Customer Reviews

Midsomer Murders - Set Five

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

As we watched the episodes in Set Five, I said to my husband, "Doesn't Barnaby look younger?" Sure enough this set of films was made arond 1996-7 and therefore predates some of the earlier sets released by Acorn Media. This is not a problem, but I am concious of Barnaby's entire family appearing much younger, and Sgt Troy so new to the force he is still pointing out the obvious to Barnaby, and failing to notice some things he should. Barnaby's daughter is back in school and trying to decide whether to change her school major to acting. (Often her acting provides a clue toward solving a murder.) Everyone has longer hair and is thinner.

The second episode (of five) is my favorite so far. (These episodes are so good I am not going to rush through them just so I can tell you about them.) At one point, Barnaby's daughter brings home a Russian kitty she has named 'Killmouski' who soon takes over Barnaby's bed, chair and everything else--if you live with a cat you can imagine the interaction.

The plots in these episodes are the best in the series and I have watched all the films in the other sets. These early stories seem more like the early Morse episodes in complexity, and like them must have been based on real books, not relatively underdeveloped screen plays. The characters are well developed. Each of the mysteries in the MidSomers series is set in a different mythical village in Southern England and constitute what Diana Rigg calls "cozy" mysteries that could be updates of the Marple novels (the plots are different).

Morse fans will recognize JoAnna David, as well as several other supporting actors, and 'Rebbecca' fans will recognize Anna Massey. Jonathan Firth (who has many facial tics similar to those of Colin Firth--are they related?) appears in an episode involving a shocking discovery by an older retired teacher (who ends up dead). One of the great delights of these stories is the acting which is always absolutely fabulous.

There are bodies aplenty in the cosy, peaceful villages located in Midsomer County. All of the little picture-perfect villages and small towns have a wide and varied assortment of English citizens, ranging from wealthy magistrates and high Church of England prelates to milkmen and shopkeepers, wives and lovers, thieves and...a lot of murderers. The corpses are just as varied as the living. Barnaby must apply all his experience, skepticism, persistence and unflappability to catch the culprits.

In Set Five, Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby (John Nettles) and his sergeant, Gavin Troy (Daniel Casey) deal with two cases which are uncommonly complex and satisfying. In one, it is the case, itself, which is so good. In the other, it is the excellent performance by one of Britain's best actors, Bernard Hepton.

In Death of a Hollow Man, Hepton plays Harold Winstanley, an aging, flamboyant man of the theater, now reduced to directing a regional play in the community theater of Causton. There are red herrings, private passions and young ambition. Through it all, Winstanley remembers what he believes were his glory days. He can almost taste vindication for himself in his new play. Bernard Hepton brings a wide range of emotions to the part, and they all are believable. He was 73 when he made this program. To get an idea of his range and skill, watch him in The Charmer (1987) as Donald Stimpson, an apparently mild man who plots revenge; in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1979) and Smiley's People (1982) as Toby Esterhaze, a weak, sly department head in The Circus; and as Archbishop Cranmer, a man of the cloth you'd be most unwise to make your confession to, in Elizabeth R (1971) and The Six Wives of Henry VIII (1970).

In The Killings at Badger's Drift, Barnaby finds himself in the middle of a series of murders that involve a level of ruthlessness which is startling...not to mention cosy blackmail, revenge, neediness and sexual shenanigans that are both lusty and sad. Surprisingly, there are no red herrings here. Every bit of murder, blackmail, poisonous mushrooms and shotgun blasts has a purpose, and still the final revelation comes as a shock.

For the record, Set Five's other three mysteries are: Faithful Unto Death, set in the village of Fawcett Green, Death in Disguise, set in the Lodge of the Golden Windhorse, and Written in Blood, set in Midsomer Worthy. Each program runs about 100 minutes.

The charm of this series lies partly in its setting. Midsomer County is a very pretty place, green and cared for. The towns are tidy, filled with competent and knowledgeable tradesmen; the villages tend to have a few eccentrics and a lot of thatched roofs. This could be much too cosy except for three things. First, the performance by John Nettles. He's a fine actor who is completely at home in the role. Watching his Barnaby think his way through clever mysteries, unfailingly polite and unfailingly unintimidated, is a pleasure. Second, the mysteries themselves. This series has been going on through eight seasons. DVD sets are out for six of them so far. The mysteries are almost always real puzzlers; not flashy, but well disguised. They are consistently interesting and well written. Third, the quality of the production and the actors. I suspect a substantial budget has been allocated for each episode. The series looks first-rate. The actors are first-rate, too, which is typical of British productions which find their way over here. Daniel Casey does a fine job as Barnaby's assistant. He respects his boss and is smart enough to learn from him. But he also can be exasperated at Barnaby's penchant for not sharing everything. And he occasionally gets put out when an apparently important car trip (Troy almost always drives them) turns out to be a trip for a bacon sandwich Barnaby's been thinking about. Barnaby's wife is played by Jane Wymark, and it's a pleasure to observe how much at ease the two actors are with each other. They play a long-married couple, still in love and with a comfortable kind of middle-aged affection for each other. All the actors do outstanding jobs, and there usually is a sprinkling of well-known names.

