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🎙️ Episode: https://share.transistor.fm/s/42cb6967
📓 Show Notes: https://midsomermaniacs.transistor.fm/episodes/mystery-maniacs-cold-cases-midsomer-season-07-binge
Show Notes
This cold case covers our podcast for Season 7 of Midsomer Murders.
Cold Cases
00:00 Intro
10:40 Episode 29 - "The Green Man" - Pause Tom and the Yob Magnets in the Research Dungeon
1:24:10 Episode 30 - "Bad Tidings" - Cactus Jack, You You Cow and 3 Red!
2:41:33 Episode 31 - "The Fisher King" - Barrows, Spear Fishing and Doors Wide Open
3:40:28 Episode 32 - "Sins of Commission" - The Black Lodge, Pants Pub and a Flyswater!
4:52:01 Episode 33 - "The Maid in Splendour" - Bembo, Lorna's Teeth and a Love Shack
5:49:51 Episode 34 - "The Straw Woman" - Vicars on Fire, Country Polka and Elvis?
7:05:08 Episode 35 - "Ghosts of Christmas Past" - Pam, Bonking and a Fungus Cardigan!
Read Along With Us
If you've been listening to the show and want to dive into some actual fiction, this is your week.
Free preview chapters for both of Mark's serial novels are available right now. No credit card, no commitment. Just chapters. Go read them and tell us what you think.
And if you want to keep reading past the previews, the Patreon is open. Five dollars a month gets you one series. Eight gets you both. New chapters every week.
Free chapters - https://markbellauthor.substack.com/
Patreon link - https://patreon.com/markbellauthor
Thanks again for listening!
Mark & Sarah
-----------------------------------
Upcoming Tentative Schedule
Upcoming Tentative Schedule
- September 28: Mystery Maniacs - Clues and Reviews 09/14/26
- September 30: Mystery Maniacs - Cold Cases - Midsomer Season 07 BINGE
- October 5: Mystery Maniacs - Clues and Reviews 09/14/26
- October 7: Mystery Maniacs - Cold Cases - Midsomer Season 07 BINGE
- October 7: October Newsletter
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Creators and Guests
What is Mystery Maniacs?
Mystery Maniacs Podcast is a comedy recap podcast dedicated to British Mystery Television. Formerly, Midsomer Maniacs podcast.
Hey, Maniacs. Hey, Mystery Maniacs. Well, cold case number seven, season seven
Sarah:Of Midsomer. Murders. Do you have double latex gloves on?
Mark:No. But I just finished the ham. Cast your mind back. Boo. Boo.
Mark:Boo.
Sarah:To March 2020.
Mark:Yes. So we published an episode on the March 7. You'll be amazed by this episode, folks. It was a short episode in which we talked about how busy we were.
Sarah:How is we'll be back next week. And in the time between, we'll be back next week and we're back. Yep. COVID happened.
Mark:March 12, everything shuts down. March 16, we have an episode where we're like, well.
Sarah:No one's allowed to leave the house anymore.
Mark:This will all be over in a few days.
Sarah:I think we sound remarkably sane in these episodes.
Mark:I I Except
Sarah:except the ham.
Mark:Yes. So we bought, we had to get a ham. Sarah asked me to get a ham at the store and I bought an 18 pound ham.
Sarah:I was expecting like a five pound ham. Yep. You brought home an 18 pound ham. It almost didn't fit in the oven. And then I was like, okay, I guess we're eating ham for a while.
Sarah:We do. Because this is in the era when everybody was like strangling each other for toilet paper. Yep. So I was like, okay, we have food. We have now protein to last us quite a while.
Mark:My favorite of of the COVID related bits is in the March 23 episode, we talk about, well, we've really been in the house a long time.
Sarah:We didn't know anything. We didn't know it was coming. We had no idea what was coming.
Mark:Oh my gosh.
Sarah:We didn't know the horror, the sadness, how scary it was gonna be.
Mark:I did hear when I was relisting the episodes, we make mention of sweet baby Fanny. Oh, our baby. So Fanny was our dog during this period of time. She was 11, almost 11 at this point in time. And we she passed that summer Mhmm.
Mark:And it was sad. And I cannot believe that that she was part of the podcast.
Sarah:Yeah. Like And now Olive just turned five on nine eleven.
Mark:Yes. And she's in the newsletter every month.
Sarah:Yeah. So Ugh. Way to bring it down, dude.
Mark:No. Fanny Fanny got us through the COVID, I would say.
Sarah:Yeah. It is really odd to hear us introducing these episodes, not knowing what was happening, but being like, Hey, we're all in this together. It's not gonna be so bad. Yep.
Mark:Wash your hands.
Sarah:Little did we know the naivete of the flashback.
Mark:Bell of a vaccine before you know it.
Sarah:Oh yeah, it'll be one of those things where, you know, just don't go to work if you're sick.
Mark:It'll be like the Spanish flu will just disappear.
Sarah:We went to a conference at a water park.
Mark:I cannot believe we did not get sick. We went to a conference at a water park hotel. Yeah. We went to the water park.
Sarah:Yeah. I mean, chlorine kills everything maybe. Yep. But still we came home. That's why we recorded the, we'll be back next week because we were gonna be at this conference.
Sarah:Yep. And then we come back and like the day we came back, we got the email from campus saying, don't come to campus.
Mark:Yep, the NBA canceled, the NHL canceled, everything shut down like overnight.
Sarah:Yeah. And we had just been in a hotel with thousands of people. Yes. And now don't leave
Mark:the house. In a wet environment.
Sarah:Yeah. Oh, and by the way, there's no toilet paper Giant
Mark:petri dish that we swam around. Yeah.
Sarah:And people were like talking like, Oh, did you see the news today that like some people are sick
Mark:Something's on this going on in China.
Sarah:And there's like some people on the coast who like might have it or whatever. That's kind of weird.
Mark:Meanwhile, China was like, dudes, lockdown.
Sarah:Oh, and then it just got more interesting from there. We didn't know. Nope. The other thing that we didn't know at this point is how much the community that we were building around this podcast was gonna help all of us get through it. It made such a big difference.
Mark:We totally were at the very beginning. Like the first COVID episode is The Green Man and that's episode 29. Yeah. We're just getting started. Yeah.
Mark:I cannot believe how early it happened.
Sarah:And then all those faker copycat people who started podcasts during COVID were like, whatever. Yeah. Had 28 episodes already.
Mark:28 episodes. I cannot believe we have Joiners. Over two fifty episodes.
Sarah:Okay. So what's your favorite episode of this season? What is your favorite episode of our podcast of season seven?
Mark:Okay. Season seven includes the green man, bad tidings.
Sarah:The Fisher King, sins of commission, maiden splendor
Mark:And straw woman. Straw woman, and then the Christmas episode that was lit, like, left for a year. Yeah. The saddest Christmas episode of all time. Does your Christmas episode involve suicide?
Mark:Why, yes, it does. Yeah. My favorite moment of ours, our laugh till you cry moment, was a thing I still cannot believe happened, which was in the sins of commission episode. I've already established that I read everything. It's a episode about authors.
Mark:I'm gonna look at the books. Mhmm. There's a magazine story about one of the characters and the headline is right and the little quotes are right, but the entire text of the article is from a Microsoft Office installation guide.
Sarah:Copy and pasted. I remember when you found that you I were like cannot Holy crap. Come here. You have to see this. Like, are you sure?
Mark:That's
Sarah:terrifying. Showed me like What? Wow. You're right.
Mark:Cannot believe that was in there. I cannot like, okay. Understandably, there is a naked woman on the other page. Yeah. So most people are gonna orient to that.
Mark:I think so. Yeah. Okay. But not Mark.
Sarah:No. No. No. Not my man. He notices the Microsoft Office manual because that's the kind of person you are.
Mark:As a technical writer, I saw immediately the familiar pros of instructional manuals.
Sarah:My favorite.
Mark:Wow. I I like, it's so crazy. That's so crazy that today I went back and double checked.
Sarah:Just in case it
Mark:To make sure I wasn't on crack.
Sarah:It was during COVID. Who knows? It You might have had so much ham poisoning that you
Mark:It was definitely straight. A moment in my life where I
Sarah:It's like when we found the credit card of the Yep. Production assistant.
Mark:Yeah. We talked about all those things we found in previous episodes when we get to this My
Sarah:Face Hurt episode of this season has to be the Maid in Splendor because I don't know why we got so carried away, but Bembo, the old guy who sits in the pub and gets kicked out of the pub because they're not allowed to wear work clothes, no work clothes. At the pub, we got slap happy carried away about Bembo. And then I I made a T shirt of Bembo that says no work clothes and everything.
Mark:I can't believe that we mentioned in both of those episodes. So in both the episode for Made in Splendor and Fisher King, we mentioned both David Lynch and young Sherlock Holmes because there's tie ins to both of them in both episodes.
Sarah:But I have to say the worst murder in this season of Midsomer has got to be in the straw woman when the minister is burned alive in front of a crowd. Yes. That is just devastating.
Mark:Absolutely devastating. These are the very first Scott episodes. The first episode still has Troy in it and a young Superman. Good day for it. And a strange fox puppet.
Sarah:Yes. The fox puppet is so bad. It's a good season. I hope you guys enjoy it. It's not too, traumatic.
Mark:Yeah. So Scott starts and I I watched some of these episodes again this week and I just felt sad for Scott. I've really felt for him.
Sarah:Because you knew he wasn't gonna last. He doesn't know that, but you
Mark:know that. My favorite Scott moment is Barnaby shows up at his house. He's he's bedraggled, and he's like, I got here. There's two murders. I have no idea what I'm doing.
Mark:I have no idea who you are. I barely know what I'm living in. And Barnaby goes, your tie is crooked. And Scott goes, yes, it is. And then he does the thing that makes you love Scott.
Mark:He goes, can I buy you breakfast?
Sarah:He's he's rallying.
Mark:And and Barnaby goes, Yes. And that is like, that's a a moment of camaraderie where Barnaby obviously realizes he's hit the switch where he doesn't need to press anymore. Yeah. And he's going to get free breakfast out of this. So, okay.
Sarah:Well, and Scott is saying my life is a shambles, but I'm not. Yep. I'm gonna get it together. Yep. And I So it's like, okay.
Mark:Yep. I think it's some some great acting. I think Scott's acting is so much better than people give credit for.
Sarah:I think so too. It's a good season. Alright. Enjoy it, Maniacs.
Mark:Enjoy Maniacs. And this is all part of the crew, constable Crabb. Constable Crabb and Sergeant Hill. Constable Crabb. Constable Crabb.
Sarah:Constable Crabb? Does he live with SpongeBob and have crabby patties? It is hard to say constable Crabb
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Who's kinda crabby too.
Mark:Starting again. Constable Crabb.
Sarah:As soon as Troy gets promoted, everybody's nasty damn.
Mark:Including sergeant Gil.
Sarah:Yeah. And constable Grabb.
Mark:And sergeant Spongebob Squarepants.
Sarah:Yes. And Patrick. Hey, Maniacs.
Mark:Hey, Maniacs.
Sarah:It's Midsomer Maniacs. I'm Sarah.
Mark:And I'm Mark. And this is a special Valentine's Day Midsomer Maniac recording session.
Sarah:Oh la la.
Mark:Episode 29.
Sarah:Did you bring me some flowers from the all night gas station?
Mark:I did indeed bring you some flowers from the all night gas station. We'll get there.
Sarah:People don't understand. You and I in front of our mics, no kids in the house.
Mark:There are no children.
Sarah:We're gonna order some Indian delivery. That is a romantic night.
Mark:And we're naked? No. Oh. Well, I'm naked.
Sarah:They can imagine that if they want to. It's up to them.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Anyway, what episode is this?
Mark:This is episode 29, season seven, episode one, The Green Man.
Sarah:And even though it's the first episode of a new season, it is the last Troy. The last
Mark:Troy episode.
Sarah:We're gonna have a little tribute to Troy at the end of
Mark:this to Troy.
Sarah:Lots of people send us their favorite Troy moments.
Mark:Yes. So Midsomer Maniacs is a podcast dedicated to the ITV series, Midsomer Murders. Each week, we dig into an episode of the show, including the murders, the mayhem, and the loonies, and everything else we love.
Sarah:That's right. Including Cully having yet another job.
Mark:Yet another job. Just a little warning off the top, if the show is too much for your kids, the podcast probably is too. But if you're listening into this this far, I think you're probably, going to listen on.
Sarah:There's really just Rumpy Pumpy in this episode.
Mark:I got to tell you, I've looked at our demographics. I'm not really worried about children watching me listening to these episodes.
Sarah:How do you know? There might be a parent out there driving their kid to school in the morning? They put on the Midsomer Maniac podcast on the way to school. Good to The kid's really interesting
Mark:at Excuse
Sarah:me, ma'am. What's rumpy pumpy mean? Where did you hear that? Podcast.
Mark:Our children look at us like, who are you people?
Sarah:Nah. That that we can't do anything.
Mark:Shock that we seen this episode before? Yes.
Sarah:Yes. We have.
Mark:But we have to watch it three times this week.
Sarah:Though, I will say there was a moment in this episode that made one of our children cry.
Mark:Yes. It did.
Sarah:Like, this week when we were rewatching it again.
Mark:Yes. Well, there's sad parts to this episode.
Sarah:There are. Let's get into it.
Mark:It was filmed in May and June 2003 and broadcast on the 11/02/2003 to 10,010,000 people. Directed by Sarah Hellings and written by Michael Russell. It takes place in Midsomer Worthy.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And the pub, which is the exactly named pub, it's not even the aptly named pub, is The Green Man.
Sarah:How many pubs in Britain alone do you think are called the green man? Guess.
Mark:I know I went to at least one when I was in England the first time because I may have been a little obsessed with green man stuff at that point in time.
Sarah:You might think by my question that there is more than one. Yes. How many do you think there are?
Mark:I'm guessing one
Sarah:now. Way more than
Mark:one. Okay.
Sarah:Okay. Okay? I
Mark:got confused.
Sarah:Give me an actual guess.
Mark:74.
Sarah:206. 206.
Mark:There's not that many villages in England.
Sarah:There are over 20 in London.
Mark:I wonder what the two closest green men pubs are.
Sarah:Probably the ones in London.
Mark:Yeah. Is
Sarah:it I can look.
Mark:But it's not a franchise. Those are all
Sarah:No.
Mark:No. Independently owned Green Man pubs.
Sarah:I mean, they might be owned by there might be a couple that are owned by the same brewery
Mark:or something. But Elephant and and Castle. Yeah. I'm sure there's lots of those.
Sarah:But I would think that a brewery owned pub, they wouldn't want more than one with the same name because that would be confusing. Yes. There's a great website. We'll post a link to it. This guy, he's doing he's actually doing, Robin Hood research.
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:And one of the things that he looked into was the green men reference in Robin Hood, and then he got curious about how many pubs were called the green men, and he made a list. And that's for his website, Robin's hoodlums. It's complete with like GPS coordinates for every one of them. Wow. It's incredible.
Mark:That's more nerdy than we are. Yeah. Wow. That's impressive.
Sarah:200 and 6.
Mark:200 and 6.
Sarah:But I think there were a couple counties he hadn't surveyed yet, so probably more.
Mark:Oh, geez.
Sarah:Anyway, so we started out with, Collie's got yet another job though. This is a volunteer job. You think she got paid for the library mobile?
Mark:I think she got paid for the library mobile.
Sarah:But this one she's volunteering.
Mark:And certainly as a travel agent, she got that bonus for sending her parents to Africa.
Sarah:Yeah. I think she got a cut. Yeah. She's doing PR for a guy named Webster.
Mark:Woah. Woah. Woah. Woah.
Sarah:Woah. What?
Mark:There's a headband we need to talk about here.
Sarah:Okay. It's horrible. Lay the headband on me.
Mark:Cully's headband. What? It's egregious. First of all, it's six inches wide.
Sarah:She's gotta keep her hair out of her face.
Mark:Oh, I
Sarah:So this is what happens when when you get your hair cut short, whether you're a man or a woman, you get your hair cut short, she had that cute little pixie cut, and then you're gonna grow it out. You you have these weird phases while your hair is growing where you have to just tame it. You just have to control it until it gets past that phase.
Mark:This is the weird Cully season. Yeah. Because the the next episode has her and her high school friends. That episode.
Sarah:Oh, that one creeps me out.
Mark:I don't know why it gives me the heat. Creepy. Creepy. Creepy.
Sarah:But she's doing PR?
Mark:Yep. For a tunnel. Well, it's for a canal rebuilding. For Tim Webster.
Sarah:Yes. Who, hopes to get a knighthood by, excavating this tunnel.
Mark:He's trying to get national attention.
Sarah:It's a canal tunnel.
Mark:For his contour canal. Yes. That follows the contours of an of a like a
Sarah:hill or
Mark:a mountain.
Sarah:Mhmm. Which was an alternative to, cutting cutting through the mountain to make a a place for the canal. Yeah. Right? Which would have been a lot more labor intensive.
Mark:Exactly.
Sarah:So she's doing PR and of course, Joyce is gonna get involved.
Mark:Well, Joyce gets more than involved, she gets caved in on, literally.
Sarah:That's the one thing about this episode that I always remember. I can forget some of the character names, but I always remember how genuinely upset Tom is.
Mark:Like you're always saying with episode. There wasn't the emotion that this episode has. Yeah. This has so much more emotion in it.
Sarah:Like, I I am upset on his behalf. I don't really care how long Joyce stays in the in the tunnel, but I don't want Tom to be so sad.
Mark:So they're clearing stuff out of the tunnel. Okay. Is there's no reason given for the collapse?
Sarah:No.
Mark:He's supposedly Webster's supposedly an engineer.
Sarah:Right. So he should know better.
Mark:He should know better.
Sarah:But, you know, he doesn't know about all the bodies in there either.
Mark:No. So So we don't know what happens with Joyce here. Joyce may bite it here. Right? She might die.
Sarah:Well, we we we do know that she doesn't.
Mark:Well, of course, we don't. We do. But, okay, we're we're still supposed to think that Joyce is in grave danger.
Sarah:Yes. So Even though they know right away that they're alive and on the other side of it, they can hear them. I mean, it's not I don't think there's a whole lot of suspense of is Joy's dead. It's just it's scary. It's scary that she could have died.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Which wouldn't nearly make up for all the lives she's taken. No. Maybe they should have left her in there and Midsomer would have
Mark:been safer. No one dies when she's in there. That's true. Yep. No one dies when she's in Africa.
Sarah:Just saying.
Mark:Except the man from Dakari.
Sarah:Dakari. Before we get too deep in, I just we need to set some some rules here because we've got Tom and we've got Tom.
Mark:No. We have Tom and we have Tom. Pause Tom.
Sarah:Pause Tom.
Mark:Because every time anyone says that name and they're referring to Tom, it's pause Tom.
Sarah:I'm gonna call him old Tom.
Mark:Pause Tom.
Sarah:You can call him pause Tom if you want.
Mark:I'm gonna call and old Tom are the same person.
Sarah:Yes. Because in my notes, I put TNT by for Tom and Troy Yes. Pretty often. And as I went was reviewing my notes and I realized, I was like, Tom's on the bridge. Tom's at Webster's.
Sarah:Tom is in the camp. Wait a minute. Which Tom?
Mark:Well, there's
Sarah:Tom's got a fox.
Mark:That would be Tom.
Sarah:Tom. There's just a little beat. I'm just gonna call him old Tom.
Mark:Troy, especially, he does pause Tom.
Sarah:Yes. But I'm just gonna call him old Tom so that there's clarity.
Mark:Okay. So old Tom. I'll call him old Tom too.
Sarah:Thank you. That would probably help. Yep. Old Tom's on the bridge.
Mark:And there's some yobs that we never see again. These yobs.
Sarah:No. Those are the same yobs. No. They're they're they're in Daniel's car.
Mark:I'm sure they're different yobs.
Sarah:They're the same yobs.
Mark:I thought
Sarah:they were They didn't pay for four extra yobs.
Mark:Well, they didn't pay for good music. That's for sure.
Sarah:So do you know what yobs means?
Mark:You told me, but I would like to listen Well, to
Sarah:I mean, what do you think yobb means?
Mark:Well, Yobb is a narrow dwell young man around the village up to no good.
Sarah:Yeah. Like, an uncouth antisocial younger person. That's what it means.
Mark:Throws beer cans at runners.
Sarah:But what I was interested in is where it comes from. Yes. So I went to the OED. The OED dictionary. To find the first citation for yobb.
Sarah:Yobb. Turns out it originated in Australia, but probably from Brits who were sent to Australia. The first citation for it in Britain is in the thirties in print, but it is a member of a group of slang words called back slang. Which is backwards talk. Yes.
Sarah:That costermongers in London used to use to talk in code.
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:So it's boy backwards. Yobb. Yobb. And it stuck around. I thought that was fun.
Sarah:I'm Graham. I'm harassed. Nice to meet you. So the yobs are in the car. We we see Tom being stubborn for the first time.
Sarah:He's got his walking cane.
Mark:Why does Tom go to town? Why does old Tom go to town ever?
Sarah:Tom goes wherever he wants.
Mark:I know he goes wherever he wants, but every time he goes to town, yobs.
Sarah:Drawn to him like a magnet. Pause Tom and the yobb magnets.
Mark:Pause Tom and the yaw magnets.
Sarah:They wouldn't make very good music. I don't think they would be able to agree on anything. And just pauses for Tom's parts. It's just silence.
Mark:And then just Tom samples.
Sarah:Yeah. Yep. That's a bad thing.
Mark:That's a bad it's a wrong A
Sarah:wrong thing. Tom's played by David Bradley who has been in everything.
Mark:Yep. He's super good. He's a fantastic actor.
Sarah:But he plays that part.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Right? He was in The Strain and he played an old crotchety guy. Yeah. He's in the Harry Potter movies. He's an old crotchety guy.
