Sam's summons

Sam Neill gathered a Kiwi-heavy cast for his third season of courtroom drama The Twelve, set in Western Australia.

- BY RUSSELL BAILLIE

In the third series of Aussie jury trial drama The Twelve, you might be forgiven for thinking the Sydney-born show that shifted to Perth for season two is now in a different jurisdiction, a couple of thousand kilometres to the east. After all, as well as Sam Neill returning as defence lawyer Brent Colby, the cast includes Kiwis Danielle Cormack as the crown prosecutor on his latest murder case, Sarah Peirse as the wife of the accused, Marlon Williams as his son, as well as his Sleeping Dogs cast mate from 48 years ago, Sir Ian Mune.

The trial involves a defendant, a mate of Colby's, charged with killing a woman who had threatened to expose him as "The Cape Rock Killer" responsible for murders at a local coastal spot in the late 1960s, when he was a teenager.

As before, the series, which was originally adapted from one-season Belgian legal drama De Twaalf, also follows the lives of the jurors on the case.

Cormack and Peirse, whom the Listener was able to snaffle for a joint chat from their respective homes in Sydney and Auckland, were fans of the previous seasons.