Ashley Jensen reveals she got so cold filming new series of Shetland her fingers 'stopped working'

Shetland star Ashley Jensen has told how she got so cold filming the new instalment of the murder mystery series that her "fingers stopped working".

The actress had special "heat pads" in her pockets, underwear and even taped to her back to try to keep warm as she filmed outdoors this year.

And she revealed that she even had to put her hands in hot water between takes to "thaw them out".

Jensen was speaking ahead of the return of Shetland, which will see her character, Ruth Calder - who travelled from London to her native Shetland on the trail of the case that unfolded in the previous series - reunited with fellow detective Alison "Tosh" O'Donnell.

The actress said she found the cold weather experienced by the cast and crew on the new series "something else" and a sharp contrast to her debut last year, when the cast and crew went wild swimming during a “heatwave”.

She said: "That was one of the most exhilarating evenings. It was absolutely glorious.

“The weather was so poor this year, wild horses or wild Shetland ponies, would not have dragged me into the sea this time.

"The weather was a challenge. I mean, I've known cold when I've been filming but this was something else. 

"This is filming when it’s so cold your fingers had stopped working. We had heat pads in our pockets, our underwear and taped to our backs. 

“We even had to put our hands in hot water in between takes to literally thaw them out. It's the only thing that would bring the feeling back into my fingers."

Jensen, who replaced long-time lead Douglas Henshall as the show's lead, admitted she did not know if she would be returning to the role when she finished filming her first season, which was launched last autumn. Another two seasons were announced by the BBC in March.

As the new series starts to unfold, Detective Inspector Calder has decided to leave her London life behind her to settle permanently in Shetland.

Jensen said: "Calder’s decided to return to Shetland because it almost felt like there was unfinished business there, or a sort of magnetic draw back home. She's there to find out who she is which, I think, goes against all her previous instincts.

"When she first came back, she thought that she’d be there to solve the case and then get away and get back to London, back to her life. But she’s experiencing that thing where home sometimes draws you back."

The actress insisted she did not want to know how the new series would end to try to make her performance more realistic.

She added: "There are many threads to series nine. We jump back and forth in time - there's a historical case, domestic relationship. There are so many different strands to the story and quite a lot of them are linked. It's a very complex web.

"In fact, I decided that I wasn't going to find out who the murderer was. So, for the first three episodes I felt like I was really in Calder’s shoes. I was looking at people through the character's eyes thinking, ‘What are you giving me?’

“Then I would leave a scene and quickly look back around again, just to see if somebody was doing something they shouldn't have been behind the coppers’ backs after we had gone.

"It added another element of fun for me. I wanted to be really present in every scene, to make myself look and listen to what people were saying, to see if I could solve the puzzle and, ultimately, the crime."