Sarah:He's in Hot Fuzz. He's an old crotchety guy. He plays Walder Frey in Game of Thrones. He's an old crotchety guy. Yep.
Sarah:But David Bradley is not an old crotchety guy. No. He's actually very funny. I watched a couple of interviews with him and he's amazingly not old crotchety guy.
Mark:Oh, that's good.
Sarah:And I actually found a picture of him young. Oh. Which I was like, wow. He actually was younger at some point. No.
Sarah:Because you wouldn't think.
Mark:He came out of the womb like that.
Sarah:Because he's looked the same for like forty years.
Mark:Yeah. Definitely.
Sarah:He got old. He got older looking, and then he just stayed.
Mark:I think this is probably the first place I saw him in.
Sarah:He was on Celebrity Mastermind in 2013.
Mark:Okay. So for American people, mastermind is this British television show in which you answer questions in a very specific area of interest. That you choose. That you choose. So I remember the first mastermind I ever watched.
Mark:The guy's topic was bar towels of Scottish pubs.
Sarah:Yeah. Like And they prepared, like, 15 questions. Specific.
Mark:And then there's a celebrity version in which you're always amazed. First of all, I don't know who that is. I don't know who that is. I don't know who that
Sarah:oh, I know that person. The contestants?
Mark:Yes. Yeah. And then they ask wickedly specific questions, and these celebrities are like
Sarah:So either their topics are super lame and stupid or incredibly erudite and unexpected. Yep. Would you like to guess what David Bradley's topic was on Mastermind?
Mark:Okay. David Bradley's topic on Mastermind was dark champions of the twentieth century.
Sarah:No. This topic was one man named Max Wall.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Who's an early comedic actor. Oh,
Mark:I wonder how he did.
Sarah:He came in second.
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:Max Wall was in a movie later in his career that we have to find because the entire movie is about somebody interviewing a serial killer, like a suspected serial killer, and Maxwell plays the character of the suspected serial killer, and all he says is yes or no for the whole movie.
Mark:Oh, that'd be interesting to watch.
Sarah:It would be interesting. Yeah. But David Bradley, good actor. Does a really good job in this episode.
Mark:Fantastic in Game of Thrones. Fantastic in
Sarah:Harry Potter. Nasty in Game of Thrones. Nasty.
Mark:Yep. Well, he gets his comeuppance.
Sarah:Yes, he does. So But he's a good guy here.
Mark:So then we moved to the cop shop with Tom, young Tom.
Sarah:Just Tom. Barnaby and Troy who's nervous because he wants to know if he's passed his inspectors exam.
Mark:And he has.
Sarah:He has. He's inspectors
Mark:Everybody wants to know wants to give him a job.
Sarah:And so we get that first, like, warm glowy emotion from Barnaby going, oh, because he just looks genuinely proud.
Mark:He totally has the I'm so proud. Look.
Sarah:John Nettles does such a good job. Yeah. In that scene, and when he's upset about Joyce, and he's utterly convincing, and we feel all kind of warm and fuzzy about him too. But also like, oh no, that means that Troy's gonna leave, which is kinda what Tom's feeling too.
Mark:Yeah. He's proud of him, but he's gonna miss him.
Sarah:Old Tom's got a fox.
Mark:He's got a jaunty hat and real fox that isn't real sometimes.
Sarah:It is kinda fun to watch those fox scenes and go, real fox, fake fox, real fox, fake fox.
Mark:I'm going to get picky here.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:In addition to the fake fox, there are two shots that are horribly done in this episode of Foxes. Okay. They're out of focus. They're
Sarah:They they look like they're cut out of nature documentaries.
Mark:Yeah. And they look standard definition to the rest of the show being high definition.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:And there's a shot like Barnaby like that too. I have to think there may have been some footage lost in this episode and they had to fill in some things because
Sarah:Or they had to use the backup footage or something.
Mark:Yeah. It it never should have made the TV.
Sarah:Well, then later, the foxes make interesting sounds like, why?
Mark:Yeah. The foxes are really, the foxes are quite a a good, part of the episode. And, you know, though we don't see it, there's a fox corpse. So it could be corpse of the episode.
Sarah:That's true. I didn't even have the fox on my list of corpses.
Mark:Yes. We don't see it though.
Sarah:Probably because all I could think about was Henry Cavill.
Mark:So Superman arrives. No. The Witcher. The
Sarah:Witcher. He's he's Simon Mayfield. Yes. But he's Henry Cavill, 20 years old. Yes.
Sarah:Most recently in The Witcher.
Mark:He is Butterchild. He's so young, you're like, no, that's oh my gosh. That's That the is him.
Sarah:Well, and Henry Cavill is known for this gravelly voice. Yes. It almost sounds fake gravelly.
Mark:In The Witcher, he's so
Sarah:And in this, he's like, hey, what are you looking at mister? I did a wrong thing. I was rumpy bumpy in a car with my friend's mom.
Mark:Okay. We'll get to that. Oh.
Sarah:No. So he he's in the car with somebody. We don't know who it is. We find out it's Lillian later Yeah. Doing the rumpy pumpy, and old Tom comes by, and he jumps out of the car to yell at him, and his rumpy pumpy partner takes off and leaves him.
Mark:I know. I have in my notes. Superman must fly back to town.
Sarah:I got it. The witcher got ditchered. Our notes are funny.
Mark:Superman roughs up Tom as fox attacks.
Sarah:News at ten. Joyce is rescued.
Mark:So we never see who he's shagging in the woods, but we know it's Lily.
Sarah:Yeah. It's his friend's mom.
Mark:Which is, it's it's unfortunate.
Sarah:She's pretty. Yeah. She's live.
Mark:Back at the tunnel. Tom is upset.
Sarah:Yeah. He doesn't care about his suit. It's getting all dirty.
Mark:And Cully does the head shake because she doesn't know?
Sarah:No. It's like genuinely sad.
Mark:But then they solve the problem.
Sarah:They bricked up by
Mark:the ants.
Sarah:Fox don't stop Joyce. You can't track Joyce.
Mark:Joyce makes it out and everyone claps. If there's a nice handheld picture, hand holding picture.
Sarah:Yes. They don't like clutch each other and make out or anything. They just grip hands. They're happy to be together. But okay.
Sarah:So the rocks fall, trap Joyce and the other people. But what's on the other side?
Mark:Apparently, because I did a lot of thought of this. Apparently, there's a number of people who are clearing out the tunnel. Yes. Then there's a space, then there's the opening to the tunnel.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:And the cave in happened luckily in that space. So there's room for them.
Sarah:Wait a minute. So you think the tunnel has collapsed further on and that's what they're clearing out?
Mark:No. No. No. The tunnel is Okay. So there's the entrance.
Mark:Yes. Then there's parts of the tunnel. Yes. And then there's where they're clearing out the tunnel.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:So they would be working where they cleared out the tunnel. Yeah. And somewhere before between where they're working and the entrance, the tunnel collapsed.
Sarah:Yeah. That's not what I'm asking. I'm asking what are they clearing out?
Mark:The tunnel collapse.
Sarah:Oh, and so they think it's safe. Oh, yeah. Clear rubble that has already collapsed in a tunnel.
Mark:Okay. It fell once. So because of that, it's never going to fall.
Sarah:No. It's fallen twice already because it fell once to kill the people who are trapped in the wall, the dead bodies. He Then it collapsed again, and now they're clearing that out.
Mark:Bus engineer. He knows what he's talking about.
Sarah:No. He's not a bus engineer. He's a tour bus owner. Tim Webster owns Midsomer Tours, double decker buses.
Mark:All I know is if Superman had his powers, Joyce would be out of there, lickety split.
Sarah:Witcher wouldn't have let that happen. No. He'd just grumble it really. So what do you make of Lord Fitzgibbon?
Mark:I like Lord Fitzgibbon, but there is not nearly enough backstory there because he's an appeal courts judge Yeah. Who has no money and a weird house and no wife and like, what happened to him? That he like, I'm assuming he's retired from the bench. Yeah. But he should be loaded.
Sarah:No, not necessarily. Well I mean, he should have enough. Yeah. But if he's a lord, he probably has a family home, like a country house. That that makes you broke immediately.
Sarah:As soon as you take possession, you're broke because you can't maintain them.
Mark:Idea If
Sarah:he's a bachelor, then he's got no kids to
Mark:My idea do for his backstory was he was the the middle brother. So he didn't inherit anything. He has a modest house and he's bachelor.
Sarah:Well, he's got a pretty big house and yet he lives in one room. It's clear he lives in one room. He's got a bed in the corner. He makes tea in the fireplace. Yeah.
Sarah:But he doesn't seem to mind. No. He seems rather happy
Mark:about it. He sure has a lot of man traps.
Sarah:Yeah. Do you know the difference between a man trap and a bear trap? No. There isn't one. Oh, okay.
Sarah:But there are a lot of videos on YouTube of idiots who think they're fast and strong testing themselves by punching the center of a bear trap and trying to get their hand out of the way first.
Mark:Wow. That's a YouTube video of ouch.
Sarah:Oh, there are like 20 or 30 of them.
Mark:Oh my gosh. Okay. Don't do that.
Sarah:If you test yourself to see if you're fast enough to punch a bear trap and make a video of it
Mark:I realize
Sarah:you might be an idiot.
Mark:That the demographics of our podcasts are 70% female over the age of 45. So I don't think many of you are going to do it. But if you are, Mabel, don't.
Sarah:Martha. Or if you're thinking about dating a man and he says, hey, look at this video I made, walk away.
Mark:Yes. So they find a bunch of bodies.
Sarah:Right. In the collapsed tunnel behind a wall that's now fallen down.
Mark:And this is all part of the crew, constable Crabb, constable Crabb and sergeant Phil. Constable Crabb. Constable Crabb.
Sarah:Constable Crabb? Does he live with SpongeBob and have crabby patties? It is hard to say constable crab Okay. Who's kinda crabby too.
Mark:Starting again. Constable crab.
Sarah:As soon as Troy gets promoted, everybody's nasty, Dan. Including sergeant Gil. Yeah. And constable crab.
Mark:And sergeant Spongebob Squarepants. And
Sarah:Patrick. They're nasty
Mark:to Well, my Midsomer.
Sarah:But constable Crabb does have one of my favorite lines in this episode. He says, there's a surprising quantity of dead people in there.
Mark:That's that's a great line. That should be the subtitle of every Midsomer.
Sarah:But in fact, the quantity is surprising because it goes from three to four to seven to eight.
Mark:Yes. All those things. Really, there's nine because there's eight original in the cave in and then the ninth body.
Sarah:Probably 10 because, you know, Joyce probably killed somebody while she was in there.
Mark:I
Sarah:mean, she's trapped. She's got nothing else to do.
Mark:The darkness was the worst. I couldn't see what I was killing. I just killed everybody. So Crabb flags Troy down, and Troy feels gutted. Yeah.
Mark:That he doesn't know that his governor's wife has been in this accident.
Sarah:Yeah. Because he wants to be there. One of the skeletons is clearly a modern skeleton because it's got dental work. So though most of them died in the original collapse
Mark:Yes. The NHS feelings. Again, for our American listeners
Sarah:That's National Health
Mark:Health Service. When you have health care that the government takes care of.
Sarah:That your taxes pay for.
Mark:Yes. Yeah. And everybody's treated well.
Sarah:Okay, Bernie. Sorry. You're so Canadian sometimes. Of all of the canals that Webster could have chosen, the tunnels he could have chosen to bring back to life, to fix up, make his name, why did he pick one that had already collapsed twice?
Mark:I I don't know.
Sarah:It's not like it's on his land.
Mark:Yeah. It's weird.
Sarah:It just doesn't make any sense to me. And I think that is is irritating to his wife, Lillian too, who clearly hates his guts.
Mark:It it is a trope of the horrible marriage here.
Sarah:Yeah. Lillian, the bitchy wife, she's even coming out of the indoor swimming pool. We've seen that before. Yep. Right?
Mark:Drinking and listening.
Sarah:Isn't it a little early to drink? Yeah. What does that lady say in the author's episode? It's noon somewhere.
Mark:It's noon somewhere. Yeah.
Sarah:Tom's talking to Webster and I wonder, I think he probably would have known about, he knew about the whole project already, right? Because Joyce is volunteering and Collie's volunteering. So I would think he might've even met him before. I almost feel bad for Webster. He's trying to do something.
Sarah:It's kind of quixotic what he's trying to do, but he's trying to do it.
Mark:He is, but he comes across as a a jerk to Tom.
Sarah:Yeah. He's kind of lords it over him, I guess. Yeah. I agree with that.
Mark:I wanna talk about something. Okay. The thing I wanna talk about
Sarah:Is a Midsomer episode?
Mark:Where the hell is old Tom's camp?
Sarah:I understand why you wanna know that. Explain.
Mark:At one point, Fitzgibbon says it's an hour walk from here. Mhmm. And yet everybody, including Troy, the dogs, the yobs, the yobs and the dogs, and the fox, all get there super fast.
Sarah:Okay. So back up. Couple things. One, we know it's quite a distance because when Troy is trying to drive through Fitzgibbon's land to get to the camp, Fitzgibbon says, you can't get there from here. My roads are all overgrown.
Sarah:You're gonna and and Troy says, last time I was out there, it was a forty five minute walk. Yep. But then later, when it's a crime scene, there's just cars pulling up to it. Yeah. Instantly.
Sarah:That's inconsistent.
Mark:There there is a problem as to where Tom's camp is. Also, Tom's camp is not like okay. I understand Tom wants to live on the land and wants to be outside.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:Based on his life, I understand. He he wouldn't have built a structure by now?
Sarah:That's the point. He doesn't want a structure.
Mark:He could have built a lean to.
Sarah:He could sleep in one of Fitzgibbon's sheds. He doesn't want to. Yeah. He wants to be outside.
Mark:I think he would have built a lean to at least.
Sarah:I don't think so. Think he probably moves around based on the season.
Mark:He doesn't need a hovel like in the other episode, but
Sarah:You wouldn't wanna sleep where he sleeps in the wintertime. You'd wanna be more into the woods to get a break from the wind. So I'm sure he moves it around.
Mark:Okay. We're gonna just be very clear here. I would never want to sleep where he sleeps. Okay? I have slept out of doors.
Sarah:Don't wanna cuddle up with David Bradley?
Mark:No. Old Tom? I like walls. Okay. Do I like walls?
Mark:I'd go sleep in the canal cave in.
Sarah:I like I like comfy beds, so I'm not interested either. Poor Troy though, trying to find him, you know, like it's as if they assume that, old Tom moves around all the time. Like his camp moves around every night and it doesn't.
Mark:No, the camp stays at the same
Sarah:That's where you find old Tom. He will eventually come back there.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:So, you know, Troy kind of waits out there for a little while and leaves a note or whatever, but, know, he's gonna come back.
Mark:The other thing that bothers me about this episode is the Green Man pub has a sign outside that says the Green Man. If you don't know if Green Man's a folk lore hero of England. They also have the same sign inside.
Sarah:Yeah. I'm right inside the door in case you don't know where you are when you're inside.
Mark:Don't know where you are.
Sarah:You know, sometimes you get drinking and you get lost.
Mark:Where am I again?
Sarah:Inside the pub.
Mark:Oh, I'm in the green mud. Charlie Perkett picks, Troy as a copper right away.
Sarah:Because he's a an old retired cop.
Mark:He knows everything about what's going on already. You should go ask Lord Fitzgibbon. Now I have
Sarah:to tell you something about Charlie Burkett.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:He's played by Fred Pearson. There's not a lot in Fred Pearson's acting history that's notable.
Mark:He's not a great
Sarah:He's been in casualty. He's been in the bill. He's been in blah blah blah.
Mark:He's a fine actor.
Sarah:He's not
Mark:he doesn't stand out.
Sarah:But he has one role
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:That will enshrine him for at least you and me.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:He was in an episode of Misfits.
Mark:Okay. Oh, yes. Okay.
Sarah:Let's just say, miss Misfits is not for everybody.
Mark:No. But for the people who enjoy it, sweet Jesus
Sarah:is the fisherman. Remotely tolerate the first few episodes Yep. And get past them It is so worth it.
Mark:It may be the best superpower superhero show of all time.
Sarah:Yes. That's that's good. That's that's teasing him. They'll watch it now. It is.
Sarah:You should watch it. Anyway, but he's in one of our favorite episodes. He's the old Jewish guy who gets time travel powers and goes back to kill Hitler.
Mark:Oh, that's And
Sarah:loses his cell phone.
Mark:He loses his cell phone.
Sarah:So the Germans win the war and change the future.
Mark:This show is bonkers. Okay.
Sarah:Fucking Hitler.
Mark:This show is bonkers. But that is one of the best episodes mostly because it may be like, this is the most rude, vulgar superhero show you've ever been seen. Smart. So smart and so emotional. Mhmm.
Mark:Like, you weep openly while you're laughing several times.
Sarah:But he he plays the key character in that episode that is so good.
Mark:Yeah. That's such a good show. We should watch that show again.
Sarah:But I'm start at the beginning people. Yep. Because it won't make any sense to you, but it's so worth it.
Mark:And you don't even like cheese.
Sarah:That's our Valentine's Day gift to you, Mids. If you haven't seen it, go watch it right now.
Mark:Absolutely.
Sarah:We'll wait for you. Webster has a model of the canal on his little table.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:He's so proud of it.
Mark:Yeah. There's a couple of weird shots where like Tom is looking through things. Yeah. And that's how the shots begin. Well, in
Sarah:the in the model, the canal is the tunnel is completely clear. There are no dead people in it. There's just bright sparkly blue water. Blue water. So I fell down this rabbit hole looking at canals
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:In The UK.
Mark:Now I have to tell you, dear listener, we have a dream, and our dream is to go on a vacation in England and go on a canal boat for a few days.
Sarah:Yeah. Right?
Mark:And it's beautiful. We've watched canal shows and canal boat shows. We'd like to do it. And hell, I'd record a podcast though while we're on the boat. Right?
Mark:So we're like immediately, oh, it's a canal. There's a bunch of boats in it.
Sarah:Yeah. But so Webster mentions this Sir Jonathan Haslett, who he claims designed this canal and this tunnel and that's why he wants to restore it because it's this great feat of engineering. As near as I can tell, Sir Jonathan Haslett is not a real person.
Mark:Nope, I looked him up. He's not real.
Sarah:But I got to looking around at abandoned canal tunnels in The UK to see whether this kind of project is something that people actually undertake.
Mark:Like sometimes they have episodes that are ripped from the headlines.
Sarah:Exactly. Yeah. I couldn't find a lot of examples of tunnels being restored in that way. Most of the ones that are useful have been maintained instead.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:But I did find some awesome stories of canal tunnels in their heyday.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:That were just epic.
Mark:So the heyday of the canal system in England, especially, happens in the late seven the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century.
Sarah:Prior to trains.
Mark:Prior to trains and telegraph.
Sarah:Right. And I found one example of a tunnel that was like seven miles long and had a wharf in the middle of it so boats could turn around and get past each other.
Mark:Had a bar in the middle of it. Yeah, really.
Sarah:It would have been very dark.
Mark:Welcome to the green mud.
Sarah:Yeah, see there you need a sign that tells you where you are because it's so black. The more I looked around, what I actually found was a lot of people talking about exploration, or I guess it's not really urban, suburban country, rural exploration in these abandoned canals, tunnels. And then a bunch of information about how they were built and all this stuff. And I'm ever so slightly claustrophobic, right? I just don't like tight spaces that I can't get out of.
Mark:She's like Tom.
Sarah:Yes. I'm like, old Tom, I gotta be outside. Don't fence me in. And I found out, and I knew quite a bit about canal boats anyway, but I found out that in the early days when they primarily used the canal boats to move coal from the mines, tunnels were very small because they were built efficiently and cheaply, right? Just to get stuff from one place to another.
Sarah:And so they used to be so tight that they wouldn't build a towpath inside the tunnel. So you would have a horse that walked along the canal and that actually, he actually pulled the boat. But when they would get to a tunnel, the horse would have to go up and over the hill. So one guy would take the horse up over the hill and the other guy would have to take the boat through the tunnel. And these tunnels were so tight that they could lay on their back on top of the coal and use their feet to walk along the top of the canal to propel the boat.
Sarah:They called it legging. And just the thought of doing that makes me want to hyperventilate. I can't believe people did that.
Mark:The darkness was the worst part.
Sarah:For miles.
Mark:For miles.
Sarah:They did it. Yep. And no lamp because, coal. So
Mark:you can generally walk a mile in about fifteen minutes if you're in any sort of shape.
Sarah:So they would have been doing this, it probably would have been slower than a walking pace, would So it would have been an hour and a half in a three mile tunnel. Yep. Just on your back, just walking along the top of the tunnel, moving the boat along with your body.
Mark:Smoking your pipe.
Sarah:Not. Nope. Because you die. Yep. Not even enough room on the sides of the boat to jump off.
Sarah:You had to you would have had to jump off in front or behind it. It was that tight.
Mark:See, what you told me about this, and I agree, it's hideously claustrophobic, but if it if it was me, I would have got out and pushed the boat.
Sarah:You would have fallen asleep. Be honest. You would have laid on the top of the boat, started legging, and then started snoring.
Mark:That that's true.
Sarah:And eventually another boat would have pushed you out the other day.
Mark:I would have I would have fallen asleep. You're you're correct. Why didn't they put ropes along the top so you could do hand over hand?
Sarah:I don't know. I mean, they did depress like every fifth brick, so it's almost like a ladder. So your feet would have, you know, toehold to move along, but yeah, just the idea. And I saw an image of a guy doing it, but just like, woah. Sorry, digression.
Sarah:Anyway, canals. Cool. Hey, Webster's son's name is Daniel. He's one of the yobs
Mark:Who are going out to shoot bunnies, which sounds like a euphemism, but they're going out to shoot bunnies.
