Midsomer Murders - General Discussion

[Llywela]

15 hours ago, BlackberryJam said:

I think Winter needs a girlfriend. 

Poor Winter. Midsomer sergeants are not allowed to have personal lives, still less settle down into a happy relationship with anyone. That is the prerogative of the Chief Inspectors, and for whatever reason the sergeants are always kept single as a contrast. They don't even get to have ongoing relationships that take place off-screen, not for longer than one episode. The closest Winter ever came was admitting how he felt about Kam right before she decided a job offer in America was more important to her.

Even after they leave the show, the sergeants aren't allowed to settle down, it seems, even though it makes no difference at all in terms of storylines or needing to cast partners for them, or whatever. It would have been so easy to put a wedding ring on Troy when he came back for Cully's wedding, for instance, implying that his life had continued to move forward since he was promoted and left the show, but no. Still single. Or at least, not married.

And then there's Jones, who did at least get to have a bit of a love life during his time on the show, without anything ever coming of it. The show went to all the trouble of telling us that Kate Wilding had followed him to Brighton (when she could have moved quite literally anywhere), made a point of letting us know that she was living with him (while house-hunting for herself, of course, can't imply that it is a permanent arrangement) and even showed us a picture of them together, and then when Jones came back for a visit a few years later, Sarah asked after Kate, so we know the two of them were still close at that point...yet the writers wouldn't commit to actually coming out and telling us that they were romantically involved, even though it could not have mattered less at that point and would have been a nice happy ending for both characters. But no. Just friends.

It's weird, but it is the one thing the show has always been consistent about. Sergeants must remain terminally single, even when they are no longer sergeants and have long since left the show!

I would really love to know that even just one of those former sergeants was now happily paired off!

14 hours ago, kimaken said:

Indeed it was. On the other hand, Paddy running around and behaving like an irascible dog was pretty funny. I wonder though, how old he's supposed to be? I recall John acquired him in Winter's first case (and Paddy wasn't a puppy then) not too long after Sykes passed away (Betty was a toddler then). I think the show jumped a few years so Betty is now old enough for boarding school--so wouldn't Paddy be a lot older now? Yet he was running around like he was still a young dog.

Betty was born (at least, that episode aired) in February 2014 so would be getting on for 10 years old now (although she is very tall, the actress may be older). Is she at boarding school? I don't remember ever being told that. We've been told she was away at camps and sleepovers to explain absences, but I don't remember anyone saying boarding school. I don't think there has been any time jump, either. Slightly longer gaps between seasons, perhaps, but that isn't the same thing. Betty was a toddler when Paddy joined the family, yes, and he was an adult dog then - but probably still a young adult dog. Smaller dogs tend to live much longer than larger dogs - the little terrier-cross we had when I was growing up lived to be 19 and remained fairly sprightly right up until her last years. So Paddy being full of beans doesn't surprise me. After all, it has been the same dog playing him all these years, so it isn't as if the show is faking his energy! That's just the type of dog he is.

Edited December 20, 2023 by Llywela

[Prevailing Wind]

I'm watching episode 4, the "green" village one.  The American guy reminds me so much of "Selwyn Proctor*," I had to look him up to make sure it wasn't the same actor.  It's not. This guy actually IS American.

*Selwyn Proctor - the stock broker husband in the episode where the so-called Book Club was investing and that handsome Jesse Birdsall played the pool cleaner. The one with the crazy wife of the doctor who was planning to live with Sir James.  Oh, that episode was SO chock full of memorable stuff: "Darling Gerald", Ginny Sharp being killed in her own pool with an ashtray from The Feathers, Troy being offered an outrageous sum for his first issue "The Hawk" comic book, Joyce solving the puzzle of the letters being tossed into Mrs. Proctor's pool, Troy insulting Sir James' wallpaper, "Bookie's Daughter" being hissed by Marjorie Empson as she lay dying.

[LisaM]

I thought that episode 4 (green village) was fine but not memorable - with the exception of the weather vane through the heart. That was a nice touch. Always nice to see Julie Graham, who shows up in almost every British mystery I watch. 

[mellyf]

9 hours ago, Prevailing Wind said:

I'm watching episode 4, the "green" village one.  The American guy reminds me so much of "Selwyn Proctor*," I had to look him up to make sure it wasn't the same actor.  It's not. This guy actually IS American.