If you're in the mood for civilized British television mysteries, where the mean streets have more cobblestones than crushed beer cans, where the occasional drug user is not a grubby petty thief but an upper-class wife, where the chief copper has a happy home life and no angst to share with the viewers, Midsomer Murders might be just the thing.

The programs in each set do not reflect very accurately the order in which the programs appear in each season's series. It doesn't make any difference since each mystery is self-contained. The DVD picture is excellent. There are a few extras such as a map of Midsomer County showing the towns and villages, cast filmographies of the major players and a biography of Carolyn Graham, the author of the books the series is based on.

I really, really do but can anyone explain to me why they put these dvds out so out of order? Set Five is actually the first season while set one is the second season, etc, etc.

What can one say? This is a terrific Series. The acting is wonderful...and showing the family life in-between the "murders" gives a feeling a reality. Cannot say enough about this set...except to say I have watched it three times!!

They are amateurs and pros, London dwellers moving equally comfortably in international society as in that of their occasional forays into the English countryside, and lifelong inhabitants of those rural settings. They investigate crimes in the Thames valley and cities as large as Oxford, midsize towns like a certain Kingsmarkham, and villages with such all-English names as St. Mary Mead or King's Abbot. And they have been portrayed by some of Britain's finest contemporary actors, from Jeremy Brett and David Burke/Edward Hardwicke (Sherlock Holmes & Doctor Watson) to Roy Marsden (Commander Adam Dalgliesh), Patrick Malahide and William Simons (D.C.I. Roderick Alleyn & D.I. "Br'er" Fox), John Thaw and Kevin Whately (D.C.I. Morse & D.S. Lewis), David Jason (D.I. "Jack" Frost), George Baker and Christopher Ravenscroft (D.C.I. Reginald Wexford & D.I. Mike Burden), Peter Davison and Brian Glover (Albert Campion & Magersfontein Lugg), Edward Petherbridge and Harriet Walter (Lord Peter Wimsey & Harriet Vane), David Suchet/Albert Finney (Hercule Poirot) and last but not least Joan Hickson as Miss Jane Marple, the grandmother of all English village detectives.

To that illustrious group, British author Caroline Graham in 1987 added another sleuthing couple, the middle-aged D.C.I. Tom Barnaby and his young colleague D.S. Gavin Troy, coppers in a cluster of villages which, collectively, make up an area known as Midsomer County, and which could easily rival Agatha Christie's very own St. Mary Mead in per-capita occurrences of treachery, crime, and bloodletting. The series' first entry, "The Killings at Badgers Drift," was so successful that it won a Macavity Award for best first mystery and, for its author, an instant loyal following. Before long, the books had spawned a television series, which at almost 50 episodes has long since outrun the number of its print originals. Starring as Barnaby and Troy are Royal Shakespeare Company alumnus John Nettles, best known to TV audiences as Jerseyan Detective Sergeant Jim Bergerac in the 1980s' series of the same name (based on the books by Andrew Saville), and Daniel Casey, whose most notable other roles to date have been appearances in the BBC's "Our Friends in the North," ITV's "Steel River Blues" (for which he gave up "Midsomer Murders" in 2004), and the 1998 Catherine Cookson adaptation "The Wingless Bird." Nettles and Casey are an engaging team, not quite faithful to their characters' literary versions - which however works well to their advantage; particularly in the case of Daniel Casey's Troy, who despite a certain learning curve in political correctness is less brash than in the books, and who presents a good foil for Nettles's emphatic Barnaby; in turn overall more reminiscent of George Baker's Wexford than of Nettles's own Bergerac, whose domestic bliss is spoiled, again and again, by the callings of his job, to his regret as much as to that of his culinarily-challenged wife Joyce (Jane Wymark) and theater-bound daughter Cully (Laura Howard); yet, he is to much of a professional not to heed those callings every single time.