Sarah:They're going lamping. Yes. Which also sounds like a euphemism and isn't. No. In The US, we call it spotlighting.
Sarah:Yeah. That's what they call it in Canada too. It's illegal here.
Mark:It's super illegal.
Sarah:In The UK, it's kind of ambiguous because the law laws primarily are against lamping using dogs. So you you can't
Mark:What about coal lamping?
Sarah:While you're legging? Yep. Upside down. So, what they're doing isn't illegal, but it's unethical. People who are real hunters don't approve.
Mark:Fitzgibbon doesn't approve too and
Sarah:Old Tom really doesn't approve.
Mark:When when Fitzgibbon's gamekeeper who is that played by again? Fitzgibbon? No. Fitzgibbon's gamekeeper.
Sarah:I don't know.
Mark:Who's mentioned three times in the episode.
Sarah:Oh, he doesn't appear. But never appear. No. No. But he's he's brutal.
Mark:That's like a checkoff rule that you shouldn't do. Right? And Fitzgibbon makes a joke that
Sarah:Every time he kills a teenage boy, we bury him in quicklime. There's no evidence. Yep. I made I made Fitzgibbon from Kentucky there. Ain't no evidence of the quicklime.
Sarah:My gamekeeper takes care
Mark:of Fitzgibbon sounds like? No, he
Sarah:doesn't. He sounds horrible.
Mark:So the ops go ahead and shoot. Tom stops them, takes their gun away because they're cowards, throws it in the in the woods.
Sarah:That's a really tense scene.
Mark:It is super tense. The kid, like, takes the rifle and points like they shoot a warning shot.
Sarah:Yeah. And you don't know what they're gonna do. Yeah. Because it's Midsomer. It it Midsomer murders.
Mark:I'm sorry.
Sarah:So, I mean, I knew he wasn't gonna shoot him when the first time I saw it because it wouldn't have been very mysterious if we saw who shot him.
Mark:But I gotta tell you, they're doing the wrong thing.
Sarah:It's a wrong thing. And Let me tell you about the yobs.
Mark:Well, just before that, in the weirdness that is episode weirdness that we've talked about before, I always get this scene and this tramp mixed up with the tramp from the episode with the hunt in it.
Sarah:Yeah. With the with the hounds.
Mark:Yes. Those two tramps, they should hang out. Well, Tom's not dead and the other tramp is, but they should they would have been best buds.
Sarah:Yeah. But no. Because people who live in seclusion don't hang out with each other.
Mark:That's true.
Sarah:Go away. You can't have a pair of hermits. It doesn't work.
Mark:What do you call a pair of hermits?
Sarah:You don't. So the Yobs, let's talk about who they are. We've already said that one of them is Henry Cavill.
Mark:Yes, the witch Harry.
Sarah:He's 20 years old in this episode. Yes. So he's a little bit older than he's supposed to be, but not too much. Yeah. He got really lucky.
Sarah:He probably didn't think he was lucky at the time, but I'm sure Henry Cavill looks back now and says, shoo, that was close. When Stephenie Meyer wrote the Twilight books
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Edward Cullen in her head was Henry Cavill. Oh. And she wanted him for that part when they made the movies. Okay. But the director liked Robert Pattinson instead.
Sarah:Good. Oh,
Mark:darn. Like, he's so much better than that.
Sarah:Oh, yeah.
Mark:I actually think Henry Cavell will at one point be Bond.
Sarah:He almost was already. Oh, really? They wanted him for what is it? Casino Royale is the first one with
Mark:Daniel Craig.
Sarah:Daniel Craig. Yeah. But they thought he was a little bit too young to be James Bond, so they went with Daniel Craig instead.
Mark:Because he was in Man From Uncle, which is basically James Bond.
Sarah:Yeah. He was really good
Mark:in And does a great job in that.
Sarah:He's the first non American to play Superman.
Mark:Yes. I can see that.
Sarah:And he has an eight pack.
Mark:Well, does.
Sarah:Not a six pack.
Mark:He does.
Sarah:Apparently, very few people can actually achieve an eight pack. Oh. It's like a genetic thing almost.
Mark:Well, when he's in that hot tub in the Witcher, man.
Sarah:Hot tamales.
Mark:Hot tamales.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So that's one yobb. Okay.
Sarah:We got two more yobs. We've got Daniel Webster. Mhmm. This is Tim Webster's son.
Mark:The killer.
Sarah:He's played by Mark Buckner. What's interesting about him, his acting career, his credits just stop in 2005. I'm like, what happened to him? He's not dead. No.
Sarah:He's too young to be dead. He left acting, went back to grad school and he's now the CEO of a company called Investorly.
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:Investorly is an equity crowdfunding platform to help great high growth, good global good businesses from emerging markets find an international network of support and investment from both institutional and consumer investors. So they're crowdfunding for businesses that originate in emerging markets, third world countries.
Mark:Wow. So now
Sarah:That's pretty cool.
Mark:He he has a brain Yeah. And he has a heart. Yeah. I say so. Mister Empire.
Mark:Not in
Sarah:this episode.
Mark:No. But the actor,
Sarah:the person behind it, Mark Buckner, he does. Yeah. And then our third job, is Steven Curtis.
Mark:Who is the worst? Just the worst.
Sarah:He's the worst job? Yep. He's played by Jamie Thomas King. And the thing that's interesting about him is he's been in a Murdoch. Oh.
Sarah:He's in the Canadian patient, which is a 2017 episode.
Mark:Canadian patient. Mhmm.
Sarah:Like the English patient?
Mark:You like the English patient?
Sarah:The Canadian patient.
Mark:I don't know. I have to watch that one. It's another Murdoch
Sarah:I've seen it.
Mark:Well, I know we've seen it.
Sarah:Yeah. So But he doesn't have a whole lot of acting credits. He does a lot of stage stuff, but that was the interesting thing about him. Yes. So there's the yobs.
Sarah:Now you know.
Mark:Excellent. So Troy is also wandering the the forest and he sees an owl, and that owl is beautiful. It is. It's really it's a great actor, and it's really well shot.
Sarah:It makes me think of the owl in Labyrinth. Yeah. David Bowie has an owl.
Mark:Troy just wants to know if Tom's okay.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:He's worried about him. And then he just disappears into the forest like the green man.
Sarah:He's magic. When they drop him off, it's really magic. Like, there's just a deer standing there. Yeah. And then they just poof.
Sarah:Yep. Disappear.
Mark:So let's get this straight. The Yobs then go to the green man Mhmm. And they bother Charlie there.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:But the the killer, the kid who's the killer, what's his name again? Daniel.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:He's not there. I double checked. Mm-mm. Because he's creeping back to the forest to get the
Sarah:gun. Right.
Mark:And then he sends a text message pretending to be his mom doing a booty call.
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:This is problematic.
Sarah:What's problematic about that? It's weird. He lures Simon out there thinking that he's gonna go out and be with Lillian.
Mark:And then
Sarah:And it's Daniel waiting for him instead.
Mark:He leaves a Superman trap on the Yeah.
Sarah:One of Fitzgibbon's. Right? Yeah. I mean, that's kind of what we're led to believe because Fitzgibbon has a whole barn full of traps.
Mark:Yep. Click one. And he gets shot right in the face.
Sarah:Does right in the head.
Mark:He's a little pissed off that they're bonking his mom.
Sarah:Yeah. Daniel's got problems. That is not a justification.
Mark:Okay?
Sarah:It's a justification for being a little upset with your mom, especially if your friends are teasing you about it. That's pretty uncomfortable. You never see that. Get some new friends. Tell your mom to stop it.
Mark:No. We're gonna talk about stories we read as a child.
Sarah:His mom
Mark:In faraway land.
Sarah:Is played by, Sherry Lungi. Yes. She's also in another episode of Midsomer called A Dying Art. Yeah. She plays Alexander Monkford.
Sarah:She's in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Kenneth Branagh's Frankenstein movie. She plays his mom. Because Branagh plays Victor Frankenstein and she plays his mom.
Mark:Oh, she plays his mom?
Sarah:Even though she's only like six or eight years older than him.
Mark:Oh, okay. I only ever saw that once at the theater.
Sarah:But the role that you remember her for is Guinevere in Excalibur in 1981. Yes. The movie that is just covered in Vaseline. Every shot is this blurry, fuzzy It's
Mark:covered in a lot of
Sarah:glittery things.
Mark:Gem, gold, sparkle, blur. Okay. First of all, all the army, all the armor is super shiny.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And then all of the women are super naked.
Sarah:Yeah. And shiny.
Mark:Yeah. Yeah. And Picard has hair. Yeah. Patrick Stewart's in it, and he plays like a swashbuckler almost.
Mark:Yeah. His hair is absolutely worth going to see seeing again. Excalibur is fantastic. I watched it easily 10 times as a kid, and I will
Sarah:Because of the naked ladies? No. The armor. No.
Mark:I like the armor. And I will easily watch it again. Everyone is at eleven.
Sarah:Oh, yeah.
Mark:It is over the top.
Sarah:Way
Mark:over the top, and it is so fantastically bizarre. And you spend the whole movie going, that's this person.
Sarah:Oh, yeah. That's this person. Notice one person after another that you recognize.
Mark:Absolutely.
Sarah:Yeah. So Daniel's luring his friends out into the woods with a promise of sex with his mother so he can kill them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Sarah:I don't care how much your parents fight. That's not an excuse. Yeah. George has got the bones in the super tech morgue. He says that the modern skeleton was killed probably with an axe to the head.
Sarah:Yes. There's only one modern one and we find out later of course that old Tom killed him because that's his dad.
Mark:But where's Tom? Tom's in Research Dungeon.
Sarah:Yes. So is that supposed to be the newspaper archives or the village archives or is that Tom's basement?
Mark:Or the police archive? It's all, I don't know.
Sarah:He spends a lot
Mark:of time
Sarah:down there.
Mark:It's the Research Dungeon where research montages happen.
Sarah:Where he just happens to find the notes from the, like, the commission for the building of a tunnel or something, like Let let me see. And the newspaper It
Mark:is the Canal and Navigation Company Midsomer Canal Society recorded minutes for the following months, June 1799, August 1799, September and October 1799, and in October 1799 it talks about a annual trade fair and that there's an in opening. They've done a really good job on these. They're stitch bound. They're actually, written with a quill pen.
Sarah:Yeah, They're they're old fashioned. Yeah. For sure. I wonder if they're real.
Mark:They could be except for they say Midsomer.
Sarah:Midsomer.
Mark:Yeah. Now another thing they say, so the minutes have that all at the top and then the first item of every meeting is apologies. Do you know what that is?
Sarah:Is that when they start out by saying who's not present?
Mark:Yes. Apologies are from people who are unable to attend the meeting. They're noted at the beginning of the meeting notes and included in the minutes.
Sarah:I wish they included the reason why they weren't there, you know, like Dave Wimple not present because of gout. Yeah. Or his mother is upset again.
Mark:Yep. Nope. None of those are there. So the other thing about the the research dungeon is nothing is cataloged or in order. It's just a bunch of old books.
Sarah:Big Big big bound records.
Mark:Find anything. I don't know.
Sarah:I mean, they only have as many records as can fit in those two little alcoves in the wall. Yeah. It's not very big. So once the the living yobs find out that one of the yobs is dead, the witcher
Mark:They're is they're crying little baby yobs. They're
Sarah:angry, and they want Tom blood.
Mark:They want
Sarah:Old Tom blood.
Mark:Tom blood.
Sarah:See, the listeners can't see you bug eyed paws.
Mark:Tom. So
Sarah:they go trash his camp, and they shoot his fox. They're they're Sad teenagers. Assholes. They're upset.
Mark:They're I don't care. They killed the fox.
Sarah:Their friend has been shot in
Mark:the head. Now never mind that the fox probably has rabies and would eat them, like would bite them in a second and probably make them really sick.
Sarah:And never mind that Daniel is one of those angry sad yobs and knows full well that he's the one who killed Simon. Why is he even pretending to be angry at
Mark:all He's the angriest because he pretends to be angry.
Sarah:Well, Tom has something to say. A death for a death.
Mark:Death for a death.
Sarah:They burned the camp. Poor Tom, the purposely home homeless guy is now really homeless because even his dented teapot is burned. Yep. Webster and Lillian argue blah blah blah.
Mark:And Troy has to arrest Tom because he was one of the last people seen with the gun.
Sarah:Well, and he says he doesn't remember what he did with it. Yeah. Like, they saw him throw it into into the woods, but he says he doesn't remember. How can you not arrest him?
Mark:And Daniel Casey does a great job of acting here where it's like
Sarah:He's torn. Yeah. He doesn't want to hurt Tom, old Tom, and he knows that he probably isn't responsible, but how can he not bring him in? And since old Tom keeps hiding, he has to arrest him. He can't just ask him to come in to be questioned.
Mark:And plus, yobb dad really is against him.
Sarah:Oh my gosh. That's one angry jerk yobb dad.
Mark:I call him yobb dad with dad backwards, but dad backwards is dad. So he's yobb dad. So just pretend I'm saying dad backwards.
Sarah:That's Steven Curtis's dad. Yeah. And, yeah, he's something else. He's got big hairy nostrils.
Mark:He is just the worst, and his wife wants to, like, force feed the orange juice constantly.
Sarah:Yeah. She's she looks like she's been crying for a week.
Mark:Well, yeah, because I bet you the witcher's been witching her too.
Sarah:Well, and, when she looks like she's been crying for a while, that's after their son is killed. Yeah. So of course she's upset. Yeah. And the dad's like, well, what is there to do?
Sarah:You don't even have to talk to anybody, just arrest that one guy. Obviously he did it. Like you don't need any evidence or any investigation or whatever. It's just that guy. Like, no, wait.
Sarah:Yeah. Because their friend did it. Yeah. Hold on. So we've got these two kind of parallel cases, right?
Sarah:So Troy, who's now Inspector Troy,
Mark:Inspector Troy.
Sarah:Is responsible for deaths in the modern age while Tom is investing the historical death of Eric Edwards in '19 Which '60
Mark:is just the longest time ago ever.
Sarah:I wasn't born yet. You weren't either.
Mark:Pretty close.
Sarah:You were a twinkle in your mom's eye.
Mark:He's telling you I'm a sixties baby.
Sarah:But you weren't born yet.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And Burkett is the one who knows all about it, right? Because he was like a a constable in the village at the time. And so he, he knows all about the Edwards case. They get a letter from Australia, they get to pretend that he's alive and he's just gone away, but you know, he hasn't. And then Webster screams at Cully.
Mark:Yeah. Which I thought happened way earlier in the episode.
Sarah:Well, he's brisk with her all the time. He's never satisfied with what she's doing. And she comes out and says to Daniel, I think your dad just fired me from a job I volunteered for. Yes. And it's like, well if you went and got a real job, Collie, that wouldn't happen but okay.
Mark:Poor Collie.
Sarah:So he gives her a ride into town. So now instead of Joyce hanging out with murderers, it's Cully hanging out with murderers. Yes. Troy's so upset about trying to find old Tom that he hits Tom's, Tom Barnaby's side mirror because he's a bad driver, hardy har har, that old joke. Yep.
Sarah:And Burkett gets a mysterious phone call. Who calls him?
Mark:It's Fitzgibbon who calls him.
Sarah:Yeah. Because they know about old Tom.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Right? They know old Tom killed his dad and is kind of broken.
Mark:So he's Eric Edwards' son. Mhmm.
Sarah:And that's when Steve gets the text and goes out to have rumpy pumping with Lillian, but actually gets rumpy pump actioned in the head by Daniel.
Mark:Yes. Rumpy pump action.
Sarah:I thought that was funny. Yeah. So now Steve's dead. So we got two yobs down.
Mark:Two yobs down. Yep. Well, the other ob's the killer. So really, we're all at yobs down.
Sarah:When they send the dogs after old Tom, it's sad. It is. But he won't come in. Dude, if you'll just come in and talk, this is not going to happen to you. And David Bradley does such a good job of being like proud and kind of crotchety and independent, but he also does a good job of being vulnerable and old.
Sarah:Yeah. And they put just enough blood on him to make him look, you know, not like mortally injured, but kind of beat up and you feel, you just feel bad for him.
Mark:You do.
Sarah:Even if he does have a big padded sleeve that the dog is grabbing. Yeah. It's just like, Ugh. But then they put him in the most dramatic interview room we've ever seen in the Midsomer. It's got like one light, one bare light bulb.
Sarah:The edges of the room are in darkness. And when Troy is talking to, oh, that jerky cop, Oh, Sergeant Gill, who appears in another episode by the way.
Mark:Oh, does? Sergeant Gill?
Sarah:Sergeant Gill who razzes Inspector Troy. They're in there together and it's just so, I don't know why it's so dramatic, but they, they light it funny. Maybe to make it feel even more claustrophobic so that we understand why Tom is kind of losing it.
Mark:Maybe.
Sarah:So Tom then finds a picture of Eric Edwards
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And shows it
Mark:Who looks like somebody who should be in fog
Sarah:hat. But he does have a little bit of a resemblance to old Tom. The first time I saw it, I thought, I wonder if that's actually David Bradley from the sixties.
Mark:Or David Bradley's dad.
Sarah:No. It wouldn't it wouldn't be old enough.
Mark:No. It wouldn't. So
Sarah:No. So we know that old Tom says he went away, he didn't come back, he couldn't Yeah. Because he was dead. And now Barnaby has to confront Fitzgibbon and Burkett and say, okay, you two know what happened.
Mark:And they they basically come clean, and it's great because Tom is stuck Mhmm. Because he knows who killed Eric Edwards now, but he understands ethically that Tom shouldn't go to jail.
Sarah:And since he's working the case alone, he doesn't have to.
Mark:No. He totally lies to Troy.
Sarah:He's not setting a bad example for Troy. Nope. Showing Troy that you shouldn't always follow the law. Cause he even tells Fitzgibbon, you know, it's a slippery slope and you know it. Yeah.
Sarah:But he makes that decision on his own and he doesn't have to worry about explaining that to anybody. Nope. It's an old guy's decision. Yep. I think you're overestimating the peace you've given Tom down the years.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Like you're not you haven't helped him as much as you think you have. So does does Daniel have a collection of phones now? He does. Because he's got Simon's phone, and then he's got Steve's phone, and he's got the unregistered phone that he uses to make the text messages, and he's got his own phone.
Mark:There's a telephony problem here. Okay? The telephony problem is that the Yobs have been calling Lillian for months and talking to her and texting with her and then suddenly they get a call a text from another number which okay Lillian clearly doesn't care about this these affairs being noticed.
Sarah:Right, so you think when they meet her in the woods they'd say oh I wasn't sure it was you since it came from that other number and she'd go what? Or something like that?
Mark:Yeah, Right?
Sarah:Well, I guess that doesn't happen because
Mark:They get shot.
Sarah:They get shot. They never actually see her in those cases.
Mark:But they also like are like just like, oh, well, I guess you got a new phone. I guess I'll just run out into the forest and have rumpy pumpy.
Sarah:Okay. They are supposed to be, like, 18 year old boys.
Mark:They are.
Sarah:So They are. They'll do really stupid things for sex.
Mark:But there's a problem there that I didn't like.
Sarah:I have no problem with it because I think they would totally do it. I think if she was sending smoke signals or Morse code, they'd probably still come.
Mark:So they find out that Lillian's been calling them. So they go to the Webster house to talk to Lillian.
Sarah:And she's dead.
Mark:And you have the saddest scene of sad scenes. Yeah. Because we don't like Webster, but his wife didn't deserve to die. And it's implied in that scene that she shoots herself.
Sarah:Right. Because that's how Daniel makes it look.
Mark:Yeah. So that's
Sarah:And if you're, you know, her husband and you guys are constantly bickering, then you would feel bad that she killed herself. Yeah. Like, it's my fault, you know, but not as bad as you'll feel when you realize that your son actually did it.
Mark:Because she was bonking his friends.
Sarah:And killed his friends. Like, wow, that's so bad. And Cully goes to talk to Daniel because she feels sorry for him. Yep. But then he confesses to all the murders and we've got the, you know, the classic Midsomer scene where Tom realizes that his wife or his daughter are actually with the killer.
Mark:But it's Troy that figures it out.
Sarah:Yeah, he does.
Mark:But of course, I don't care.
Sarah:Because he's an inspector now.
Mark:I don't care what's happening in that scene because I'm obsessed
Sarah:with three d pipes. The screensaver on the computer?
Mark:The screensaver from Windows 95 is on one of the computers and I'm like, nostalgia zone of three d pipes.
Sarah:Is it from Windows 95?
Mark:I think it's Windows 95.
Sarah:Because that would be pretty old because isn't that what year is this film?
Mark:It's 2003.
Sarah:That's pretty sad if they're still using Windows 95.
Mark:I I think I I I was trying to look as to what version of Windows it was.
Sarah:Maybe they had it for a little while longer than that.
Mark:Oh, they did have it in Vista too. That explains it. We've tried to scrub from our brains.
Sarah:That's true. It was in Windows 98,
Mark:Windows 95, and Vista.
Sarah:This says like New Coke Yes. Or Crystal Pepsi. It just you just it's just bad. Just forget about it.
Mark:We we missed one tiny little scene. We just went over it really quickly. The scene where Troy runs into Tom's car and then bitches. Yeah.
Sarah:Like, wait a minute. You hit me.
Mark:It's just a wild goose chase.
Sarah:And then we get the little nice up the little nice dinner scene at the table. This is Troy's last episode, and there's a cake.
Mark:Yes. It has Middlesboro FC on
Sarah:it. Mhmm.
Mark:Because that's where Tom is go Troy is going.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:Now Middlesboro is a real place.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:Middlesboro FC is a real football team. Mhmm. They were established in the year that it says on the cake. Mhmm. And Troy and they totally make fun of him for being going up north again.
Sarah:To Yorkshire. Yes. That's where Middlesbrough is. Yeah. We know that Midsomer is near Oxfordshire.