*Selwyn Proctor - the stock broker husband in the episode where the so-called Book Club was investing and that handsome Jesse Birdsall played the pool cleaner. The one with the crazy wife of the doctor who was planning to live with Sir James.  Oh, that episode was SO chock full of memorable stuff: "Darling Gerald", Ginny Sharp being killed in her own pool with an ashtray from The Feathers, Troy being offered an outrageous sum for his first issue "The Hawk" comic book, Joyce solving the puzzle of the letters being tossed into Mrs. Proctor's pool, Troy insulting Sir James' wallpaper, "Bookie's Daughter" being hissed by Marjorie Empson as she lay dying.

Market for Murder is one of my favorites! Rupert Vansittart has been in three Midsomer episodes (as well as showing up on Father Brown and Sister Boniface). 

I knew I'd seen the actor playing the Texan before, so I IMDB'd him, and he was in The Mummy with Brendan Fraser. But I also thought he resembled Rupert V. 

[BlackberryJam]

So I'm freaking out. I would have sworn the Rooster Harlin character, with that terrible accent, was played by Rupert Vansittart, but No. It was Corey Johnson, an American actor. Thanks for cluing me in!

Also, I kept expect Havers to show up there with Inspector Lynley.

There needs to be a British detective show actor bingo card. 

[Llywela]

1 hour ago, BlackberryJam said:

So I'm freaking out. I would have sworn the Rooster Harlin character, with that terrible accent, was played by Rupert Vansittart, but No. It was Corey Johnson, an American actor. Thanks for cluing me in!

This is the trouble with accents - even genuine ones can sound completely fake if they show up in the wrong context! The same thing can happen if an actor who you know best from a production where they use a fake accent then takes on a new role in which they use their real voice, I've had that happen to me before. The real accent can sound fake just because it isn't the voice you've come to expect from that person. Apparently, our ears are easily thrown and deceived!

[Enigma X]

Can a person, a family, or a group of people actually own a whole village in the UK? Just curious.

Also, I sometimes disagree when people say an accent is off (or on) and rarely comment on it. I am not saying that Johnson's accent was good or bad (genuinely don't know), but the actor is from Louisiana.  Both Texas and Louisiana have many accents packed in their States, but the actor is also putting on an accent that is most likely different from his own.

[Llywela]

2 hours ago, Enigma X said:

Can a person, a family, or a group of people actually own a whole village in the UK? Just curious.

Yes, it can and does happen, but is actually a lot rarer these days than you might think, watching this show. I can think of a bunch of episodes over the years where we've been told that the local lord-of-the-manor owns the entire village. In reality, there are now only a couple of examples where entire villages are still owned by their local lord - one of them was in the news recently, actually, because the village was sold in its entirety against the wishes of pretty much its entire population. Google Trevalga if you want to know more about that story. There is also a village on the north Devon coast that is completely owned by one person - Clovelly, that one is called, it's a popular tourist attraction these days, really pretty, but you have to pay an entry fee to enter the village, which consists of about 80 cottages and a couple of pubs perched on the edge of a cliff. (We won't go into the Duchy of Cornwall or the other royal estates.)

It basically all goes back to the feudal system in the Middle Ages and the way land was divvied up when William the Conqueror invaded and captured the country, way back in 1066. In essence, in order to take and retain control over the country he had conquered, he imported a bunch of loyal supporters from his lands in Normandy and set them up as local lords across England. The modern peerage system also dates from this time, and in those days it wasn't just titles that were granted, they also came with vast swathes of land attached, as well as massive amounts of power. These dukes and earls and barons etc became representatives of the king, holding land on his behalf and wielding power on his behalf. They now owned the land and everyone else had to pay rent to them if they wanted to go on living there. They built new castles and manor houses, and new villages sprang up around them - villages which they owned in their entirety because they were built on their land. Freehold is everything, especially when the bulk of your income is derived from rents.

And then centuries passed and these manors and estates were passed down and merged and split up, but it wasn't until the Industrial Revolution that real change began to happen. Some of these landlords became enormously wealthy off the back of it, simply because they owned the land on which new towns and cities were springing up, so they got to control the planning, building and development of these settlements, and usually retained the freehold. That situation didn't change until as recently as the 1960s when the Leasehold Reform Act was passed, giving householders the right to purchase their freehold. And, of course, the introduction of inheritance tax in the 1890s led to a lot of the big old estates being broken up and sold off.

