Product Details

• Actors: John Nettles, John Hopkins
• Directors: Caroline Graham
• Format: Box set, Color, Widescreen
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo)
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 3
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: ACORN MEDIA
• DVD Release Date: March 27, 2007
• Run Time: 300 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000L2129U
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #21,263 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Midsomer Murders: Set Eight" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

What evil lurks beyond the well-trimmed hedges of Midsomer...

The cozy villages of Midsomer County reveal their most sinister secrets in these contemporary British television mysteries. Inspired by the novels of Caroline Graham, modern master of the English village mystery, the series stars John Nettles (Bergerac) as the unflappable Detective Chief Inspector Barnaby with John Hopkins (Love in a Cold Climate) as his brash young assistant. Guest stars include John Burgess, William Gaunt, Freddie Jones, Keith Barron, and Margery Mason.

The Mysteries
The Maid in Splendour—Midsomer Worthy’s beloved local pub figures in a case involving unrequited love, secret business deals, and passionate affairs.
The Straw Woman—Scott becomes bewitched by a village schoolteacher as he and Barnaby unravel a centuries-old mystery in Midsomer Parva.
Ghosts of Christmas Past—Barnaby escapes Christmas with his in-laws only to be thrust into the shadowy world and dark secrets of the mysterious Villiers family.

DVD SPECIAL FEATURES INCLUDE John Nettles interview, Midsomer map, Caroline Graham biography, and cast filmographies.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Still satisfying, thanks to John Nettles, but the producers may be trying to make the series appeal to a younger demographic, April 15, 2007

By 

C. O. DeRiemer (San Antonio, Texas, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Midsomer Murders: Set Eight (DVD)

Midsomer Murders - Set 8 is the last three episodes of the series' seventh season. (The first four episodes are contained in Midsomer Murders - Set 7.) It seems to me that with the seventh season, the producers of Midsomer Murders began to cautiously attempt to appeal to a younger and more contemporary demographic. Nothing wrong with that, but at the same time the cleverness of the writing and the complexity (and to a degree, the integrity) of the mysteries have been weakened a bit. The strength of the series is still the performance of John Nettles as Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby, who finds plenty of murders to solve in the tidy, cozy towns and villages of Midsomer County. Barnaby remains the constant; he's unflappable, shrewd, fair-minded and experienced. Nettles brings a real feel for Barnaby's integrity, intelligence and dry humor to the role.

The three episodes in the set all come with high production values. The stately homes of the well-off never looked better and the smaller homes of the middle class never looked tidier. The countryside is green and beautiful, except when it's nighttime and killers are on the prowl.

The producers, in their effort to stay contemporary, are most likely well aware that their star is now beginning to age a bit. Nettles was 61 when the seventh season began. He probably has less appeal to the younger set than the young hunk (and good actor) John Hopkins, who was brought in to play Barnaby's new assistant, Sergeant Dan Scott. At the same time, the mysteries all too often carry the dreaded burden of the modern psychological backstory. The writers come up with complicated plots, but at times the characters' backstories or the still unformed skills of some of the young actors or the veering toward daytime television melodrama tend to be unsatisfying.

"The Maid in Splendor" starts out with a nice mixture of family tensions, unrequited love and a nasty wife, but the solution depends on an unlikely scenario in which the acting of some key players doesn't quite do the job and on the improbability of one important relationship. We're talking soap opera melodrama.

In "The Straw Woman," Barnaby finds himself in a completely humorless melodrama that features rigid Christian beliefs, earthly love among High Church priests, a roll-in-the-bed episode featuring Sergeant Scott and, again, acting among two key, young players that has little nuance.

"Ghosts of Christmas Past" is the best of the lot with all sorts of family secrets combined with retribution and murder. But here, the solution depends on something Barnaby is told in a report from another police district that he and we learn only after 90 minutes of the 100-minute episode have gone by. This deux ex machina approach to solving mysteries does not play fair with the audience.