Sarah:Yeah. Right? Wherever it is, it's somewhere close to there. So it's a three hour drive, three and a half hour drive.
Mark:Oh my gosh. We'll have to pack two lunches.
Sarah:Or a seven hour train ride.
Mark:Oh my god. What how does it take seven hours to get there?
Sarah:You actually have to go south before you can go north to get there via the trains.
Mark:Oh, okay. That's trains are supposed to be faster than cars.
Sarah:I know. I looked into Yorkshire because they say all this stuff about, oh, was that your southern slur accent coming out or whatever? Like, I was like, how different can they sound in Yorkshire?
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And I knew that I had heard a Yorkshire accent before, but I get it mixed up with like the Wilkshire, the Southwest accent. Yes. It's not that they sound alike, but I just forget which is which. Yeah. Yorkshire accents sound much more Scottish.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And so I I did a little digging around into Yorkshire slang.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Okay. I wanna say this sentence, but I'm embarrassed because I think I know I'm gonna say it wrong.
Mark:Okay. If you're from Yorkshire, please excuse us.
Sarah:I'm sorry. I ate a minky buddy, so I'm off to bark to chuck my guts up.
Mark:Okay. So that's you ate something bad.
Sarah:A bad sandwich.
Mark:Bad sandwich. So you're off to the bathroom to throw up.
Sarah:Mhmm. Me gaffer twerk give me a dollop of something keddy. Now I'm jiggered.
Mark:Somebody made you sick and now you're in bed.
Sarah:My boss, gaffer. Yeah. Twerk at work. Yeah. Give me a dollop of something keddy.
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:Rancid. Now I'm jiggered, so I'm tired out because it was bad. I'm not chuffed. Hey, buy gum. Hey, buy gum.
Sarah:You have to drop the h's and I just I have trouble doing it. I'll belt you if you don't stop beefing.
Mark:Meanwhile, Tom, old Tom is there with the owl and the pups.
Sarah:He's chuffed.
Mark:He's he's chuffed.
Sarah:But the baby foxes make a weird sound.
Mark:They do.
Sarah:Who's the best body? Simon, Steve, Jillian, or the fox?
Mark:I'm gonna say Jillian.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. I'm gonna go Simon.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Because he's got his leg in a bear trap and Jillian's challenge is she has to be dead while being cuddled. Yeah. And that's hard.
Mark:Yeah. That's true.
Sarah:But it also kind of can hide some sins there. Yeah. If you're breathing or something.
Mark:I guess. What happens after the credits?
Sarah:Daniel goes to jail.
Mark:Jail y jail, like forever jail.
Sarah:Yeah. I'd say old Tom is quite happy. I'd say Fitzgibbon and and, Burkett are fine. Joyce is never gonna go in a tunnel again. No.
Sarah:And the courtesies, well, she's just gonna cry some more and he's gonna be a jerk.
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:And, Troy's gonna go off to, Yorkshire.
Mark:Well, I think Fitzgibbon and, Charlie Burkett are gonna relax a bit Mhmm. Because they've been keeping this secret for a long time.
Sarah:Yeah, I agree.
Mark:And the landlady is gonna go on having no name.
Sarah:True. Yeah. So it's a it's not a bad episode. It's a fun episode. It's an emotional episode.
Mark:It's the the moment with Troy and Tom at the end is is sad.
Sarah:Well, and the moment with them at the beginning is touching. Yeah. And the moment when Joyce is trapped is touching.
Mark:And the moment where he drives into his car, they're touching.
Sarah:And and what made one of our kids cry watching it is that the kid got the impression that old Tom laid down by the fire at the end and died. Yeah. I was like, no. No. No.
Sarah:No. No. No. No. He's fine.
Mark:He's happy.
Sarah:He's happy. He's content. It's all good now. That's why there are babies.
Mark:I would I'd I'd like Tom to get some help.
Sarah:Yeah. You think you think the social workers should come and visit old Tom?
Mark:Well, like, just like, Fitzgibbon should pay for a therapist who comes out into the forest and sits down and talks to Tom.
Sarah:I think old Tom is
Mark:fine. Okay.
Sarah:If he was half his age, yes. But he's old enough now. He's got he's content.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:I hope he gets something good to eat. He must be a vegetarian.
Mark:It's gotta be.
Sarah:No. He says you can kill if you eat it.
Mark:Wonder if he eats the fox.
Sarah:Anyway. Now they stuff it and use it earlier in the episode.
Mark:Exactly.
Sarah:So Troy is gone.
Mark:It's the last Troy episode. So Troy, who I thought was in a million episodes, is only in 29 episodes.
Sarah:So Daniel Casey did an interview where he talked about his favorite moment. Oh, okay. Specifically, the murder that he liked best.
Mark:What is the murder that he likes the best?
Sarah:The he says, my favorite murder was death by drinks cabinet. That was hilarious. He opened the cupboard and the drinks cabinet collapsed on him. That's genius. Yep.
Sarah:And that was in an interview in Saga. Yeah. So he liked that moment. And in another interview in, I forgot that note. I think it's in the Guardian.
Sarah:They interviewed him and and he said he just liked all the moments where he and Barnaby had banter between them. Those were his favorite times because he he and John Nettles were very close and they got along very well.
Mark:And he just he didn't there's nothing wrong with the show. He didn't have a problem with it. He just wanted to move on.
Sarah:He just wanted to do different things and he has gone on to
Mark:do He different wanted to do I think he wanted probably more leading parts and he he moved on.
Sarah:There's only so much you can do with a sergeant unless they're growing and evolving. He would be kind of stunted. Yeah. So it just made sense. Then we, you know, we
Mark:get See, I think the that's the problem they've run into with Murdoch, not to go off on a tangent. Yeah. Is no one progresses.
Sarah:Yeah, nobody gets promoted. Yeah. We got lots of favorite try moments.
Mark:Absolutely. The social media has been out of this world with this, absolutely. One of the big moments that keeps coming up and again is something we haven't talked about because this is Troy's last episode in which he is in the show regularly.
Sarah:Right. Because he comes back for Cully's wedding.
Mark:He comes back for Cully's wedding when Cully marries not Nico.
Sarah:Right. Simon.
Mark:Yes. Lots of people like, him and the lady in the Bell Ringer episode, the cougar.
Sarah:Oh, that that is a funny situation for him because she really puts him
Mark:Yes. Rosalyn par.
Sarah:Like, he does not know how to deal with that, and I think that's funny.
Mark:Where he plays the spoons is big Yeah. And takes Cully to the adventure course, snogs her and finds a dead body.
Sarah:Yes. They get the one kiss. I know a lot of people wanted those two to get together but I don't think that would have worked long term for the show.
Mark:No, I don't think so either. But it was nice and cute. So we had one person who a regular contributor to things that we talk about, who is like, wait a minute, you guys are recording on Valentine's Day? That's so cute. My
Sarah:favorite moment for Troy is when he's in the bookshop with the the two gay guys. What episode is that?
Mark:That is Not Written in Blood.
Sarah:The one with Amadeus.
Mark:Yeah, one with Amadeus. Third or fourth episode.
Sarah:Because again, when he's uncomfortable, he's awesome. So anybody who puts him in a weird situation that he doesn't know how to deal with, he calls them arse bandits later. Disguise. Thank you, death in disguise. I can never remember the titles of the episodes.
Sarah:I like that scene because he's like, you know, he sold me a diary for the same year or whatever because he's trying to buy his mom a gift. Yep. And he winds up buying her a car vacuum and Tom says she doesn't have a car and he goes, well she can use it for cushions or something. Like they just so discombobulated him, he didn't know what to do with himself. Yes.
Sarah:You know, and I like that.
Mark:There's two parts in Electric Vendetta I really like with Troy, where first of all he sees the combine harvester and thinks
Sarah:it's a UFO. Then there's Bin Man!
Mark:Bin Man!
Sarah:Bin Man! Bin Man!
Mark:Yes, if you haven't listened to our episode for, the electric van, We have a little, song Yeah. That we
Sarah:A Vidman song. A big man song. I can't believe it hasn't rocketed to the top of the charts. Yes. Come on.
Mark:Come on. It's awesome. Folks.
Sarah:So Daniel Casey is done. Yes. Oh, Troy. But you know what? He's moving on to better things.
Mark:He is indeed. And now we have Scott's first episode, which is Bad Tidings. Before we get to that, remember you can find us all the time on Twitter and Instagram and email. We're at Midsommar Maniacs. We also post on Facebook groups, Midsomer for Midsomer Acorn and the subreddit and anywhere else where we find some maniacs.
Sarah:I found some really awesome Midsomer Tumblr's this week. I may have to post some links.
Mark:There's some really good Midsomer Tumblrs. If if you haven't explored that, you should go explore that. Yeah. So Bad Tidings is the episode that starts with the Spanish night out, the fancy dress night.
Sarah:It's never a good thing to participate in any kind of village activity. You are gonna get killed.
Mark:Yep. And, Oof, Scott's first episode is a tough one.
Sarah:Yes. It is.
Mark:He makes a couple of, jokes about how everybody's dying.
Sarah:Yeah. The jokes that every viewer makes. Yep. He makes.
Mark:So thank you all for, contributing to the your Troy's favorite moments. We all miss Troy. We all love him. I'm I'm a Jones man myself, but, Troy is a close second to Jones.
Sarah:You never forget your first sergeant.
Mark:Yes. You never forget your first sergeant.
Sarah:Alright. So until next time, Maniacs.
Mark:Bye, Maniacs.
Sarah:Bye, Maniacs. No. I was just like, I don't know what to say about that.
Mark:I'll have you, you cow.
Sarah:I like how you deliver that. I'll have you, you cow.
Mark:You, you cow.
Sarah:You, you cow.
Mark:You, you cow. Wow.
Sarah:Hey. It's Midsomer Maniacs.
Mark:Hey, Maniacs.
Sarah:Hey, Maniacs. I'm Sarah. And I'm Mark. And this is Midsomer Maniacs.
Mark:Midsomer Maniacs is a podcast dedicated to the ITV series, Midsomer Murders. Each week, we dig into an episode of the show, including the murders, the mayhem, and the loonies, and everything else we love.
Sarah:Great Scott.
Mark:Just a warning off the top of the show, if you don't let your kids watch the show, the podcast Yeah. Is probably too much for them. But if they watch the show, I hope they enjoy the podcast.
Sarah:Great Scott. Great Scott. I'm just gonna keep saying.
Mark:It should be John Hopkins. It's interesting. So that both lead actors now are named John. I wonder how they did that on the set. John.
Mark:John. John.
Sarah:It makes it easier for my notes because I used to write TNT for Tom and Troy, and then I would get confused. And now it's TNS, so it's easier.
Mark:Someday it'll be TNA. It's a
Sarah:whole different show. Because, and we say, great Scott, because today we're talking about Bad Tidings, which is season seven episode two, otherwise known as the debut of Scott. Dan Scott. Dan. The big city.
Sarah:He's from the smoke.
Mark:Yeah. He is. He's from the Met.
Sarah:Yeah. The rough streets of London.
Mark:So we just found out today, to our sadness that John Shrapnel has passed. He played Max Jennings in Written in Blood.
Sarah:Had one of the most awesome last names ever.
Mark:And we told that great story about his family and how they kind of made a whole kind of romanticized myth about their name.
Sarah:Yeah. Shrapnel. Sad news.
Mark:Sad news, but, great actor.
Sarah:It's an awesome episode. Go rewatch it.
Mark:He was in, how to get ahead in advertising.
Sarah:Oh, yeah.
Mark:I didn't know that. So This episode, Great Scott, was filmed October, November, 2002 and broadcast the January 4 two thousand four to nine point nine six million viewers. Directed by Peter Smith and written by Peter j Hammond.
Sarah:This episode bothers me more than any other Midsomer Murder episode. It stuck with me. It made me feel yucky for hours after I saw it the first time.
Mark:There is only one episode I find yuckier than this episode.
Sarah:Which one?
Mark:The piano episode.
Sarah:Oh, no. This one's yuckier to me. And I remember after I saw it the first time, thought, wait a minute, Midsomer Murders, it's never like overly bloody or, and you know, they don't cover like super heavy duty kind of crimes. And what bothers me about this episode isn't even a crime. Yeah.
Sarah:It's relationships.
Mark:One scene that really bothers me.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. And we'll get there. And and I'm sure we're not the only ones who felt that way.
Mark:Takes place in Midsomer Mallow, and the pub that we see once is called the star.
Sarah:It's not nearly as important as the village hall.
Mark:No. The village
Sarah:hall Because that's where they have a Spanish night.
Mark:Spanish night. And that is how we cold open on a band pretending to play Spanish music.
Sarah:Oh my gosh. The guy with the trumpet isn't even trying to pretend.
Mark:I don't think he actually held a trumpet before this. Now the guy playing guitar can actually bar bar chords. So he plays guitar.
Sarah:Somewhat, but he's not.
Mark:The drummer, I would say, knows how to hold the sticks. So I'm assuming he's an actual drummer. Keyboard player, you see him in, like, two shots. At first, I was like, there's nobody else. Oh, there's a keyboard player.
Sarah:I don't know if there's any keyboard in the music.
Mark:I don't think so. There's some maracas.
Sarah:You don't see anybody playing maracas?
Mark:Nobody's playing Maracas. I was surprised there were no castanets because this is a little a little close to the nose of racism here.
Sarah:It's cultural appropriation to the max. Yeah. And it's an event to the max. I'm really impressed that in a place like Midsomer, they could scrape together that many Spanish flamenco outfits.
Mark:Yeah. It's in okay. The band is not so on point. The food, not so on. There's some paella
Sarah:Yellow rice.
Mark:And some horrible value lager that we'll get to. Right? There's a cheese plate, some wine, and somebody has ketchup there. I'm like, what you putting ketchup on? And some Kings Mill bread.
Mark:Okay. So the food is okay. But the
Sarah:food is what you would expect.
Mark:The outfits are on point.
Sarah:Yeah. Mary's got the widow's weeds like the big, black lace mantle on the top of her head and everything.
Mark:Instead of running a doll shop in this town that how does that doll shop stay afloat? There should be a Spanish outfit shop.
Sarah:I'm thinking here in Bloomington where I have to say we have a major theater department, we have two amateur theaters and half a dozen or a dozen fraternities and sororities that regularly have some kind of theme party. Two costume shops. And so we have two full time open all year costume shops. I bet you you could scrape together maybe three outfits.
Mark:There's 10 here at least. Maybe. It's crazy.
Sarah:Yeah. In the in the scene, though there's way more than 10. There's 10 matadors.
Mark:Matadors. Because
Sarah:all of Spain is just matadors and flamenco dancers. That's it. That's all they've got.
Mark:Well, and taco fonts. We'll get to that.
Sarah:So while we're talking about those outfits though, let me tell you a little bit about those outfits because I kind of always wanted to know why Matadors wore those hats.
Mark:You mean the Mickey Mouse ears?
Sarah:Yeah. It's like it's almost like a tricorn, but it's a bicorn.
Mark:Mickey Mouse ears?
Sarah:But it looks a bit more like ears. Yeah. So a Matador's suit, I'm gonna try to pronounce this.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:It's traje de lusis. Oh. It means suit of lights. Oh. And it refers to the gold thread and the sequins that are on them.
Sarah:But the hat is called a Montero hat. Montero? Montero. Oh. They're from the Iberian Peninsula.
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:Their traditional hat from the Iberian Peninsula.
Mark:Okay. That's at least Spanish as opposed to some other things.
Sarah:And, they call them bulbs. Bulbs. Not Mickey ears. Okay. The bulbs on the side are meant to represent horns.
Mark:That makes sense.
Sarah:They're stylized horns.
Mark:That makes sense.
Sarah:And the hats are typically made out of Astrakhan fur. Do you know what Astrakhan is?
Mark:No. I don't know what Astrakhan. It sounds like a Japanese super villain.
Sarah:It's this it's a super short, tightly curled black, very silky soft fur because it's taken from fetal lambs. Oh. Or really newborn lambs, like eyes aren't even open yet. Wow. So if you're a newborn lamb, you don't want to be black.
Sarah:No. Because if you're black, you're probably going to become Astrakhan. They used to make whole coats out of it. Roosevelt had a whole coat, Teddy.
Mark:Teddy had a whole coat?
Sarah:It's it's apparently it's super soft. Oh. But it would be.
Mark:I would think so. Anyway,
Sarah:it's a Montera, not a Mickey Mouse.
Mark:Okay. Well, Fiona and Gary Thompson are dancing and fighting. They're fight dancing.
Sarah:Because she bought her dress. How much did that cost? Like, everybody else would rent one.
Mark:We're on the verge of bankruptcy. And they are the worst arguers in the world because they everybody knows their business.
Sarah:Oh, yeah. They don't even know how to have, like, a clenched teeth fight.
Mark:I told you that I've got that dress.
Sarah:When we're dancing the flamenco, I'll talk to you about our debt. Like, really? Just wait till afterwards. Cut off all the money. Well, gets upset and apparently that makes her shoes magically change.
Mark:Yeah. Her shoes change.
Sarah:Because when she's dancing, she has, well, the feet that are hers when she's dancing have what we call character shoes, which are typical dance shoes. It's got a, like a pump, wide pump heel on a strap that goes across the top like a Mary Jane. But when she dies, she's just got on pumps. The strap just flew off in anger. I've enough of Gary.
Sarah:I'm out of here. He makes you so mad your shoes fly off.
Mark:Okay. Before we follow Fiona and leave the party, we need to talk about the slogger.
Sarah:Yeah. It's pretty, you know, it's they they focus the camera on it for quite a while. The piles of warm room temperature. I'm sorry, England. You're wrong about that beer.
Mark:It's value lager and value blitter bitter. Now, first of all, it's British beer in a can, which if you don't know about British beer in a can, if it doesn't have a widget in it, which is
Sarah:a little ball?
Mark:A little ball that makes it taste like draft beer, like Boddington's, the official beer of my old band. I love me some Boddington's.
Sarah:Then it tastes bad. Then it tastes bad. This is not just lager in a can without a widget. This is store brand lager in a can without a widget. And what store would it be?
Sarah:It's Tesco's.
Mark:Tesco's. If I was gonna go to Tesco's and buy value lager. So this is like the equivalent of like Walmart.
Sarah:Yeah. Walmart brand beer.
Mark:Yep. How much would I pay for one of these babies?
Sarah:You would pay 88p for a four pack.
Mark:Like right now?
Sarah:Well, they don't sell the lager anymore, but they still have the bitter. It's like a pound 50 for a four pack.
Mark:A pound 50 for a four pack.
Sarah:It's only 2% alcohol. You could drink it all day and never get a buzz.
Mark:You could absolutely drink that all day and not get a buzz. But
Sarah:now you know what you could get? What?
Mark:An awesome song. So you've gotten some work into the culture of Tesco's Lager.
Sarah:We should insert a sample of that song right here. Wow. I'm sorry. That's gonna be stuck in your head like it's stuck in mine. It's on Spotify if you wanna listen to it again.
Mark:That was some fantastically bad EDM music and I will put a link to it in the show notes.
Sarah:Because Tesco value lager is just so awesome. One review that I read said, if you can imagine water that's flavored to taste ever so slightly of lager, you'd be close to imagining what this tastes like. So maybe all the people 60 who are at this party or that's all they can handle.
Mark:I don't I don't know. Because no. Because Charles Rust on his to do on his grocery list has some whiskey. On his chalkboard?
Sarah:Yes. Yeah. But he would never share his good whiskey. Three red. Three red.
Sarah:That's at the bottom of the list. Yep. We'll get there. Sorry. Yeah.
Sarah:So Fiona's off. Cheap beer. Her shoes are angry. She's out of there. Yes.
Sarah:But there's a squeaking noise.
Mark:It's the odd job man, Jacob.
Sarah:Yes. We can just call him odd job man. Yeah. He's got a wheelbarrow.
Mark:He's checking the handles on parked cars.
Sarah:He's got a mullet.
Mark:He does.
Sarah:But, you know, Fiona doesn't make it home. We know that. Right?
Mark:No. No. The so there's someone in the bushes and the way they do it, it looks like it's a really super tall person because the bushes move way up in the air, like seven or eight feet in the air. Well,
Sarah:you know, Lynn is the killer. We know this. She is rather tall and her oil skin coat has kind of a peaked hat on it. I don't know. Maybe she climbed the tree
Mark:Maybe.
Sarah:To look down on Fiona.
Mark:Fiona's getting her keys out, gets knifed.
Sarah:Yep. Repeatedly. And then dumped in Cheney's field with a rose in her mouth.
Mark:Where Monty and my peers can find him. How many old ladies out on walks with dogs have we found bodies with now?
Sarah:Quite a few.
Mark:Yeah. Garden of death is at least one.
Sarah:Yeah. It's either an old lady or the housekeeper Yep. Pretty much who find the bodies. This is a cully episode as well.
Mark:Okay. First of all, we have to deal with this new kitchen. It's nice. It is by far the best kitchen we've seen yet.
Sarah:What I don't understand is Joyce hands Tom a bowl of cereal first.
Mark:Which is either bran flakes or shredded wheat because those are the two boxes of cereal.
Sarah:Then she brings him a full English.
Mark:Yes. Which he doesn't touch at all.
Sarah:But it actually looks edible.
Mark:Yes. It does. I don't know why.
Sarah:He says he doesn't want it. She looks at it like
Mark:She's got bread, eggs, and tomatoes out and orange juice. She's doing it up. I wanna go to choices for breakfast.
Sarah:Apparently, she can make breakfast. It's just the other meals she has trouble with.
Mark:I think it's because of this. In the old kitchen, she had recipes on the doors. And now that she doesn't have recipes on the door, she can actually concentrate on cooking food.
Sarah:Oh, those were bad recipes distracting her? Is that giving her bad ideas?
Mark:I guess.