TL;DR - once upon a time it was normal for entire villages to be owned by their local lords, because that was how the feudal system was set up, but these days it is now quite rare because most of those big old estates have been broken up. What it means in practice is that the local manor owns the freehold on all the land and property locally, because that's how the settlement developed hundreds of years ago, and for whatever reason they simply haven't caught up to modern times so that situation still remains.

There are still big estates which own a scary amount of the land in this country - it is scarier still when you start looking into it and realise how many of those landowners are descendants of William the Conqueror's cronies, even to this day. But because householders now have the right to purchase their freehold, very few of those big estates now own entire villages outright. But a lot of them still own huge amounts of land and property in the settlements around their manors, just not the entire settlement. These days, they tend to own pockets of land and property dotted about the place - a bunch of farms here, a portfolio of houses and shops there, that kind of thing, whatever the estate has managed to hang onto in a changing world in which 40% inheritance tax is due over a certain threshold.

Anyway, all that is how Midsomer Murders comes to have so many stories about inbred local lords on whom local populations are dependent for both their homes and livelihoods. It's all about residual feudalism and the significance of freehold.

Edited December 26, 2023 by Llywela
clarity and typos

[Enigma X]

@Llywela Thanks. Very informative.

[Mittengirl]

Now that is how you cast an actor with a disability!  Her disability played no part in the case or her life (as seen in the episode), she was just a person in the village who had a tangential relationship to the case.

[Mittengirl]

Does anyone know if there are only 4 episodes this season?  I hope not, I need the distraction from real life.

[Prevailing Wind]

14 minutes ago, Mittengirl said:

Does anyone know if there are only 4 episodes this season?  I hope not, I need the distraction from real life.

According to imdb, yes - only 4. Why even bother?

[Prevailing Wind]

I just watched Written in Blood again and something Honoria says has always bothered me... Amy's in the kitchen slicing up a white vegetable (Parsnip?) and Honoria takes over after Amy announces she's leaving. Honoria starts ranting about "blood and bone. Blood counts. Bone counts."  But Amy is NOT a Lyddiard by blood nor bone; she's one by marriage.  Honoria's off her rocker anyway, but the way she hated Amy, you'd think she'd be more than happy to disown her, not claim her to be "blood and bone."

[Llywela]

1 hour ago, Prevailing Wind said:

I just watched Written in Blood again and something Honoria says has always bothered me... Amy's in the kitchen slicing up a white vegetable (Parsnip?) and Honoria takes over after Amy announces she's leaving. Honoria starts ranting about "blood and bone. Blood counts. Bone counts."  But Amy is NOT a Lyddiard by blood nor bone; she's one by marriage.  Honoria's off her rocker anyway, but the way she hated Amy, you'd think she'd be more than happy to disown her, not claim her to be "blood and bone."

Oh, Honoria is absolutely barking, completely off her trolley. Her main reason for wanting to hold onto Amy is because she doesn't want anyone to know her brother was bisexual and died of AIDS; she is afraid that Amy, as his wife who clearly had no suspicions about his sexuality and therefore presumably had a normal sex life with him, might eventually develop HIV and AIDS and realise she contracted it from...I think his name was Ralph, wasn't it, the husband? Anyway, Honoria's fear is that if Amy becomes HIV+ she will realise she caught it from her husband, and that might cause the truth about his sexuality to emerge, and Honoria can't allow that because she is in massive, massive denial about the whole thing, considers it shameful and can't bear the idea that anyone else might find out.

I suppose Amy's blood would count if it is infected with HIV by Ralph, in Honoria's warped mind? That's the tie that binds her.

Edited February 18 by Llywela

[Prevailing Wind]

Yeah, the dead husband was named Ralph. There was inconsistency in pronouncing Honoria's name, too. Most folks, including her, said "On OR ria" but Amy said, "On or REE a."

I liked the entire episode but for the creepy drama teacher.

