Martin Compston has admitted that he'd be "heartbroken" if Line of Duty were to end now.
The sixth series of the BBC One police drama ended earlier this month, and it proved to be divisive with fans when the identity of the final H was unveiled.
And Martin, who plays DI Steve Arnott in the series, has confessed that he understands why a lot of viewers were disappointed by the underwhelming ending.
Speaking to ES Magazine, the actor said: "You've got to respect people have invested so much in this thing and everybody has a different version of their ending, but yes… it's been a pretty wild few days."
Martin joked there'd be "riots in the streets" if the series didn't give away H's identity in the series finale.
But he praised the show's writer Jed Mercurio for not taking the "easy option" and ending the series with a "crazy gun shoot-out", which he believed would have been a "cop-out".
A seventh season of Line of Duty is still yet to be confirmed.
Martin said he would hate for there not to be another series, but believes that its devoted fans need a bit of a break.
He continued: "The idea that I would never work with all the guys again together would be heartbreaking.
"But also with everything that's just gone on this week, I think everybody, including the audience, needs a bit of time away from it. So we'll see."
In the series six finale, it was revealed that DCI Ian Buckells was the final H.
It emerged that Buckells had been tipping off criminals and bent coppers throughout the series, sending them instructions via an encrypted messaging service.
In the end it was the misspelling of the word "definitely" that helped Steve and the rest of the AC-12 dream team catch him.
It proved divisive, as Line of Duty fans were expecting some criminal mastermind to be the head bent copper, not bumbling Buckells.
Mercurio has defended his show against the criticism, tweeting: "1. No one disputes the Line of Duty finale divided social media opinion but the audience research so far shows a far less extreme picture.
"We knew a "down" ending would rate less favourably with some viewers, however all 7 episodes varied by under 10% on average viewer score ...
"2. The research determines the episode ratings based on randomly polling viewers, rather than sites like imdb where scores can be skewed by users strongly motivated to register their immediate anger/adulation …"
He continued: "3. 1000 random viewers submitted scores from 1-10 which have been used to calculate the Appreciation Index (AI) as a score out of 100. The AI for the “down” finale was only 7 points below the next lowest in Season 6 (Ep 1) …
"4/4 These figures won’t stop the debate, of course, nor should they - that’s still all part of the experience of shared TV viewing. Thanks again for watching."