Sarah:Like, pork and and stewed grapes?
Mark:Yeah. Now, Culley is problematic in this episode for a couple of reasons. When is
Sarah:she not problematic?
Mark:One, she doesn't live with them.
Sarah:No. She lives across town.
Mark:Across town, and she's been doing temp work. Mhmm. Who is paying for Cully's car? Who's paying for Cully's apartment? Barnaby is is funding this entire operation.
Sarah:You think so? I think we're supposed to assume that she's making enough to support herself. She's not rolling in it, but she's making enough.
Mark:This is another one of those great episodes where you never know how far Costin is from the town.
Sarah:Never. It could be five miles. It could be 50 miles.
Mark:Does Kelly live in Costin or in Midsomer Mallow?
Sarah:That's a good question because when she's with Scott showing him an apartment, she says she lives on the other side of town.
Mark:And is that Costin or Midsomer Mallow?
Sarah:Yeah. We don't really know. But apparently, it's close enough that she can be there for breakfast time.
Mark:Yes. It's ten years after high school for Cully. She wants to have a reunion with her friend.
Sarah:Why? Oh, don't understand why.
Mark:There is a bigger why question. The bigger why question is behind Tom, there is a light switch in the middle of the wall. Why on earth would you put a light switch in the middle of a wall?
Sarah:You mean, like, right not right inside the door?
Mark:No. No. Not right inside the door. Like, over here, we have a light switch that's right inside the door. No.
Mark:No. It's in the middle. It's easily four feet away from anything. Why would you put and it's not it's not like it's under a counter or something. It's a big wall that's flat.
Mark:It's blue. It's got no pictures on it. Bang. Light switch. Light switch with two switches on it.
Sarah:I don't know.
Mark:It drives me insane. Poor design
Sarah:Yep. To make Mark crazy.
Mark:Yes. And this kitchen is a full actual kitchen because in they do flip the cameras around in the set in a a later shot. When they are sitting at the table there, there's like a like, it's not a set.
Sarah:Yeah. It's not a
Mark:kitchen in a
Sarah:real house. It's never a set on Midsomer. It's always a real space. Yep. Whoever decided on the camera angles for this episode definitely likes kitchens because later the camera pretends it's a spice rack.
Mark:It does indeed.
Sarah:Kelly's gonna organize this school reunion for her and her four friends because they promised they would get together and celebrate. And Celebrate what? We're still alive ten years later?
Mark:Again, let's let's be generous and say Costin has 25,000 people in
Sarah:it. Mhmm.
Mark:And that's gonna be incredibly generous. Yeah. You would run into these people long before this.
Sarah:I would think so. I mean, maybe not Rachel because she doesn't leave the house, but Lynn for sure. I go
Mark:I teach at a small school. We only have 200 students, and I run into them everywhere.
Sarah:All the time. So All the time. Nevermind. These friends are not worth reunioning with.
Mark:No. Oh gosh. No.
Sarah:Nobody wants to see them. Scott shows up. Of course, he's late because of trains and delays and everything else. Yes. He has attitude right off the bat and he has no place to live.
Sarah:So Tom asks him if he's going to stay in the section house.
Mark:Yeah. Okay. A section house to me is a railway thing.
Sarah:No. A section house is like a dorm for policemen.
Mark:Yeah. In Canada and The US, a section house is a railway thing. In The UK, it's a policeman thing.
Sarah:But either way, it's kind of a a dorm for for workers.
Mark:Well, the section house for railways are notorious for young men who work on the railway, who drink a lot and party a lot.
Sarah:Well, so I did a little research into the section housing in The UK, and I can tell you that did not happen there. Okay. Because until the seventies, every section house had a matron.
Mark:Oh, okay. So my brother, who worked on the railroad for years and years and years, did electrician stuff for the railroad, lived in section houses for a while and then was like, I'm never living in those places again. They had no matrons there.
Sarah:They haven't been great in The UK either. I I read a speech in front of parliament from the nineteen thirties. In the thirties where some Lord or other was saying that they needed to be reformed simply not because they were places of ill repute, but because he felt like they weren't up to the quality of the world's best police force. And these men, boys, really, most of them were so young, they deserved better living conditions. And then I went on to read that they had married housing too.
Sarah:So if you were a constable or a sergeant, you qualified to live in section housing if you were married, but once you had a child, they sort of encouraged you to get out.
Mark:That's weird. Like why wouldn't Scott stay there then?
Sarah:Probably because it's like living in a dorm.
Mark:I guess.
Sarah:Even a good dorm or a barracks kind of. You know, even if you had your own, like, room, it's not having your own place. I can understand why he wouldn't want to.
Mark:Plus can see that.
Sarah:He's from the big city, remember? Oh, that's live in the section house with the yokels.
Mark:City boy from the Met.
Sarah:It's not gonna go live with the yokels. No. No. Fiona's body is found in Cheney's Field.
Mark:Cheney's Field, which they make this big thing. They mentioned the doomsday book group that runs the town events says something about Cheyne's Field, and then it is forgotten forever.
Sarah:So it's common land, which is something we don't really have here in The US. No. We have federal land and it's it's not in the middle of town. I mean, we have parks, right? But common land is different.
Sarah:So common land originally was shared space where kind of people who ran smaller farms could pasture their animals for periods of time. So you could take your cows out to graze there and then take them back to the barn at the end of the day.
Mark:Yeah. It's a British thing. It's not a Canadian thing either.
Sarah:It's not, it's not federally owned. Common land could actually be owned by one person, but because of, British law, even if they owned it, they still had to make it accessible. And the people who had access to that land were called Commoners. Commoners, which when you hear it today, you think commoners means like lowly, you know, not special, right? Yeah.
Sarah:But it didn't at all. It just meant that you had access to common land. So you were a commoner.
Mark:Oh.
Sarah:Which I thought that was kind of nice.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Do you know why the Domesday Book is called the Domesday Book?
Mark:I did at one point in time, but I have forgotten why it's called the Domesday Book.
Sarah:And it's not far fetched to say that Chaney's Field would be in the Domesday Book by the way, there's lots of common land listed in the Domesday Book. But the reason why it's called the Domesday Book, it was basically a shore to shore reckoning of the entire kingdom in '10 For '80
Mark:William the Conqueror.
Sarah:He wanted a list of everything, right?
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:And the reason why they referred, and it wasn't actually called the Doomsday Book originally. Became the doomsday book because for the little people, they came around to assess what you had, it was like they were writing it down in the book of judgment because it contained decisions about what you owned and what somebody else owned and it was unofferable. You could not argue with it.
Mark:So they just decided and that was it.
Sarah:So it was like the final judgment. They called it they referred to it as doomsday and then it became known as the doomsday book. I thought that was interesting because I always kind of wondered why it was called that. Like, did they think the world was going to end or something? No, it's more of
Mark:a Like written to the end of time.
Sarah:No, it's more like a, an opinion on the fact that the people who were assigned to come around and count everything and take this measurement, if there was any confusion over who had what, they just decided it and that
Mark:was it. And that was it.
Sarah:You have five cows. I have three cows. No, one of your cows is mine. No, it's not. It's written.
Sarah:That's it
Mark:forever. Yep. Well, and half the well, more than half of the people wouldn't have understood what was writing anyway.
Sarah:No, they couldn't have read what was being written Ten eighty
Mark:five, the literacy was at a super low period.
Sarah:Yeah. But because things like that and things like common land were written down then and it was the final judgment, those things still stay common. They're still common to this day, a lot of them. Right?
Mark:That's interesting.
Sarah:Some of them have been fenced and sold and whatever, but it's, it's kinda like that. The rambler is always going about going on about their rights to ramble in certain areas is because those were common land.
Mark:Well, we've lost PC Angel, but I have a new friend.
Sarah:WPC. Yep. That's all she is.
Mark:That's all she is. She's played by Alex Bell Court.
Sarah:She gets Because she is the quintessential WPC. And she
Mark:gets a speaking part. She does pretty good. Yeah. She's alright. The the men with white sticks have now upgraded to yellow sticks.
Sarah:They poke with the yellow sticks. They find the stuff.
Mark:She's got a rose stuffed in her mouth. Fiona does a really good dead body here except for the two shots of the dead body or she's moved between them.
Sarah:She's repositioned. Yeah. Yeah. She's not moving.
Mark:No. She's not moving.
Sarah:Not like Charles Ross. That there's inconsistency between the the positions in the two shots.
Mark:Yep. Somebody was not working continuity in those days.
Sarah:We have this we have two kind of groups in this episode. We've got the old people who are the Midsomer Mallow Residence Association.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And the young people who are Cully and her friends.
Mark:Yes. Right? And they're all despicable people.
Sarah:Yes. Mary, Donald, Shirley, and Charles are the Midsomer Mallow Residence Association. Yes. The MMRA. So I like to just call them Mumra.
Sarah:Mumra. Like from He Man.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Yeah. They're all the old people who's planned the Spanish night. Yes. And they and Fiona Okay. You you grew up in a small town that probably had some kind of residence association or village countdown Absolutely.
Mark:My father was a reed.
Sarah:Yeah. So Fiona was part of this association. Yes. And they voted her off. Yes.
Sarah:But she wouldn't go.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:What does that mean? Does that mean she just kept showing up to meetings?
Mark:Just kept showing up to meetings and events.
Sarah:Wouldn't they just ignore her vote?
Mark:I don't know. It's like, the whole we shouldn't have wished her dead. It's sad. We shouldn't dance on her grave. That whole thing is just red herrings all over it.
Mark:You don't actually talk about people like that.
Sarah:You don't?
Mark:Well, I have people that I have difficulties with, but I never wish them dead.
Sarah:Well, if you vote them off your committee and they just keep appearing
Mark:I don't know.
Sarah:You might say f off and die.
Mark:Could be. I would have. Charles Rust would never say f off. No. No.
Mark:No.
Sarah:He's too fancy for that.
Mark:Yes. Donald is rolling up a sign and I'm off because the sign is in taco modern font.
Sarah:I remember that font.
Mark:So this font was okay. If you don't know, this font was everywhere for a while. It was one of the most overused fonts that there was.
Sarah:If it was beachy or Mexican or Spanish Yep. It was taco modern.
Mark:Taco modern.
Sarah:But you know, I'm not surprised that the that Mumra uses taco modern in their sign. Now They're not sophisticated.
Mark:It says Spanish knight on the sign. Mhmm. It's a mixture of capital letters and lowercase letters is infuriating. Half of the letters are uppercase, Half of the letters are lowercase. It makes no sense as to what is uppercase and lowercase.
Sarah:Okay. But that's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to weird signage in this episode. Okay? Cactus Jack. Anything else you need to say?
Mark:Why is Cactus Jack not in taco modern?
Sarah:Because it's in that squirrelly spirally cactus font instead.
Mark:Why do you buy it? Cactus Jacks?
Sarah:You buy cacti.
Mark:No. You buy margaritas in tacos.
Sarah:Now that's racist. No.
Mark:Cactus Jacks, if I drive into town and I see a sign that has cactus jacks on it, I know I'm gonna go into that place and get a margarita and a taco.
Sarah:Yeah. But not if you see his booth at the garden fair. What the hell is he doing at the Selling cacti.
Mark:Oh my gosh. Cactus Jacks. It's not even Jack's cactus?
Sarah:If you didn't, just spend thirty seconds looking at the booth signs at the garden fair later at the garden competition because they are fantastic. It's just like cake. Okay. Next to cactus Jack.
Mark:Also, they clean up from the Spanish night twice.
Sarah:No. The night the same night of the Spanish night, they sweep and get rid of trash. Yes. The next day, they actually clean up the rest, put away the tables
Mark:and Why didn't they do it all in the same night?
Sarah:Because it was late. I don't care. Do it. Somebody was dead. They didn't know that.
Mark:They didn't know that. In the background on Spanish night, you see it for one shot is a very tiny head of a bull. Oh. Like on a plaque.
Sarah:Why did somebody bother to bring that? I don't know. It's tiny. Everybody had to make a contribution to Spanish net.
Mark:It's like about the size of a football. And it's on a little plaque. It's in the background. You see it once.
Sarah:That's the tiniest bowl ever.
Mark:It's it's a wee bowl.
Sarah:It's like an Astracan bowl.
Mark:Yes. It was probably Astracan.
Sarah:The bulls bulls aren't born with horns. Ow, that would be bad. So you brought up, Charles Rust, who's our favorite member of the Residence Association.
Mark:Oh my god. Charles Rust.
Sarah:He's played by John Standing or Lord John Standing. He's a fourth baronet. He was John Aaron in Game of Thrones.
Mark:Yes, he was.
Sarah:He was alive for one episode.
Mark:He managed to be alive for one episode.
Sarah:But I think he's the first death that we see where they put the stones on their eyes. Yes. Which is creepy.
Mark:Yeah. He's in he's in he is in Game of Thrones to appear in the I am to be list. Yes. That's it. He is like the first thing that happened.
Sarah:Yes. So he's a fourth baronet. His his family goes way back. As a matter of fact, they used to own the land that Bletchley Park, that became Bletchley Park during World War two.
Mark:By the way, if you haven't watched Bletchley Circle, that's a fine
Sarah:You should definitely go watch it.
Mark:Series about women who worked at Bletchley Park and great stories about women, especially in the fifties in Britain. And then they there's a Bletchley Park, San Francisco. It sounds weird that they go to San Francisco.
Sarah:It totally works.
Mark:But it totally works and it's also very, very good.
Sarah:He's also in the Dogleg Murders in 2009. Yes. He was in two episodes of Murder She Wrote. Wow. He, I don't know how to describe this.
Sarah:Your mom doesn't listen, right? No. Okay. He was in a movie in 2006 called Rabbit Fever.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:That is a fictionalized account of the impact of women's addiction to the rabbit vibrator.
Mark:Oh.
Sarah:Silence. He's also a painter. He's had lots of great exhibitions and in fact his paintings are quite pretty.
Mark:Oh, I think he's probably a cool guy. Gets lots of work.
Sarah:Yeah. And and he was willing to be in that movie. So
Mark:Rabbit fever.
Sarah:I'm not gonna recommend it. Just saying.
Mark:No. We're not gonna watch it while the kids are around.
Sarah:They've gotta be in another state.
Mark:So they interview her husband, and it's just like, Cheney's Field, blah blah blah.
Sarah:Who? Gary? Yeah. Yeah.
Mark:Gary is like such a nobody in this whole episode. He is in this scene and he's sad at another point.
Sarah:He's played by Michael Simpkins
Mark:Mhmm.
Sarah:And and he's been in everything.
Mark:Well, yeah. He's been in so much.
Sarah:But the interesting thing about Michael Simpkins is that he's married to Julia Deacon. And if you don't know who Julia Deacon is, you might recognize her as Marsha the landlady on Spaced. Oh, okay. She plays that character.
Mark:Again, another great British show. If you haven't seen spaced, if you like Shaun of the Dead, spaced is a sitcom by the same people
Sarah:But earlier. But
Mark:earlier. And, really, they're trying out the jokes that they use in Shaun of the Dead both visually and thematically. But she's incredibly funny.
Sarah:Yes. She's super funny.
Mark:Everybody on that show is crazy funny.
Sarah:And Michael Simpkins in other roles is very funny too. Yes. This is it's not I don't think it's a role meant for him except for the one broody face that he makes.
Mark:Yeah. He's broody McBruderstin.
Sarah:Yeah. Charles's house. Let's talk about that.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Because we know we're gonna have the open garden day. Yep. And Charles is very proud of his garden. Yes. Every time we see him at home, you know, he's out there with his gloves on.
Mark:I'm not a gardening guy, but his garden isn't horrible. No, it's beautiful.
Sarah:Yeah. It's very well done.
Mark:Yeah. There's no hanging baskets or troughs.
Sarah:I'm not sure why he's won the award for frontage. Yeah. Because his backyard is where it's really pretty.
Mark:There there's some problems with the front of his house.
Sarah:Here's where I need our listeners help. Yes, we do need help. Because maybe I'm imagining this.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:When Charles goes from his backyard to his front yard, the first time we see him, he comes out of the gate, he walks across a little kind of causeway to the street Yeah. And then over to his front door and between the street and his front door is a little bridge as if there's like a tiny canal or creek or something.
Mark:Like running along the front of his property.
Sarah:That's right in front of his property.
Mark:So there's the street, the ditch
Sarah:and his door.
Mark:And then like a wall.
Sarah:Yeah. Right. And so he has a little bridge that goes to his door.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:And I could swear that that house is in another episode.
Mark:I don't remember. I I I have an inkling of people going across a bridge to a house, but that's all
Sarah:I got. In my mind, it is that house and the person who lives there has garden gnomes. Maybe I'm imagining it, but if any listeners remember, if you know what I'm talking about, let us know because it's been bugging me and short of just speed watching every episode from here on out, I can't remember which house it's in. And I tried to find out, I Googled out the wazoo and all I learned was that some really ticked off villagers in The UK have started digging trenches around their garden greens to keep travelers from being able to bring their trailers onto the green.
Mark:Travelers. They ruin Midsomer episodes and the village green.
Sarah:Apparently they would rather have these giant like it looks like a tank has torn up a track around the village just to prevent a trailer from being able to roll into the green. But if that house is in another episode, please somebody tell me because it's bugging me.
Mark:We find out that Culley's friends, two of them, live on a farm, and we find out that
Sarah:Cassie and Noel.
Mark:Scott is gonna live is gonna stay at Barnaby's house overnight. And Joyce has Waitrose organic plain whole meal flour. It's like an advertisement for it.
Sarah:Yeah. They do kind of feature it, don't they? So this is a new house, though nobody mentions it. Not only do they have a nice kitchen, they apparently have three floors. Because Joyce and Tom go up the stairs to the linen closet and there's another stairway going up.
Sarah:Not a ladder, a stairway. It's pretty nice. They moved up in the world.
Mark:Now I'm gonna say something here. It's probably not that nice, but Culley kinda has gorilla arms in this this part here. She's she's got some dark hair on her arms. And
Sarah:Some women do.
Mark:Saying I'm not saying it's wrong or she should do anything about it. She should celebrate it completely, but it took me back. Like, I was like, woah. I just had not noticed it before.
Sarah:She's very fair.
Mark:Now now I'm going to be watching Cully's arms.
Sarah:Are you gonna be looking for gorilla arms? Yep. Well, she wears that boat neck top the whole, like The whole whole first half of the episode. Like, several days in a row, she's wearing that boat neck top.
Mark:It's gonna start to smell soon.
Sarah:I like boat neck tops.
Mark:Well, like boat neck tops too, but I like people who change their clothes on a daily basis.
Sarah:Did you just say boat tube tops?
Mark:Boat tops.
Sarah:Boat shaped tube tops. That would be kind of weird. Donald eventually admits that Charles threatened Fiona in some way and that he, Donald, heard a squeaky noise that night. Yes. And he was out in the car park having a smoke.
Mark:So the odd job man has a squeaky cart.
Sarah:Charles is gay.
Mark:Is squeaky. And his his wheelbarrow is squeaky too.
Sarah:And Rachel's baby stroller is squeaky. We'll get to Rachel's baby stroller. Those are and somebody online suggested it could have been the ice cream cart too.
Mark:Yes. The ice cream cart could have been squeaky. Let's hope the ice cream cart doesn't run into Cactus Jacks.
Sarah:I just have this idea of of Jacob, the odd job man actually pushing around the ice cream cart like, you want some vanilla? I can sharpen my knife for you. No. Thank you, sir.
Mark:So we have a mystery. The mystery is where is Jacko? Did you see this? No. On the sign outside of the post office where Cully and Scott talk about where she lives.
Sarah:Because his apartment is above No. No. Before that,
Mark:before he has an apartment, he's he's looking around. There's a bill a message board there. And one of the things says, learn salsa, which, obviously this little town is a little in love with salsa. Mhmm. Salsa.
Mark:Salsa. But also lost Jacko, and they're offering a reward. It's gotta
Sarah:be a dog.
Mark:If you know where Jacko is, there's a reward in Midsomer Mallow.
Sarah:It's gotta be a dog.
Mark:Jack O.
Sarah:Cassie and Noel have a dairy farm.
Mark:Woah. Okay. In my notes, all in capital letters, is the following phrase. This farm is all wrong.
Sarah:Well, and it's not the first time we've seen a dairy farm that was, like, miraculous on a Midsomer. Right?
Mark:They at least tried with the other dairy farm.
Sarah:UFO speed milking episodes, and now we have the free range cows and chickens wandering around farm.
Mark:Okay. You don't put cows in with chickens where there's no fence for the following reasons. The cows will step on the chickens and kill them. Okay, the cows will leave the area. They'll just wander away, just wander away looking for something to eat.
Mark:And most importantly, that is not how you care for or direct or look after dairy cows. You have to be very careful where you put dairy cows because you don't want to be chasing cows to milk them.
Sarah:And you also don't want them to get anything that might poison their milk, right? If they eat something that they shouldn't.
Mark:You want to take care of very care, close care and intention of them and don't leave them in chicken stepping areas.
Sarah:This is a multimillion dollar farm. That's the other problem. It's beautiful brick buildings, thatch roofs, tile roofs. It's gorgeous. Two people are running it.
Sarah:No way, no how. No. No way, no.
Mark:No. No could never keep up with that.
Sarah:Even weirder in terms of valuable homes are Lynn and Matthew Spearman's home.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Grove House.
Mark:So Lynn is our killer. Yes. Who? And Sarah disagrees with me here, but I feel like halfway through the episode, they went, wait a minute, let's make Lynn the killer Because the first half of the episode, she appears to be incredibly afraid of what's going on.
Sarah:See, I think she's putting on an act.
Mark:I don't think she's that good of an actor.
Sarah:I think she's been a malicious bitch since she was five.
Mark:Oh, she is not
Sarah:Getting exactly what she wants.
Mark:She is heck on wheels, man.
