbeat, one paced and frankly monotonous ... quite why it took three hours to tell a tale that [could] easily have been told far more economically in one is a far bigger mystery than the one this unmemorable bunch of coppers were trying to solve.