Inexplicably only released as the fifth "region 1" DVD set, the series's first five episodes (contained in this collection) provide a most welcome opportunity for fans of the series to reacquaint themselves with the very first cases solved by this winning pair of detectives, as well as the not-so peaceful, albeit wonderfully filmed setting of rural Midsomer County. Crucially, they also include the TV version of "The Killings at Badgers Drift," which (re-)introduced the characters of Barnaby and Troy (as had Caroline Graham's book, ten years earlier), and among whose high profile roster of guest stars were screen luminaries and TV regulars such as Elizabeth Spriggs, Jonathan Firth, Rosalie Crutchley, Julian Glover, Christopher Villiers and Renee Asherson. In addition to the 1997 pilot, this set features the series's complete first season (1998) and one episode from the second (1999) season:

The Killings at Badger's Drift (1997)
Written in Blood (1998)
Death of a Hollow Man (1998)
Faithful Unto Death (1998)
Death in Disguise (1999)

Also recommended:
The Killings at Badger's Drift (Inspector Barnaby Mysteries)
Midsomer Murders - The Early Cases Collection
Inspector Morse - Complete Collection
Ruth Rendell Mysteries - Simisola / Road Rage
P.D. James: The Essential Collection

I've always been one for a good old, cracking mystery plot. Whether it be blackmail, revenge, secret activities or what have you, I'll be the last to complain about a good mystery- especially a good murder mystery. So it is that I am incurably drawn to this series, "Midsomer Murders"... even though this is set 5, I've chosen to review it first for a number of reasons: this is actually the first season, based on the original Caroline Graham novels (we've had to wait this long for the first ones, thanks to marketing "tactics")but I also have some comments relevant to this page of reviews in particular. Without mentioning any reviewer names I'd just like to point something out (purely for the benefit of others): how can anyone in their right mind expect a murder mystery to be a good example of "moral" behavior, or cater to moral standards in an way shape or form? If people are going around threatening and killing one and other, isn't that also "immoral" by its very nature? For a murder to occur something unpleasant, unsavory, nasty has to be going on; even murder schemes designed to get hold of a large inheritance/a quantity of money cannot be held up as acts of morally correct behavior, for all that concept has come to mean in these modern times. Bottom line: mystery, in particular murder mystery, is simply not the genre for you if you are the type to be uppity on so-called "morals." Alright; that out of the way, I have to say that I have really enjoyed this series for the most part...
This,actually the first series (as stated before), is especially good with the highlights being "The Killings at Badger's Drift" (actually the pilot episode), "Written in Blood" (alongside perhaps a few others, one of the best I've ever seen from this series in the area of plot and script), and "Death in Disguise", a brilliant yarn about murder within a New-Age Christian Convent. The other two are merely competent with regards to plot and script, while the direction, acting, and overall drama/pacing/suspense remain strong through the whole set (and almost all episodes of the series that I've seen to date.) Then of course there is the English Countryside settings of each mystery. Quaint though it all may be, this element (along with the recurring characters/actors, and the at-worst competence in writing), really makes the series work for me, and with few exceptions I have been able to pretty much buy the settings, plots, and one-off characters encountered by the detectives and others. Overall: 5/5 (generous really.)
In conclusion: while most of the "Midsomer Murders" sets are GREAT purchases for the murder/mystery enthusiast, either this or set 1 (featuring the second season) are the recommended starting points for newcomers. Hold off on other sets, as plots can occasionally dip below the standards from there on out. Highly recommended (especially earlier episodes; sets 5, and 1-2, along with 4 are particularly good.) 5/5!

The set I bought is great. It has scenes that are cut out when it's broadcast on television. It makes the story make sense since they are important to the storyline.

The BBC is brilliant at these decadent mysteries set in bucolic serenity. This is an outstading example of this skill. Nettles and Casey are both modern and classic as the detective pair with a nice spin on the relationship that develops interestingly over the course of the partnership. This set contains the first five shows of the series. Cimamatography is a prime feature so what this series on a good TV. Pacing may be a bit slow but if you just relax and enjoy you'll get your money's worht.

Contains one of the most humorous episodes in which Barnaby is unwittingly stoned on muffins. As always, Midsomer Murders is fine entertainment

Top notch BBC production. Excellent cast. Beautiful scenery. My husband and I look forward to sitting down and watching/rewatching this wonderful series. Even when you know 'who done it', it is enjoyable to spend time viewing MM. Our favorite is The Killings at Badger's Drift. The mother and son mortician are great. And they reappear (as different people!) in another episode!