Sarah:They live in this beautiful house, which just has some weird things in it. Her husband, Matthew, comes down the hallway.
Mark:Don't you mean jerry curl Matthew?
Sarah:If that's a piece, it's a bad piece.
Mark:His hair is
Sarah:He's walking down the hallway with Tom and Scott behind him looking for Lynn, and there's a a row of coat hooks along the wall. Yes. And on those hooks is a gong mallet.
Mark:Well, just in case she a gong comes to the door
Sarah:You got a mallet.
Mark:You're ready.
Sarah:Hit it. There could be a gong. It's just not in shot. Yeah. Bang a gong.
Sarah:Get it on.
Mark:Well, speaking of getting it on, as soon as she walks down those stairs, Scott is, like, licking the floor.
Sarah:Yeah. He's not good at hiding the fact that he finds somebody attractive. No. Because, you know, in the big city and the smoke You you gotta be gotta make it quick.
Mark:Gotta be direct. That's right.
Sarah:Because of the fog and stuff.
Mark:He's like, when she's looking at herself in the mirror and her back's turned to them and she's showing off that she's got nothing on under that.
Sarah:He's just staring
Mark:at her. Scott is, like, licking his lips. Like
Sarah:He should be looking behind him at the most well, no second biggest flower arrangement in Midsomer.
Mark:You know, I love my wife. I absolutely love my wife because she said that's the second biggest flower arrangement in Midsomer. I'm like, that's a direct quote from my
Sarah:notes. Because the biggest one is in
Mark:Dead man's
Sarah:11. Dead man's 11 in the dining room at the very end there's that giant dried flower arrangement.
Mark:Yes. That's in the show notes for that episode.
Sarah:This time it's an entire fireplace full of flower arrangement.
Mark:It's just so many flowers.
Sarah:Because, you know, you move into the beautiful home.
Mark:What And think are
Sarah:we gonna do with that fireplace?
Mark:The descending farmyard prints, including the world's fattest cow.
Sarah:Yeah. I like that fat cow. When Lynn comes down the stairs we see the fat cow.
Mark:Fat cow.
Sarah:Yeah. They had hired, the odd job guy to wash the windows once but when Matthew refused to pay him because he didn't finish it or do a good job, he got a bit with him. That's a reference to Bolsheviks. Right?
Mark:Yes. Because he was upset because he wasn't being paid by the boss.
Sarah:Oh, he was gonna start a revolution.
Mark:I guess so. He's a bit.
Sarah:No. He's just gonna burn to death in his wheelbarrow. Yep. Okay.
Mark:No. I have another problem here.
Sarah:Go ahead.
Mark:Lin's sunglasses.
Sarah:They
Mark:have clear lenses in
Sarah:them. Mhmm.
Mark:Are they there for?
Sarah:Fashion.
Mark:They're white. They don't go with her outfit. She just flings them around.
Sarah:Fashion.
Mark:It's just horrible.
Sarah:They're an emphasis accessory like her scarf.
Mark:Oh.
Sarah:So let's talk about what bothers us because now we get to the scenes where Collie starts meeting up with her old friends. Yes. And she goes to the pub and Lynn and Cassie meet her there.
Mark:And they talk about
Sarah:Rachel. Ominously. Rachel. Troublesomely. Rachel.
Sarah:As if there's a big secret they're keeping. They suck at that.
Mark:Is it Rachel's awful hair?
Sarah:Her headband?
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:For three years, they have been hiding the fact that the baby that Rachel is raising is actually Lynn's.
Mark:Like they're talking in pig Latin. It's like, baby. Aka, Linne. It's like
Sarah:No one knows.
Mark:No one knows.
Sarah:Like, they could not make it more suspicious if they tried. And you'd think after three years, they'd be a little bit better at that.
Mark:You would think.
Sarah:They would say, you know what? Rachel lives a very secluded life. She's very happy that way. Don't bother her. Yeah.
Sarah:Because I don't know, she has an anxiety
Mark:disorder or she's She has a baby. She's kinda embarrassed about the whole situation.
Sarah:No. Because that would just make Kelly wanna go see her. That's true. Just she prefers to just be her and her daughter and that's what makes her happy. And there would be no value to bugging her.
Sarah:You would only bring her problems,
Mark:leave And her I think Cully would actually understand that.
Sarah:She might respect that, but instead they're like, what? There's nothing weird about Rachel and the fact that no one sees her and she's different and secret and don't see her
Mark:at It's like, her and Cully's gonna start looking around because they're playing the weird music.
Sarah:Yeah. Like they're looking over her shoulder going nothing's behind you, but Rachel. Like, can't not go find out now. Though, I don't imagine Rachel was that much different when she was younger. She's not a person who you're like, oh, but I really wanna reconnect with her because she was so awesome.
Mark:None of them are. They're horrible people. They are. Including Noel, and I have
Sarah:problems with Noel. Cassie and Noel are the best of the bunch, and they aren't great.
Mark:No. I really dislike Cassie and Noel.
Sarah:Holly just bad at making friends?
Mark:Like, Lynn is a murderer. Okay. Okay. So she's bad. Rachel is horrible.
Mark:Yes. She's bad. But the fact that Cassie and Noel have anything to do with them and the fact that Noel is like this weird he was in a relationship with Cully, but he calls her little Cully Barnaby. Even though he was younger than her. It's it's just so weird.
Sarah:Well, and the fact that he's Lily's dad and he doesn't say, wait, you're not gonna hide who this kid is. He never
Mark:goes to visit Lily at all in this episode. No. He is the shite dad of the year.
Sarah:He says he does try to. Yeah. But he has rights. Yeah. He should have stood up for them.
Mark:Yeah. Absolutely.
Sarah:So none of them are redeemable. I don't know why Culley is so infatuated with going to see them.
Mark:Or buying them a doll at the strange doll shop.
Sarah:Ugh. It's it's a place full of creepy dolls.
Mark:It should have been called the creepy doll shop that how is it ever staying alive?
Sarah:Yeah. And in the time, prior to big internet sales, like Shirley's store would stay afloat if she could sell her dolls online to collectors maybe,
Mark:but
Sarah:that's not the scenario we're in.
Mark:The odd job man eats an apple ominously.
Sarah:He has a lockup. Yeah. And Tom and Scott go there and Tom can't seem to control himself. He has to sharpen a knife.
Mark:And there there's sparks. I watched it. They're not real. Maybe 20 times. They're not real.
Mark:No. They're the wrong color. They're like purple. Yeah. The sparks are not real.
Mark:I don't I don't know why that scene is there. They don't find anything. No. They don't. That scene doesn't need to be there.
Mark:But Charles Rust House has to be there because it's a gold mine of interesting interesting things. Things. It It is, is, isn't isn't it? Including his grocery list.
Sarah:Well, let's talk about his house because it used to be the master's house, the school master's house.
Mark:So it has a bell on the outside.
Sarah:And it used to be Ronald's.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Right? So we kind of learn that at some point that house was sold out from under Ronald and that if Mary's husband had still been alive, it would have been a historically listed building and Charles would not have been able to buy it.
Mark:And that's strangely enough, like the plot in the dog laid murders. There's a part in the dog laid murders about some guy wanting the other guy's house.
Sarah:Yeah. So Charles is well settled into the master's house. He
Mark:loves that house.
Sarah:Including the bell and the chalkboard.
Mark:Yes. And on that chalkboard is his grocery list. First of all, it says call Jay at 8AM.
Sarah:It's not just a grocery list. It's like a to do list and a grocery list.
Mark:Wait. Who is Jake?
Sarah:I don't know.
Mark:And why are we calling them at 8PM?
Sarah:I don't know. Maybe that's who he called to arrange the posters for the garden.
Mark:Maybe because we never know who that is either.
Sarah:No. Maybe he's calling Jacob. Maybe. Because the odd job guy has a cell phone. No.
Sarah:He doesn't. No. No. That's not who it is.
Mark:It's a weird grocery list. So Stilton. Okay. Spaghetti. Mhmm.
Mark:Okay. Milk. Mhmm. Coffee. Mhmm.
Mark:Green beans. Mhmm. Okay. Malt whiskey. Okay.
Mark:It's circled. It's important. Don't know why. And three red. Three red onions.
Mark:Three red delicious
Sarah:Apples. Apples. Three red peppers. Maybe it's code.
Mark:Three red. Isn't there a cider named red?
Sarah:No. But it's like, you know, the eagle flies at midnight. Three red.
Mark:And then on the other side is a weird to do list. Weed killer.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:Grassy.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:Okay. Paper. Mhmm. Just paper. Check bank.
Sarah:It's still there.
Mark:It's check. It's underlined.
Sarah:That's a bank. Check. Cut keys. Okay.
Mark:And finish lawn.
Sarah:For a guy who sits at a desk with a ton of paperwork, he's not very good at the to do list.
Mark:No. And why is it in the kitchen? It's not like he has somebody else there in the in the house. It's not like he stands in the kitchen goes, what am I gonna do today over there?
Sarah:Three reds. That's what I'm gonna
Mark:do today. Three reds.
Sarah:Oh, and it's full of his garden awards, certificate.
Mark:Including the Midsomer Mallow in Bloom Awards for 2002, 2001, and 2000. But on top of the chest is the Midsomer Mallow in Bloom Award for 1999.
Sarah:That's kind of an outlier isn't it?
Mark:Yeah, I don't know why it's on top of the thing with the chairman's cups but yep.
Sarah:He's fancy. He is. He used to be the village doctor until he retired and Fiona was his receptionist.
Mark:You know what the hobby of people in Midsomer Mallow is? To do shit with knives.
Sarah:They do like knives, don't they?
Mark:Everybody's got a knife.
Sarah:Shirley's cutting the cake with a knife.
Mark:Knowles cutting the the mushrooms with a knife that is not for cutting mushrooms.
Sarah:No. He's using like a carving knife to cut mushrooms. I don't get it. Wrong. It's because we need to see the red herrings of knives.
Mark:There's a cribbage game in which they refer to cribbage correctly and use matches as cribbage sticks and is never spoken of again.
Sarah:Well, because that's what old people do on a dark, stormy night. Donald and Mary sit and they play cribbage.
Mark:My parents play cribbage. So but they had my parents said this awesome thing. Right? So a cribbage table is is The board? The board is usually about a foot long Mhmm.
Mark:Maybe three inches wide. It has a winding path that you move your little
Sarah:That's how you keep score.
Mark:Keep score. Right? My parents had a giant one. It was three feet long and had its own legs. It was fantastic.
Mark:They played crimage a lot.
Sarah:Did you put it next to the table or on the table?
Mark:They put it next to the table. They could play cards on it. Oh my gosh. That's hardcore cribbage. That's hardcore cribbage.
Sarah:Charles is so fussy about everything. He even polishes the bell wearing yellow gloves, and yet he doesn't oil his gate.
Mark:No. Three red.
Sarah:And I realized that some people joke about, well, I don't oil the gate because I like to hear when someone's coming. Yes. But it's not in front of his front door. No. It's in his backyard.
Sarah:Yeah. So he should oil it. It would be befitting his personality.
Mark:Well, he's got a quite a mess later on.
Sarah:Yeah. He does.
Mark:It's garden day. And I first note, under garden day is jaunty squirrel bush.
Sarah:That's one heck of a topiary.
Mark:There's a guy walking through the guard day that has this squirrel. It's obviously a squirrel. It's a topiary, and the squirrel looks like it's dancing.
Sarah:It's great.
Mark:It's absolutely fantastic, but it is pure Midsomer weirdness.
Sarah:The village is also full of people who apparently like to huff marigolds. Yeah. Have you ever smelled a marigold?
Mark:No.
Sarah:They smell like armpit.
Mark:They do.
Sarah:They're pretty. They smell like armpit. And yet here, people are shoving them up their noses.
Mark:Yeah. Booths include, cake, pure ice cream, and cactus Jack.
Sarah:Pure ice cream. It's unadulterated ice cream. Pure. You know, that other stand, it's 50% rocks. 50% ice cream.
Sarah:No. Mine's pure ice cream.
Mark:Pure ice. Don't go to Cactus Jack for ice You
Sarah:don't wanna lick a
Mark:It says cake stall. That's what the sign says.
Sarah:Yeah. That's where Shirley hangs out with her big knife.
Mark:And her Victoria sponge.
Sarah:But apparently, no forks.
Mark:Noel just puts his hands in. I'm like, well, this is yours now, Noel. Because god
Sarah:No forks.
Mark:What dairy cow utter crap do you have on that? Oh god. He does that and I just about screamed.
Sarah:He may as well just kinda like lean down and lick it. Thanks.
Mark:Speaking of ominous things, I have something planned for later.
Sarah:Yeah. Cassie. Oh, let's just talk about it.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Let's just get it out of the way.
Mark:Let's let's get it out of way, and then we'll deal with Charles and all the Lynn problems. Yes. So the thing she has planned is A picnic. A picnic from hell.
Sarah:And Rachel's finally gonna appear.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Right? That's nice.
Mark:I have in my notes, it says a picnic by the river. I hate this scene.
Sarah:And Noel has packed quite the picnic. He's got two whole picnic baskets full of containers. They've got wine. They've got finger foods.
Mark:And because
Sarah:he eats with his fingers apparently.
Mark:And Lynn arrives late covered in completely with blood. No. Oh, damn.
Sarah:Okay. She should, but
Mark:she's Okay. The
Sarah:Rachel is rude Yes. From the second she appears. Yes. She's disruptive.
Mark:I don't go into town.
Sarah:She's crass.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:She's mean. Yes. Unpleasant. Let's go swimming. And yet only Cully seems to be bothered by it.
Mark:Yes. Oh, it's just so many things wrong with this. I don't like how it's written. I don't like I know it's meant to make you feel uncomfortable, but it makes me feel too uncomfortable.
Sarah:It makes me angry. Am so I Nolan Cassie jump in. Rachel says, hey, let's go for a swim. And they're like, oh, that's so funny.
Mark:And she has a bathing suit on. I
Sarah:No. She doesn't.
Mark:You say she doesn't, but I think she
Sarah:has bathing camisole and a bra and some, like, bike shorts underneath whatever she had on anyway. Or no, no. They're just pedal pushers or pants.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:So Noel and Cassie get in the water, brother and sister splashing
Mark:around. Which we've had problems with brothers and sisters on the Rachel grabs
Sarah:Lynn and physically drags her into the water.
Mark:Which is probably good because Lynn's covered in blood and it would get all
Sarah:the It off. Maybe that's why. Lynn is not happy about this and slaps Rachel.
Mark:Just right in the face.
Sarah:Right? So now they're fighting, actually fighting. What are Cassie and Noel doing? Laughing. Laughing.
Sarah:Which is wrong and weird. Oh. Cully, stop it. Stop it. You're just gonna tell them to stop and they're gonna stop fighting?
Sarah:Well, and then
Mark:she goes in the water
Sarah:to break up the fight. But okay. And then they turn on her.
Mark:I might be a coward, but I would look at that situation and go, I'm getting back and gertie and going back to town.
Sarah:Yeah, I'm done. Yeah. They're not gonna drown. They're in like waste high water when they're fighting. No.
Sarah:I'm I'm out.
Mark:I'm like, these people are weirdos. I'm out.
Sarah:Yeah. But not Collie. She has to save the day.
Mark:So she goes in and they start to try to kill her.
Sarah:Rachel Yes. Holds her underwater.
Mark:And let so in the meantime, Charles Scott has been killed, and Joyce, rightly so, is worried because she doesn't know where Cully is.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:And they send the least likely person to go find her because he has no idea where anything is.
Sarah:Hey. Scott says, I'll go.
Mark:He does say,
Sarah:I'll go. Scott
Mark:gets a bum rap in this episode. Mhmm. He finds the odd job man. Yep. He he saves Cully.
Mark:He gets an apartment that he is a big mess. He doesn't make a fig a thing about it. He's like, this is where I'm living.
Sarah:You know, in my memory of having previously watched it, I also thought he saved Cully. Yeah. He doesn't. She's up above the water when he gets in.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Now he does holler out of there and help her. And doesn't arrest them. But they don't seem to mind that Rachel just tried to drown her.
Mark:No. They don't seem to mind.
Sarah:It's like all in fun. It's just weird.
Mark:Oh, it's horrible. And My least favorite Midsomer scene.
Sarah:When I think about this episode, I just see Rachel holding her under and all of them laughing.
Mark:I grew up near a lake in the summers. My parents went to a lake every summer, and I saw kids bully other kids and was bullied exactly like this. It is it's chills down my back. Yeah. Upset.
Sarah:We're sorry. Okay. It's not fun. Now we're through that. You know what's more fun than that?
Mark:Talking about Charles.
Sarah:Charles is dead and has an apple in his mouth. Yeah. It's sad when a murder victim is cheerier than the bullying.
Mark:But unfortunately his politics of investing article is ruined now.
Sarah:So he shows the judges around his backyard. He's charming, gives the ladies roses as they leave. And apparently, as soon as the judges are done with his yard, he's in working on paperwork.
Mark:Yep. Paperwork. I got stuff I'm to a retired, GP, so I got paperwork to do.
Sarah:So Lynn is late for the picnic because she's here killing Charles.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:She comes into his room behind him with the knife while he's working on the paperwork, wearing the ankle length black oil skin coat. Yes. How does she get in there?
Mark:Okay. How does she get in there as a problem?
Sarah:How does the whole village not see her skulking around wearing that coat?
Mark:I thought of another problem today. Okay. So we have the oil skin coat, right? She kills Fiona with the oil skin coat on, I guess, stilts. Right?
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Well, yeah, she was high up in the bush, but Okay. Not when she killed her.
Mark:When she killed Fiona
Sarah:She does drag her halfway across the village to put her in the field, though.
Mark:There's lots of blood, and she drags her halfway across the village. Right? So the coat has some blood on it now.
Sarah:She might
Mark:have cleaned it. Where does she keep the coat? Where does she keep the coat, and does she clean it?
Sarah:I'm she must.
Mark:She must. But, like, I guess she keeps it in the back of the convertible.
Sarah:Just in case.
Mark:Just in case I start to kill again.
Sarah:She keeps a knife in the in the coat in the back of the car.
Mark:Now this is also missing a key thing here. Right? She kills Fiona because Fiona attempts to blackmail her. Yes. Alright.
Mark:Charles Rust is annoying. He's arrogant. He's fatuous. He's vapid. He's horrible.
Sarah:But he never hints that he's gonna tell anybody.
Mark:Ever hints he's gonna tell anybody. So Lynn just goes crazy Mhmm. And starts to kill everybody involved. That person went to Charles's GP office. I'll have to kill them too.
Sarah:Why doesn't she kill Cassie, Noel, and, you know, all of her friends?
Mark:Because they know about Rachel. Oh, wait a minute. So is Russ.
Sarah:That's why she kills Fiona and Charles. It's just Really? Cassie and Noel should be next.
Mark:Yeah. No. It's well, anyway.
Sarah:Because what does she have to lose? If people find out that the baby is hers and Rachel has been raising it for three years.
Mark:Yeah. What does she have to lose?
Sarah:Is Matthew gonna get upset?
Mark:Matthew's gonna be like, whatever, I'm going to town.
Sarah:He doesn't care.
Mark:I love when he says he's going to town. I'm like,
Sarah:right on. You go, boy. You get out of there. All of our married lady listeners or married women who have partners are going to agree with me. We were talking about this last night about Lynn is going to go and kill Charles.
Sarah:She knows she's going to go kill Charles, but Matthew is there in the house and
Mark:Matthew, would you like to go with me?
Sarah:He says, where are you going? And she says, I'm going to go out and see some friends. You're welcome to go with me. And if she knew she was going to go kill Charles, why does she invite Matthew to go?
Mark:That was my question.
Sarah:It's all in the way she does it.
Mark:Because
Sarah:if I come to you and I've already got my purse and my keys and my coat on, and I tell you, I'm going to run somewhere. I'm clearly almost out the door. Do you want to come? Yeah. She knows he's not going to say yes.
Mark:I know, I know she knows.
Sarah:So there's no danger
Mark:snail trails to deal with.
Sarah:And why he's gotta kick pensioners out of his garden.
Mark:Yes. It's never been opened. Then put a sign up that says
Sarah:It never will
Mark:be garden is not part of the tour. That's all you have to do. It's put up a little sign.
Sarah:Yeah. But then you can't shove pensioners. Okay. That's no fun.
Mark:Scott and bar Cully miraculously dry off.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:Like, so fast.
Sarah:Cully changes clothes. But Scott's Scott pants are insta dry.
Mark:Yeah. They're insta dry pants.
Sarah:Yeah. That's awesome for him, though. It's handy.
Mark:The landlord's in the scene where he talks about Jacob's stroke and that's it.
Sarah:Again, whenever I see somebody with a tiny little part like that I think they want a contest.
Mark:Oh, the people who are the judges for the flower day, they want a contest.
Sarah:Like you can win a walk on part in the midsummer if you buy 50,000,000 boxes of post toasties.
Mark:If you almost kill me in a river by drowning me, I need to stop by your house and tell you that I'm sorry. What are you Canadian?
Sarah:Cully, cully, cully, cully. She does not pick good friends. No. And she's just got a little bit of meddler in her. She can't help it.
Sarah:We find the odd job guy and burn to death in his cart with the doll. Yeah. Which Cully bought for Lily, Rachel's daughter, but didn't give to Rachel's daughter instead gave to Noel who gave to Lynn who decided that it would be funny to put it in the wheelbarrow and burn it with the odd job man.
Mark:Why did she kill the odd job man? Because he doesn't threaten to blackmail anyone.
Sarah:Because she has a sense of humor, but Matthew doesn't. Like that, you think that's funny? That's not a sense of humor. Great. You're psycho.
Sarah:The odd job man has a squeaky cart and it might've been him on the road. He might've seen her kill Fiona. That's why she has to kill him.