 

[schnauzergirl]

Just watched Midsomer Rhapsody and was really stunned by a continuity error.  We see green grass, leaves on trees, sun shining until the one scene with about 3" of snow, bare trees, and gloomy skies.  And then it's back to green grass, etc.  Weather has nothing to do with the plot, but still ....  I'm truly puzzled how the snow scene happened.  Perhaps the need to re-shoot?  

[Llywela]

4 hours ago, Prevailing Wind said:

Yeah, the dead husband was named Ralph. There was inconsistency in pronouncing Honoria's name, too. Most folks, including her, said "On OR ria" but Amy said, "On or REE a."

Yeah, over the years there have been a few characters where different people pronounced their name differently. I think the worst is the girl named Gagan in the episode with the eclipse, John Barnaby and Jones era. Just about every single character in that episode pronounces her name differently. I find it very realistic, though, since in real life people are prone to mispronounce names and often don't pay any attention when they are told the proper pronunciation!

4 hours ago, schnauzergirl said:

Just watched Midsomer Rhapsody and was really stunned by a continuity error.  We see green grass, leaves on trees, sun shining until the one scene with about 3" of snow, bare trees, and gloomy skies.  And then it's back to green grass, etc.  Weather has nothing to do with the plot, but still ....  I'm truly puzzled how the snow scene happened.  Perhaps the need to re-shoot?  

I hadn't ever noticed that! Could be a reshoot, but wiki says the episode was filmed in February-March, which is when we often get a sudden late snowfall in these parts. I know the episodes are filmed to a very tight schedule (around 22 days per episode) so it could just be that there happened to be snow overnight while this episode was filming and they just pressed on with the schedule the next day, despite there being snow on the ground at the location being used, then by the next day again the snow was all gone - or they were at a different location which didn't get sticking snow in the first place - because that's just how snowfall works in the UK. It really does come and go as fast as that! And as localised as that.

Edited February 19 by Llywela

[Pine]

On 2/18/2024 at 9:59 AM, Prevailing Wind said:

I just watched Written in Blood again and something Honoria says has always bothered me... Amy's in the kitchen slicing up a white vegetable (Parsnip?) and Honoria takes over after Amy announces she's leaving. Honoria starts ranting about "blood and bone. Blood counts. Bone counts."  But Amy is NOT a Lyddiard by blood nor bone; she's one by marriage.  Honoria's off her rocker anyway, but the way she hated Amy, you'd think she'd be more than happy to disown her, not claim her to be "blood and bone."

She was thinking about all the free labour, and a companion to snap at and correct.  At least that is how I took it.

 

[Llywela]

8 hours ago, Pine said:

She was thinking about all the free labour, and a companion to snap at and correct.  At least that is how I took it.

 

Well, that too, but the possibility of Amy contracting HIV from Ralph (and the truth about Ralph's sexuality subsequently coming out) is her main motive, both for keeping Amy with her and for the murders. We are told as much in the episode. She tells Amy that she has waited for years, watching for symptoms which never came, while Amy herself remained entirely ignorant and never knew the real cause of her husband's death because Honoria completely took over his care the moment he became ill.

[J-Man]

On 12/25/2023 at 8:52 PM, Prevailing Wind said:

I'm watching episode 4, the "green" village one.  The American guy reminds me so much of "Selwyn Proctor*," I had to look him up to make sure it wasn't the same actor.  It's not. This guy actually IS American.

What drove me crazy in this episode was Rooster's use of British terms that an American would never use. The American actor should have clued in the writers to this issue.

Edited May 9 by J-Man

[Llywela]

On 5/9/2024 at 1:39 AM, J-Man said:

What drove me crazy in this episode was Rooster's use of British terms that an American would never use. The American actor should have clued in the writers to this issue.

To be fair, I often think the same thing about British actors playing British characters in American TV shows, so this issue isn't unique to either Midsomer Murders or this side of the Pond!

[Tyro49]

We've just finished watching Series 24 of Midsomer Murders on a DVD set borrowed from our local library. (We don't have either Acorn or Britbox, so this is the only way we can watch it locallyl) We liked all four episodes, found them twisty and mystifying, up with the best of them.

Of course we found the "Texan" ridiculously over the top, even for a British show, but we thought maybe that that was being done on purpose, Turned out we were right.

Wish the show would come back to Masterpiece Theater on PBS.