Still, John Nettles and the production values are able to keep up our interest, and it was good to see such skilled actors as Freddie Jones, Mel Martin and Bruce Alexander. Let's hope that Inspector Barnaby can find himself dealing with future murders that have more of the dry humor and cleverness of the earlier episodes. We don't want to wind up with CSI: Midsomer County.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A solid addition to a good series, June 19, 2007

By 

Anne Bobchick "Queen of All Books" (San Bernardino, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Midsomer Murders: Set Eight (DVD)

Actually consider this a rating of 3 1/2 stars. Not quite good enough for four, but still better than average.



As usual Midsomer Murders delivers charming bucolic English murder mysteries. The characters are quirky, John Nettles is wonderful and John Hopkins is starting to come into his own as DS Scott.



However there are a few negative. First this is actually the second half of the seventh season, which makes numbering the DVD sets annoying for those of us who are anal retentive. (It still somewhat bothers me that the Travelling Wilburys labelled their two albums, volume I and volume III)



Also this set is shorter than the previous sets having only three episodes. The series finally gets around to the "themed" shows having what can only be lablelled their Halloween and Christmas episodes. The Halloween episode was more than a bit contrived, but the Christmas episode made up for it.



All in all, this series is a predictable and enjoyable bit of English cosy and I do recommend you watch it with a nice pot of Darjeeling tea and some shortbread.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Complex, Intelligent, Original Mysteries, July 3, 2009

By 

Stephanie DePue (Carolina Beach, NC USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Midsomer Murders: Set Eight (DVD)

"Midsomer Murders Set Eight" is a boxed, 3-volume set of three contemporary, stand-alone British mysteries, each approximately 100 minutes long, from the popular British TV hit, which first aired in the United Kingdom in March, 1997. The series has been seen on "A & E" and "The Biography Channel," in the United States. The characters are based on those created by Caroline Graham, a modern mistress of the English village cozy mystery: the series was originally adapted by highly talented and acclaimed scriptwriter Anthony Horowitz (Foyle's War: Sets 1-5 Bundle (Amazon.com Exclusive); Robin of Sherwood: The Complete Collection).

Special features include a Graham biography, John Nettles interview, Midsomer map, and cast filmographies. But, unfortunately, no subtitles; as all the characters speak rather softly, and John Nettles, the series' star, tends to swallow his words. However, you should be able to follow the action well enough without the subtitles.

The series is set in the fictional, lovely, countryside village of Midsomer; and it certainly is green, quaint, and scenic. It's a classic "cozy" setting; lovely village, denizens upset by murder, villain found; everything back to normal again. It stars John Nettles (BERGERAC - SERIES 1 - COMPLETE ) as Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby, hard-working family man and astute detective; and John Hopkins (Love in a Cold Climate) as his brash young assistant Sergeant Dan Scott. Jane Wymark and Laura Howard costar as Joyce and Cully Barnaby, the detective's wife and daughter. The series also features many esteemed guest stars, including John Burgess, William Gaunt, Freddie Jones, Keith Barron, and Margery Mason: the supporting players bring a lot of spice to the screen. Nor have the makers stinted in the making of this series: they've supplied beautiful landscapes, plenty of extras, animal and human, lots of local color. The mysteries are:
1. The Maid in Splendour. Midsomer Worthy's favorite pub is suddenly awash in secret business deals, unrequited loves, passionate affairs, and murder.
2. The Straw Woman. In Midsomer Parva, a local schoolteacher tries to revive an ancient local festival, with disastrous results. A curate dies violently, to be followed by other violent deaths. The village suspects black magic: the detectives solve a centuries-old mystery. Viewers may be reminded of some of Stephen King's work; but that's not where the plot is ultimately going.
3. Ghosts of Christmas Past. The Villiers family gathers to celebrate Christmas exactly nine years after Ferdy Villiers committed suicide, a suicide that was soon followed by that of his attractive assistant/lover. Another member of the family dies mysteriously; the secrets of the past seem to reach out to the present.

These mysteries are greatly enriched by the fact that they are feature length, allowing screenwriters and cast sufficient time to develop them subtly and with wit and flavor. They are complex, intelligent and original; perhaps a little unlikely, but involving all the same.