Mark:Speaking of Scott, he does his freak out really well here. He's had enough. Barnaby's like, do you intend to stay? And he's like, I just got here. There's murders all over
Sarah:the place. And I don't I haven't even had time to find out where the post office is. And
Mark:You you were at
Sarah:the post office earlier. Sorry. You kind of live above the
Mark:post office. Kinda. But, you know, but then he does the right thing here and he says, can I buy you breakfast? Yep. And Tom says, yes.
Sarah:Scott knows when to turn on the charm. Yep. My favorite Scott line from this episode is where I'm from, open garden day is when someone breaks into your shed.
Mark:Yeah. And he uses that, like, later in Orcus fat fatalities when he breaks into the the safe. Yeah. It's kinda, like, implied that, maybe Dan Scott had some bad times in his early years.
Sarah:So we get this picture of Rachel and Lily's life as one that's in the dark. Yeah. Like she she and Lily have to go for their walks at night. They really don't go outside except in their backyard. They live on the very edge of town on Snakes Lane.
Mark:And Barnaby learns this when he goes to see her. Now, what is the line before Barnaby goes to see Rachel?
Sarah:Go look at those medical records.
Mark:We need to see those medical records.
Sarah:Yeah. And so he sends Scott to do it. Okay. It's boring. We don't need to see it.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:And they don't need to do it together.
Mark:Okay. So Barnaby goes to Rachel's, then leaves there and meets Scott at the doll shop. Yeah. There are no medical records in any of those places.
Sarah:No. He's already done it.
Mark:I I want five
Sarah:He did it off screen. I want need to see it.
Mark:20 frames of Scott looking for those records. Damn it.
Sarah:It would have been boring. Ugh. It would have been boring.
Mark:But he would've been like, No,
Sarah:he just gives him the information later.
Mark:I guess.
Sarah:Tells him what he needs to know. Yeah. So let's get to this last scene at Rachel's.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Collie goes to see her because that's what you do when somebody tries to kill you in the afternoon. You go see them at night in their home.
Mark:And the squeaking has come. It's like a horror movie, the squeaking. It's the baby buggy though.
Sarah:It's it's the pram. It's the stroller.
Mark:What does Barnaby call it? The wheeled kid carriers?
Sarah:The baby transporter or something. Crazy thing.
Mark:I'm like, it's a pram, man. Call it a pram.
Sarah:It's it's a stroller, dude.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:And the reason that we're told that Rachel and Lily live in shadow is because Lily is a spitting image of her mother. And people did I say? No. Rachel and Rachel and Lily. Yes.
Sarah:No. Because Lily looks too much like Lynn. So Rachel's not allowed to go out.
Mark:But Lily looks like Rachel.
Sarah:She certainly doesn't look like Lynn.
Mark:No. She doesn't look like
Sarah:They should have found a little girl who was, you know, really fair haired, who looked like Cully, but without the gorilla arms.
Mark:And I'm not gonna make fun of Kelly's gorilla arms.
Sarah:And then we might have thought
Mark:pointed them out once. It's not a bad thing. I just was surprised.
Sarah:I know.
Mark:It it came out
Sarah:of nowhere. But we have to assume then that Lynn is financially supporting Rachel. You would think. Right. So Keeping
Mark:her in horrible headbands.
Sarah:So for just a second, Rachel is the victim who's doing the right thing.
Mark:Because she's leaving.
Sarah:She's leaving with Lily to give Lily a real life.
Mark:Absolutely. Does
Sarah:she try to drown her friend? Yes. Is she cruel and rude? Yes. But for a second you think, here's somebody who's been victimized.
Sarah:These other people have taken advantage of her, basically made her take this baby. And now she's taking responsibility and saying, I'm going to give this little girl a real life. We're getting out of here.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:But then she reverts back to type and just shoves Collie out a door.
Mark:Yeah. It's just so weird. Coink a dink.
Sarah:But she does save Collie's life.
Mark:Lynn's outside. Now, remember how I used
Sarah:to hurt you when we were small?
Mark:I've been telling you about my journey with these episodes, and we are way in the middle of Midsomer, right? Season seven, episode two. Some of these episodes, I don't know who the killer is.
Sarah:You've forgotten right before you rewatch
Mark:it. Forgotten. So I start and when I get to that point, I make a note in my notes. I don't know who the killer is right now, And I fast forward to the end because it's okay. Yeah.
Mark:I do that. Yeah. And I fast forward to the exact point where Lynn is walking across the road, and I'm like, oh, yeah, it's her.
Sarah:Now I remember.
Mark:I had to watch two frames to know, oh, yeah.
Sarah:Oh. Yeah. When I when I first started rewatching it, I thought it's either Noel or Lynn. I can't remember. But then as soon as Charles was killed, I remembered it was
Mark:Lynn. Yeah.
Sarah:There's no question.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Yeah, Rachel, Rachel's kind of horrible, but sort of a victim and sort of trying to do the right thing. And then she saves Collie's life by conking Lynn over the head. Yep. Because that knife is at Collie's throat. Yep.
Sarah:For sure.
Mark:Collie almost died, Sarah.
Sarah:And here's a tip. If you're a murderer who skulks around in a big coat and kills people with a knife, choose a knife that actually fits into your pocket. Yes. That doesn't have a handle hanging out, shining in the moonlight, screaming, I'm a killer.
Mark:I'll have you, you cow.
Sarah:I like how you deliver that. I'll have you, you cow. You,
Mark:you cow.
Sarah:You, you cow.
Mark:You, you cow. Wow. I sat there and looked at that line and said, how does that properly go into grammar?
Sarah:Where do the commas go?
Mark:Is there a comma there? I'll have you, you cow.
Sarah:Lynn's the killer. She does her weird sociopathic confession, and then Collie just can't imagine canceling a dinner reservation because who would care?
Mark:God forbid.
Sarah:And she's certainly not going to eat dinner by herself.
Mark:No. So Scott's there, Joyce is there, and Barnaby's there.
Sarah:And they have dinner.
Mark:And they toast to old friends, which is obviously a Troy reference.
Sarah:Yes. While they're glaring at Scott going, you're not him. But you're No. You might be okay.
Mark:I you know, there's a lot there's a lot of Scott hate. There is. There's a lot of Scott hate.
Sarah:We can't just love him immediately.
Mark:No. Right? Can't love him immediately. You know, Troy, at some point, was an immature racist homophobic. It's true.
Mark:So there's that.
Sarah:There's some growing to do, and that's okay.
Mark:And Scott is only around two seasons. It's not like he's here forever. No. Let's just accept Dan Scott for what he is.
Sarah:You know, I think he's okay. He's just different.
Mark:I like that he he he offers to buy Barnaby a drink and offers to take him out for breakfast. Like
Sarah:He has strengths.
Mark:Yeah. He does.
Sarah:But he is from a very different place.
Mark:And he does investigative stuff that Troy took easily a whole season to do.
Sarah:And he has to acclimate. Yeah. Right? And I don't know about you, but my first day on a new job, if the shit was hitting the fan like him, I'd be a little discombobulated too.
Mark:Yeah. There are three murders in this episode in the space of three days. In London, that would be a crime spree. Yeah. Now, I know a lot of people get killed in London.
Mark:There's a high murder rate and everything is a big city. There's a lot of people, a lot of people. But these are three murders in the town of 1,500 people. It would
Sarah:be like if there were three murders in London on the same block in the same day. Yeah. Right? Absolutely. In a very localized place.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:So we've got three corpses, Fiona, Charles and Jacob the odd job man.
Mark:Okay. Breathes. Who's
Sarah:Wow. Does he breathe?
Mark:He's he's not
Sarah:And looks around too.
Mark:He's not the best dead body. It's okay.
Sarah:But he does have a tough one.
Mark:He's a good actor. He's covered with that Carol's syrup crap.
Sarah:He's arched way back in a chair with a big apple in his mouth. I don't think I could do it.
Mark:It's gotta be hard to breathe.
Sarah:Jacob, we can't count because, well, he's ashes. We don't really see him.
Mark:Yeah. We don't really see
Sarah:him. The doll does a pretty good job being dead.
Mark:So Fiona without the movement, which I don't think is her fault
Sarah:That's not her fault. On her.
Mark:It's not her fault. I think she does a great job. She's got the wide open eyes and everything.
Sarah:And the rose in her mouth. Yep. Yep. I give Fiona the corpse of the episode. What about after the credits?
Mark:After the credits. Well, let's see.
Sarah:I think Matthew has to raise Lily. There's a show I'll watch.
Mark:Trying to put all this together. Matthew is Fiona's No, Matthew is who?
Sarah:Lynn's husband.
Mark:Oh, oh my God.
Sarah:Let's go to town, dad.
Mark:So that baby really should go to Noel. Yes. Noel has rights over it and should her.
Sarah:Yeah. And I don't think Cassie and Noel would
Mark:be charged
Sarah:with anything.
Mark:I didn't mean to talk about the baby like it was an it the way Cassie does. Yeah. She's beginning to think she's its real mother. Anyway, Cassie and Noel need to get out of that place. And
Sarah:I don't think they'll go anywhere, but I think Rachel might take Lily and go.
Mark:I think
Sarah:And I think that would be a good thing.
Mark:I think Matthew is gonna be like easily a week before he notices his wife is gone. Wait. Did I have a wife?
Sarah:And he'll complain about her legal fees. Yeah. Lynn's not gonna look good in the jumpsuit.
Mark:No. Scott's gonna be okay. Cully's gonna be okay.
Sarah:Maybe Cully gets new friends.
Mark:I hope Cully gets new friends.
Sarah:And Joyce can make breakfast
Mark:Yeah. Successfully. Nice kitchen. Yeah. The kitchen appears in the next episode too along with young Sherlock Holmes.
Sarah:Maybe Ronald gets to move back into the schoolmaster's house.
Mark:Maybe. Yeah. I would say that.
Sarah:Because It won't bother him that Charles was killed.
Mark:Charles rust has no family. No
Sarah:no No wife, no kids.
Mark:No wife, no kids.
Sarah:And it won't bother Ronald that Charles bled
Mark:all over the living room and be happy. They'll play cribbage in that room and be happy.
Sarah:Ring the bell, ding dong.
Mark:Figure out what three red is.
Sarah:They should have called this episode awards day.
Mark:Why is it called Bad tidings? It should be called bad title.
Sarah:They should have called it awards day. That would have made sense.
Mark:Awards day would have made sense. Yeah. Or your friends are crap.
Sarah:Watch out. Your friends are bad or Great Scott.
Mark:Great Scott. So you can find Midsomer Maniacs on Twitter, Instagram, and emails. We post on the Facebook groups for Midsomer Murders and Acorn in the subreddit and anywhere else you can find Maniacs.
Sarah:And if you remember that house with the little bridge in another episode, tell me, please tell me.
Mark:So I gotta tell you, I gotta tease here. We got some things in the works that are interesting.
Sarah:Oh, yeah. We're gonna we might have some pretty interesting episodes coming. Yep. Different episodes.
Mark:Yep. Some some interesting things afoot. Next episode is episode 31, which is season seven episode three, The Fisher King.
Sarah:It's a good one.
Mark:Oh, young Sherlock Holmes,
Sarah:It doesn't make me feel like I need to go shower. I'm so creeped and weirded out.
Mark:Oh, you've forgotten some things.
Sarah:It doesn't stay with me with that yucky feeling like this one does.
Mark:I just have two words for you. Are you ready? Are you listening?
Sarah:I'm listening.
Mark:Pagan Viagra.
Sarah:Oh, that's true. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. That's fun though. Yep. That's fun.
Sarah:All right. So until next time, Maniacs.
Mark:Bye, Maniacs. Gary Thompson.
Sarah:Jacob. Gary Thompson is her husband.
Mark:Oh, Gary yes. Sorry. You were trying that end again. And it's her daughter's boyfriend's husband. Yeah.
Mark:Dad. Dad. Jeez. You're screwed up. Let me draw that arrow again.
Sarah:Her daughter's boyfriend's husband. That's complicated. Hey, Maniacs. Hey, Maniacs. It's Midsomer Maniacs.
Mark:Really? Is it Non Young Sherlock Holmes?
Sarah:No. It's All Maniacs All the Time.
Mark:Okay. All Maniacs All the Time. Midsomer Maniacs is a podcast dedicated to the ITV series, Midsomer Murders. Each week, we dig into an episode of the show, including the murders, the mayhem, the loonies, and everything else we love, and this episode has lots.
Sarah:Yep. And as usual, if your kids can watch the episodes, they can handle the podcast.
Mark:So we're looking at the Fisher King episode seven
Sarah:of Season seven.
Mark:Seven episode three. Sorry. Filmed in September and October 2003. The broadcast date was the 01/11/2004 to 10,170,000 viewers.
Sarah:We have a couple of themes that we wanna dig into here. So we're gonna do this a little bit differently.
Mark:Well, before we begin Okay. Sarah, have something I have to tell you.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:I know we've been married almost fifteen years now.
Sarah:Uh-huh.
Mark:But Roger Heldman is my father.
Sarah:He's my father too.
Mark:What?
Sarah:You're gonna have to shoot her in a flaming arrow to fix this.
Mark:How is Roger Heldman the the father of everybody? And he he doesn't appear in this story because I think the poor man died of exhaustion.
Sarah:You don't know this, guys, but Mark is sitting in, with a family tree in front of him that he created just to keep the relationship straight.
Mark:I created a family tree.
Sarah:It's gonna be useful. Yes. What we wanna do is to dig into a few themes. And before we do that, we wanna just give a brief overview of the episode in case you didn't just rewatch it recently just to get it familiar in your head, give ourselves some things to talk about. Where does this take place?
Mark:So this takes place in Midsomer Priors.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:The the the pub that is mentioned just once is the plow. Yeah. And it's really the story of young Sherlock Holmes who is actually David Hartley Reed in the story. Yes. The actor played young Sherlock Holmes.
Sarah:Yes. Who he he was also a lawyer in seat of Chuckie in 2004. Wow. Yeah. You know, the movies with the evil doll with the red hair.
Mark:Didn't know that.
Sarah:Yep. Because a little bit part for you.
Mark:And he wants to try to rekindle his relationship with his wife, and he's doing this by enacting a ritual on a barrow owned by his aunt.
Sarah:Mhmm. His wife, Mystery Maniacs, is played by Rebecca Sarah, who is married to Roger Allum, Oh, okay.
Mark:She's married to Thursday? Mhmm.
Sarah:Has been for a long time.
Mark:That's pretty cool. Yeah. To do this, he must first basically, the first murder is of his half brother.
Sarah:Right. David Harley Reid's dad excavated the mound in 1970 and supposedly found a chalice and an arrow. Then Roger died
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:In that barrow, it collapsed on him and he died. Right? And the chalice and the arrow go missing. Missing. David Hartley Reid has basically dedicated his life to recovering those things and to telling the story of the mound.
Sarah:And he's all into Celtic mythology now, inadvertently married his sister and now thinks that Midsomer, if he shoots a flaming arrow into the rising sun, it will rekindle their relationship.
Mark:And as he does this, he is killed.
Sarah:Yes. So first we have we have the two couples. Right? We have David and Miriam, and we have Vanessa and Gareth. They're not a couple, but they're a pair.
Mark:Gareth really wants them to be.
Sarah:Yeah. They're all related. They don't know it initially, but they all are children of Roger.
Mark:And there's actually a shot right at the very beginning where they're all talking, which we accidentally paused on the last night last time we watched this.
Sarah:At the book signing.
Mark:At the book signing, and they're all there, and no one has any idea that they're related
Sarah:to each other. They're forced half siblings standing there next to each other. So the first death is Gareth, who is by all definitions an asshole. He's just tried to rape Vanessa.
Mark:It is unsettling how the r word is not used here
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:To me.
Sarah:No. And he's killed by having his femoral artery slashed by a spear that Harry
Mark:The spear.
Sarah:The spear that Harry was used using just previously fishing. Right?
Mark:I want to talk about that later on too.
Sarah:Yeah. We'll get back to it. Gareth dies. Then our next death.
Mark:Yeah. Our next death is David Hartley Reed.
Sarah:Right. Who's killed with an arrow.
Mark:On top of the barrel.
Sarah:Through his back and out his front. It's such thorough. Right. He shoots the flaming arrow into the sun and just as it leaves his bow and an arrow comes from behind him, right through him.
Mark:No one looks left. Apparently, they have a problem
Sarah:looking I I don't know why they didn't just look left for the guy with the bow, but he rolls down the barrow and he's dead. He's dead. And then our third death is a guy named Lavery, who's from the Ashmolean Museum, who has ripped off David's heritage by probably stealing the chalice that was in the barrow and claiming that it was found in a dig that he was running. Yes. And that is now the chalice is now in the Ashmolean Museum, but the spear is missing.
Sarah:Right? Yes. And he wants to get it. So of course that's how he's involved.
Mark:And we find out that the killer is actually Per Hansen, who is actually
Sarah:Paul Hartley Reed. Paul Hartley Reed. David's dad. Right. Well, no.
Sarah:David's mom's husband.
Mark:David's mom's husband and also is actually Charlie Gilbert from From Lovejoy. Lovejoy.
Sarah:Yeah. He's played by Malcolm Tierney.
Mark:Who is great. I love him in Lovejoy. I love him in this. He's fantastically skeezy Yes.
Sarah:Always. He's from Manchester, and I always love the fact that people from Manchester are called Mancunians. Oh. It's not quite as as good as being from Liverpool because then you're a Liverpudlian. Liverpudlian.
Sarah:Which is very fun. But he's a Mancunian. Yeah, he played Charlie Gimbert, in Lovejoy from '86 to '93. Yep. A long time.
Sarah:Yep. He was also in this great movie with Richard Burton, in '78 called the Medusa Touch.
Mark:I've seen that movie.
Sarah:Yeah. Richard Burton is a telekinetic novelist who accidentally causes disasters just by thinking about them.
Mark:Yep. I've seen that movie.
Sarah:But he's also an imperial officer in Star Wars four, A New Hope.
Mark:Oh, knew that too.
Sarah:Yeah. He's uncredited, but he's in there. You can see him. So he was he's in a lot
Mark:of stuff. So that's our second our third Star Wars because we had aunt Rue.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:We had
Sarah:The UFO guy.
Mark:UFO guy, and now Charlie.
Sarah:Yep. Yep. So that's Malcolm Tierney.
Mark:He's the killer, and Scott disarms him at the end before he kills Miriam and saves the day, and that's it? Yeah.
Sarah:That's a quick recap.
Mark:That's a quick recap.
Sarah:So if you haven't seen it in a while, you probably remember now because, Per Hansen comes back to give the tour of this the talk at the library that Joyce attends
Mark:about Use the white gloves.
Sarah:Arthurian legend, history or myth. Yes. And fakes a Norwegian accent for a little while and then reveals that, yes, he's Paul. So we've got complicated family relationships here.
Mark:Extremely complicated family relationships.
Sarah:David, Vanessa, Mystery Maniacs, are all children of Roger Heldman.
Mark:Of different mothers.
Sarah:With different mothers. Yes.
Mark:So Anne Heldman is his wife Mhmm. And they have Gareth.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:Jane Willows worked for him
Sarah:and was in love with She's in love with Nathan. Nathan. But she's raped by Roger.
Mark:She's raped by Roger.
Sarah:When she's 16.
Mark:And her child is Vanessa Stone
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:Who runs the bakery.
Sarah:Right. Paul is in love with Harry, who is Nathan's son.
Mark:David's mom, who's never named, who is Anne's sister Yes. Anne's sister has With been affair
Sarah:Roger.
Mark:With her wife, her sister's husband.
Sarah:Her brother-in-law.
Mark:Her brother-in-law. And that's Paul's dad. Mhmm. And then Mystery Maniacs mom.
Sarah:No. No. You just said that's Paul's dad. Nobody's Paul's dad.
Mark:No. No. Sorry. You're right.
Sarah:David's
Mark:Roger is Paul's dad.
Sarah:Okay. No.
Mark:No. Roger is David's dad. It's a bit confusing.
Sarah:The key is to know that these four people are half siblings.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Okay? But Vanessa is in love with Harry, who is not her half sibling.
Mark:No. Okay. And in fact, everybody's really okay with that relationship because they know that
Sarah:they're related. They're not related. And they're like fifteen years apart. So, hey, they you know, she could be his mom if she started early, but
Mark:Harry kinda acts a little immature, but not he's very handy. He does a lot of stuff.
Sarah:He does do a lot
Mark:of stuff. He fixes a dock. He hunts pike with a spear. Mhmm. And he, gets the mill going.
Sarah:Yeah. And wears the same shirt the whole show. Shirt when
Mark:he's got a shirt on.
Sarah:So you mentioned Vanessa and and her mom, Jane Willows. Jane Willows is played by Linda Bellingham. Who's done tons of things. Yes. In The UK, is most famous for being the OXO mom.
Sarah:She was in OXO commercials for years. If you're from The U S and you don't know what OXO is, they are bouillon cubes used for flavoring and dishes.
Mark:They're in Canada too, OXO cubes.
Sarah:And I watched just one commercial that was then and now kind of was the last one she did in 2016.
Mark:Perhaps.
Sarah:And that made me cry.
Mark:The saddest thing ever.
Sarah:Especially since the reason why it's so sad and we'll link to it, but the reason why it's so sad is that the family is moving out of the family home because the kids are all grown and we're just about to send our kids off to So we're going to have an empty nest too, but we're not moving.
Mark:It kind of hit. A bit close to home there.
Sarah:She also, made a couple of seasons of a show called My Tasty Travels with Linda Bellingham in which she went around Britain in a caravan that she called Battenberg. Okay. She apparently she had lots of fun doing
Mark:it. I guess so.
Sarah:She a lot of fun.
Mark:So okay.
Sarah:You wanna talk about doors?
Mark:Okay. Before I wanna talk about
Sarah:I almost slapped you while we were watching this. If you mentioned doors one more time. I love you so much. We've been married. How long?
