Rebus: How old is Detective Inspector John Rebus?

HOW OLD IS JOHN REBUS SUPPOSED TO BE?

After keeping it vague in the first novels, Ian Rankin settled on 1947 as the year of Detective Inspector John Rebus’s birth, with him reaching compulsory police retirement at 60 in 2007.

This would make him 77 now.

As the novels continue with Rebus in retirement, he is not ageing in real time, and Rankin put him in his late sixties in 2020.

In Knots and Crosses (1987), Rebus's daughter Samantha is “nearly twelve", and in later novels becomes mother to Carrie, Rebus's grandaughter.

In the current TV series she is around 12 years of age.

RICHARD RANKIN who plays Rebus in the new BBC series is 41 and playing the detective aged 40 in a contemporary Edinburgh.

KEN STOTT was aged 46-52 when he played Rebus between 2000 and 2007, in the 14-episode series produced by STV Studios for the ITV network. Stott played the detective in the final three series.

JOHN HANNAH was 38-39 when he played Rebus in the first series of the same STV series.

Richard Rankin is the third actor to play the detective on TV but he has been played by 20 actors in other mediums, including stage, radio, audio book and screen.

In 2020 Succession star Brian Cox played an older Rebus in the short film John Rebus: The Lockdown Blues.

Scottish actor Ron Donachie (Titanic, Game of Thrones, The Jungle Book) has played John Rebus more than anyone else, playing the part in BBC Radio 4 dramatisations of the Ian Rankin books.

The fictional detective has also been played by Taggart’s James Macpherson and Fleabag/Guilt’s Bill Paterson, along with Endeavour’s Roger Allam in the audio book versions.

Alexander (Sandy) Morton (River City, Taggart) was the first to play Rebus in an early BBC radio adaptation for BBC Radio 4.

All episodes of Rebus will be available to stream on BBC iPlayer from 6am Friday 17 May, with the first episode airing on BBC Scotland at 10pm on Friday 17 May and 9.25pm pm Saturday 18 May on BBC One.