Sarah:We've only ever gotten in one argument. I'm not kidding. One time we've raised our voices to each other, and I almost did it the other day. If you didn't shut up about the doors. Though you have a point.
Mark:Yes. I wanna talk about doors.
Sarah:You've got a lot to say about them, so go ahead.
Mark:In fact, I wanna talk about one door
Sarah:in particular. Actually, it's a set of doors. It's
Mark:it's the front and back door at Glebe House.
Sarah:Which is David Hartley Reed's house.
Mark:They can't keep them closed. There
Sarah:Seems to be a thing in Midsomer. Times. And and Except the one time that it takes a key.
Mark:Well and Per Hansen comes over and go sneaks in the house and goes, oh, the door was open. I couldn't resist. The door's always open.
Sarah:Except in the very end when he reveals that he's the bad guy, and he's got a key.
Mark:And then they they, like, five or six times, they're like, they walk through the door and they never shut it.
Sarah:No. They just leave it standing open behind.
Mark:And then they like, in the shot in the background, it's open, and two other characters reference the door being open all the time. Somebody is playing with us with these doors.
Sarah:Well and it's a really beautiful house.
Mark:Because I have a picture, a diagram with a bunch of lines on it does not mean I'm a conspiracy theory about the doors. It's clearly something going on about the doors.
Sarah:Well, and and so it's a beautiful house. It's a stone house. It's just gorgeous. So there's an outside door that is obviously added later. Right?
Sarah:And the interior door is the period door. Right inside the front door is David's awesome hobby room.
Mark:Yeah. So David's awesome hobby room has arrows in it, fly fishing equipment, and there was
Sarah:something Skis? Skis. There's a bike. It is There are targets for the arrows.
Mark:Like, just right inside the door. Man cave. Man cave.
Sarah:Stuff that I would think you would keep in the garage or an outbuilding or something.
Mark:Would David's man cave not be the barrow?
Sarah:Hearty Oh, har har. You're so funny.
Mark:I thought that was funny.
Sarah:Yeah. You got you got that out of your system?
Mark:Okay. I won't talk about doors anymore.
Sarah:I promise. The other set that I thought was interesting is the library. So so Jane Willows works at the library where Cully volunteered driving the library mobile.
Mark:Yeah. So this is Costin Library. There's a bunch of signs outside of it.
Sarah:And she's like an event director. She's the one who organizes the talk that Joyce goes to.
Mark:Well, I'll tell you exactly what she is because they prominently place her sign. So first of all, Tom comes in off the street to the Costin Library, and I tried to find that street. I looked really hard. There's a Barnardos, which is like a charity shop. Okay.
Mark:But it's not there anymore. It's not where it like, they've moved in the fifteen years since the episode. Yeah. I don't know where it is. It's obviously somewhere in Aux Stricture, but I couldn't figure out where.
Mark:There's a sign that says, Costin Library, Monday through Saturday, 09:30, and it closes at various times. And then there's notes about office out of hours returns. So now they do this thing with Jane to make sure that we know that she is the arts officer. Right? She tells Joyce she's the arts officer.
Mark:Mhmm. She runs the talk Mhmm. With Per as the arts officer.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:But there is no fewer than five art exhibition signs that are custom made for this episode.
Sarah:Well and her name and arts officer is on a nameplate on her in tray on her desk. Yes. So we have Just in case
Mark:we don't know. We have the following art exhibit signs that are all made just for this episode. They're all very large signs. Somebody enjoyed making these.
Sarah:Like posters.
Mark:Yep. So we have the new artist exhibition, the Costin Library Flowers in Bloom art exhibition, the Costin Library Contemporary Landscapes exhibition, the Costin Library Modern Art nineteen twenty to nineteen sixty two exhibition. All of those have gallery hours of twelve to six Tuesday to Friday on the bottom of them, and I went back and looked at the hour sign on the front of the building, and those are wrong hours. So the art gallery is apparently opened at different times than the library.
Sarah:Oh, okay. That's not horrible.
Mark:It's not horrible, but it's not like, don't touch anything in this set sign. Yeah. But it is definitely interesting. But they're they're using those signs to show us that of all the things she's done. Yeah.
Mark:Which again makes me ask how long Vanessa and Jane have been in town.
Sarah:Yeah. Because we get the impression that Jane lives in Costin, but Vanessa lives in Midsomer prior.
Mark:And she set up a bakery.
Sarah:But all this time, Jane has not seen Nathan, who she's been in love with since she was 16.
Mark:And it's her daughter's boyfriend's husband. Yeah. Dad. Dad. Jeez.
Mark:You're screwed up. Let me draw that arrow again.
Sarah:Her daughter's boyfriend's husband. That's complicated. The mill is also interesting, and I actually think it's two different buildings. One is a working mill.
Mark:So Nathan and Harry live in the mill. Right. And Vanessa is trying to get the mill.
Sarah:And owns it. Yeah. But Nathan and Harry live at the mill house. Yes. Which is attached to the mill itself.
Mark:Yes. Which is working apparently.
Sarah:Is a working mill. It made me wonder if this is the same mill that they use in the episode that Thursday's In when they're talking about renovating a mill.
Mark:They never go to that mill.
Sarah:They don't ever show it?
Mark:They never I thought show
Sarah:that they walked past it once.
Mark:But I was waiting for them to drop something that said like, somebody tried to renovate it a few years ago, but he was looming.
Sarah:Yeah. So It just made me think of Restoration Man, that episode where they're that couple buys a mill and they're trying to renovate it and make it work again and how troublesome it is. And the fact that this mill is still operating impressive.
Mark:They are amazing pre industrial factories. Yeah. That's what they are.
Sarah:And I guess Vanessa wants to buy it and fix it up maybe to grind flour for her bakery. I don't know why else she would want it.
Mark:I guess so. She has two kinds of bakery flour, by the way, for sale. It's called stones mill it's called stones flour. There's whole wheat and regular. Oh, that's good.
Sarah:I'm glad you noticed that.
Mark:Packages for both of them.
Sarah:All I know is I don't want bread from a bakery where somebody touches it as much as she touches that bread.
Mark:God. She's got her hands all over it.
Sarah:It's like touch touch. Squeeze. Squeeze.
Mark:You know? Squeeze. She's worse than Noel from the last episode touching the cake. That's true. Touchy touch touch.
Sarah:So Nathan Green, who is Harry's dad, is played by Jim Carter. Who is well recognized. You just called him big brows the whole time. He's married to Imelda Staunton who plays Mrs. Umbridge in Harry Potter.
Sarah:Yep. She's also the sinning wife in Dead Man's 11.
Mark:Yes. They they are well married. I I think I put a picture of them in
Sarah:They've been married for a
Mark:long time. For that. And they've been married for a long time and he's been in everything too.
Sarah:Here's just a taste. The favorites among the stuff that he's done. Downton Abbey, Super of
Mark:popular and known for Downton Abbey.
Sarah:Yep. He's in the Golden Compass in 2007. He plays this big, like burly braided haired guy. He's He's in Haunted Hunting Moon with Gilda Radnor and Gene Wilder.
Mark:As everybody should.
Sarah:Yeah. He's in Grave and Discretion with Sting from 1995. My favorite though. Yes. My two favorite of Jim Carter's roles.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:My personal, right? You can argue, but my personal two favorites. He plays the French spy in Top Secret with Val Kilmer.
Mark:Yes, he does.
Sarah:And has the most outrageous French accent and wears a beret the whole time. Fantastic. His most
Mark:That movie is underappreciated.
Sarah:It's like real genius. Yeah. It's just it's very smart, and it's very funny, and very fast.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:It's very
Mark:fast. It's like airplane does spy movies.
Sarah:Yes. But he also plays Jennifer the Viking and Eric the Viking.
Mark:Yeah. So you brought this up to me, and I would I remembered that he was in he was in it. I didn't remember that he played a woman by
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:We need to watch that movie again because everybody is in it.
Sarah:If I remember right, he's got a blonde wig on that has two big braids on either side and, like, really outrageous lipstick. It's him and Jim Broadbent together. They're just so
Mark:a picture of him and Jim Broadbent in Eric the Viking and list to it because if you haven't seen Eric of the Viking, it's also an amazing movie. There
Sarah:are, like, a dozen actors in Eric the Viking who have also been in Midsomer.
Mark:Oh, absolutely.
Sarah:It's there's so many. Yes. So many people. Alright. We I'm checking off my list here.
Sarah:Okay. Because I'm building up here. Doors. Because you know I got something good.
Mark:I've been promised something good.
Sarah:I sent him an I'm when I was doing my research and said, oh, boy. I got something good. It's a conspiracy for this episode.
Mark:It's crazy.
Sarah:You don't know. You don't know how crazy
Mark:what I've got is. No idea. I can't wait to hear.
Sarah:Alright. Let's talk about barrows. Okay. So describe the barrow in this episode.
Mark:The barrow in this episode is meant to appear to be, oh, let's say, 20 feet high.
Sarah:Yeah. I'd say.
Mark:It's covered clearly with grass that was just recently put on it. AstroTurf. It's a set. Yes. It has some very nonconvincing fake rocks around it.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And it has an interior that can be used to lit, and they take shots on the interior.
Sarah:And it looks sort of like, an altar. Yeah. Right? We've got two standing stones with a stone across it, and that's where the chalice and the arrow were found.
Mark:Yes. I consider it the coffee table where the magic chalice, the spear, and the magic helmet. No. There's no magic helmet.
Sarah:No magic
Mark:helmet there. And but it's sturdy enough that David runs up it and can stand on top of
Sarah:it. Yeah. I remember even the first time I saw this episode thinking, barrows don't look like that.
Mark:Yeah. My very first note on this episode is this is no time, team.
Sarah:Because most barrows are very worn down. Right? No matter how pronounced they might have been when they were built.
Mark:They're like mounds.
Sarah:They're very smoothed out over time. The the ground rises to meet them, and they've probably been plowed. The stones have probably been robbed from them to use in other places.
Mark:Like on Time Team, if you haven't watched Time Team, go watch them all. They're fantastic. But the early time teams before they put the CGI graphics in there, they would, like, look at a field and there would be, like, ripples in there, like, six mounds and a Yeah.
Sarah:And I'm like Like, the dirt rises up 18 inches. How can you tell?
Mark:I'm like, those are furrows from a From
Sarah:a tractor. Tractor. It's a mound. It's a mound. So we think of these mounds as being places they're burial places in the majority of cases.
Sarah:And, even when it was for like a leader of a clan, like the equivalent of a king in the iron age. They would have cleared a circle of turf. They would have dug a ditch around it. That's kind of a symbolic separation of the sacred space on the inside and the common space on the outside. And then they would, dig a hole in the middle.
Sarah:Sometimes they would line it with clay or with wood or stone, put the leader's body in there with ceremonial goods. Then they would have a big feast, a big dinner that they would serve around the mound and then they would cover it.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Right? Yeah. And It's so a Celtic ritual. Right. And and then later on By the
Mark:way, hi Druid. Nocturnal druid. You sent us some awesome stuff this week. Wink. Wink.
Mark:Keep it up.
Sarah:I'm sure you know way more about this than I do.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:But we think of mounds as being places where people are buried. Even in a ceremonial mound like that for a leader, warriors at later dates would be honored to be buried at the foot of that mound, right? When you're watching like a time team or something like that and they're excavating it, they start at the top, they do their layers and they find levels of burial goods going down the mound. Right? Because sometimes they would bury somebody else on top of it and build it up again.
Mark:If you watch one time team, you gotta find the one where they take vets from the, Afghan war and dig one of these mounds. Yeah. It is emotional
Sarah:It's like treatment
Mark:And it makes you PTSD and stuff like that. Yeah.
Sarah:And they find really cool stuff.
Mark:Find really cool stuff. It's a super great episode.
Sarah:So all that being said, I I I say all that. I preface it with all that because in my head, the mound in this episode isn't what a mound looks like. That's what I was thinking.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:I was wrong. Oh. Do tell. I was so wrong.
Mark:You were so wrong.
Sarah:There are many mounds that look almost identical to this except for the astroturf.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Now they are more gradual, they're smoother. Yeah. They ease in This currently pyramid like at some point. Yeah. They're a bit more gradual and I'm going to butcher this.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:But there's one in Anglesey in Wales called Bryn Chelidoo.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:We'll link to it. That looks almost exactly like this man.
Mark:Oh really?
Sarah:With the door and everything. Wow. Even closer though, in Oxfordshire is Weyland Smithy, which anybody who's ever been curious even remotely about iron age Britain has seen a picture of Weyland Smithy. It is, it's not, it's, it's more than a mound, it's passages. Yes.
Sarah:It's like a mound over a bunch of stone passages. It almost looks like a catacomb built into a mound. It has a gateway and everything. These big standing stones that are part of the architecture.
Mark:Yeah. The first time I went to England, I went to a place in I think it was in Cornwall called Carne Eni Fagyu that was like that.
Sarah:So I thought this mound, you know, it's it's super fake. It's so obvious. And it's true that the stones that form kind of the doorway would have been covered with earth.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:So it has been excavated to reveal those.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:But otherwise Maybe we're wrong. There's nothing wrong with this mound other than the fact that it's a little bit too pronounced. It's covered with plastic turf. It's clearly got some ribs showing in it like two by four And
Mark:surrounded by fake rocks.
Sarah:Yeah. But the design of it
Mark:Now they do pretty authentic. They do a great job on those freak rocks.
Sarah:Big fake rocks are hard to make. They they Having made some. Great job. But
Mark:if this place actually existed, it would rival Stonehenge in terms of popularity.
Sarah:It would have been excavated long before 1970.
Mark:I can
Sarah:tell you that.
Mark:Where you have corduroys and jean shirts.
Sarah:Some antiquarian doo dah would have dug it up way before. Yeah. Okay. Are you ready for my big reveal?
Mark:Hit me.
Sarah:The spear exists. The spear exists? I'm about to show you a picture.
Mark:Okay. For those of you listening at home, Sarah is about to hand me a picture.
Sarah:No. Okay. Here's the best picture of the spear I could find from the episode. Okay?
Mark:Okay. So this is the spear from the episode. It's about a foot long. It kind of has a curved head at the bottom with some gold.
Sarah:It's leaf shaped,
Mark:and
Sarah:it has some circular scroll work added onto it. Yes. Now unfold the page. Sweet Jesus. That spear is in the British Museum.
Mark:They direct this is the spear. Wait a minute. This is the spear on the cover of the book.
Sarah:The top spear is the real one.
Mark:It's it's the spear on the cover of the book. I know. Wow. Yeah. So they copied it and made it into this spear.
Mark:Yeah. But they left the picture of it on the book.
Sarah:Yeah. Oh. And you can buy a a replica of it for £450.
Mark:Well, jeez. Why don't we have one?
Sarah:The only difference and we'll post these pictures. But the only difference between the real one and the one that they use in the episode is the real one is worn away on one side. Yeah. Right? Because that's It's had some damage.
Mark:The picture on the front of the book, it's worn away on one side.
Sarah:And the sketch in Paul Hartley Reid's diary
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Shows it worn away.
Mark:So they clearly knew what was going on. Absolutely.
Sarah:Yeah. But why is the spear that Harry has complete?
Mark:I don't know.
Sarah:When it's so clearly worn away, even in the sketches.
Mark:Well, maybe that explains why David okay. So
Sarah:David Why David doesn't recognize the spear he's been looking for his whole life? Okay.
Mark:So this is what happens, and this is my biggest problem with this episode. I came to this episode again going, oh, this is the one with the stupid spear thing. David has spent his entire life looking for the spear and
Sarah:chalice. Vindicating his father He has prove that his
Mark:spear and the
Sarah:chalice were in the mound.
Mark:He opens the diaries to the picture of the spear instantly. Mhmm. Right? He knows this absolutely. He goes out fishing, and Harry has the spear on a stick.
Mark:In the water
Sarah:It's right in front of
Mark:him. It's well lit.
Sarah:Sunset. Dappled sunlight reflecting off the spear.
Mark:At it and goes,
Sarah:oh. What are you doing?
Mark:What are you doing?
Sarah:Why are you hunting it? Why are you trying to fish with a spear?
Mark:Like, he makes reference to the spear.
Sarah:The spear that's on the cover of his own book.
Mark:So then spear Pear sneaks into his house, leaving the door open, and puts the spear on the table, and David instantly recognizes it there as the spearhead.
Sarah:Yes. But not when it's on a stick. Not It's just too different when it's on a stick.
Mark:It's on a stick. I can't really recognize
Sarah:it. I don't know what it is.
Mark:It's on the cover of his book.
Sarah:Take it off the stick and I'll I'll recognize it. Oh. This is not the big bombshell I have for you. Oh my gosh. The fact that the spear is real Yes.
Sarah:Is not the big bombshell. Wow. Are you ready for the big bombshell? Okay. I looked into this spear because the British Museum is lovely.
Sarah:They have all their collections online. Yes. And when you find something in their collection, it has all kinds of information about when it was given to the museum, its measurements, what it's made of.
Mark:Oh, super good stuff.
Sarah:Where it was found. Yeah. All that good stuff. So I'm like, who donated this spear to the museum?
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:And did I fall down a rabbit hole of awesome? Okay. Okay? And this is absolutely relevant. Yes.
Sarah:Alright? Okay. So this spearhead was donated
Mark:Wait a minute. Did Roger Helderman have sex with some woman and they produced the spear? No.
Sarah:It's not that relevant. Okay. Okay. So this spearhead was donated to the, it was actually donated to the Museum of Ireland originally, and then it was given to the British Museum.
Mark:Because they both look Irish. Celtic. We're going to skip over the mixing up of Arthurian and Celtic in here.
Sarah:No, no, no, no, There's a difference, and we're going to talk about that.
Mark:No. Okay.
Sarah:But Britain and Celtic, Anglo Saxon, that gets mixed up. Yeah. Okay. Unless you're somebody who knows a lot about history and how all those tribes mixed together and then went apart Yeah. And became different tribes after the Romans and all that stuff.
Sarah:There's a there's whole books about that.
Mark:Right?
Sarah:Yes. Okay. So this spear was donated to the Museum of Ireland in 1931
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:By captain John Ball. Okay. He claimed he found it in the Thames. Okay. Okay.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:In London.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Mhmm. But he couldn't remember where. Along the beach. No. In the water.
Sarah:Okay. He donated a ton of things at the same time. He let the museum borrow it in 1931. In 1938, when he died, it was all donated. Okay?
Sarah:So I'm like, who is this captain John Ball?
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Who randomly finds spears in the Thames?
Mark:That are like 5,000 years old.
Sarah:Yeah. And beautiful. Yeah. Right? Oh, boy.
Sarah:I wound up reading an entire issue of the journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland from 2005. I read a 113 page article called the strange case of the Stringford Lough hoard.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Which is a hoard that the same Captain Ball donated to the Irish Museum.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:That was proven to be a complete forgery Oh. Within months of Okay. Donating So total fake. This guy started out as a mechanical engineer, went into the RAF in World War one, came out of that as a captain, became the biggest armaments dealer in The UK Yep. By buying all the leftover armaments after World War one, because there wasn't gonna be another war.
Mark:It's not gonna another war.
Sarah:And then sold them back to his own government. Right? He bought them at pennies on the dollar and then sold them back for World War two.
Mark:He must have like, I know in World War two, there are were war profiteering laws.
Sarah:Well, figured out a way around them. Yeah. Because when he died, his estate was worth over $4,000,000 in today's money.
Mark:Damn.
Sarah:But the beautiful thing, the thing I was most interested in is the same guy who donated this beautiful spearhead that has been authenticated that is real, started out by donating shit that he made in his shed.
Mark:Well, and this reference the episode reference Piltdown Man. Do you know Piltdown Yeah.
Sarah:And it's a complete hoax too.
Mark:Yeah. So Piltdown Man is a Royal Academy hoax where they were trying to find Darwin's missing link, and this one dude found a skull that he says was the missing link but turned out to be a human skull and a an orangutan jawbone.
Sarah:And That he put together.
Mark:And in one of the greatest moments of trickery and hoaxing, one of the royal society people who bought this hook line and sinker said, this would really be proven if we had a tooth. And, like, three weeks later, the same guy shows up again and goes I
Sarah:found a tooth.
Mark:I found a tooth.
Sarah:Just happened to, you know, find one.
Mark:What do you know? It's a goiga dink.
Sarah:So this guy, Ball, he comes back in his first job as he becomes a chauffeur to Lord Londonberry.
Mark:Right? Okay.
Sarah:And they live, you know, he works for Lord Londonberry. They live at an estate, you know, outside and Ball puts this ad in the newspaper that says, cut this out. It may be worth money to you someday. That's what it says at the top.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:And that he will buy all fines from plows, from fields, whatever. If somebody finds something, he'll buy it.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Because this is before the antiquarian fines laws in The UK where you have to call the museum and have it, you know, authenticated and not
Mark:Like if you if you're a treasure hunter or a detectorist in England and you find something of significance
Sarah:If you find a hoard, which is more than 5 coins
Mark:More than 5 coins or a piece of jewelry, I think, you gotta call a museum.
Sarah:Right. This guy was so audacious that he boasted of how quote, amusingly he has taken in the stupid authorities of Dublin museum.
Mark:Nice.
Sarah:He sold them this hoard that he claimed he found for £200, which is about $3,800 in today's money. And immediately these guys are writing letters. The museum officials are writing letters to Lord Londonberry saying, I know he's your friend, but this thing is clearly not real. Yeah. We're going to melt it down.
Sarah:We think it's worth about £20.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:This is the same guy who then donates thousands of things Yeah. To the museum, including the spear.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Alright? It's just his his story is incredible.
Mark:Well, we'll we'll link to a couple of things that we can make reference to, like his Wikipedia page.
Sarah:He sold armaments to China, though he didn't like them because they didn't pay on time. He sold them to Japan, who he liked because they paid promptly. The world's biggest independent arms seller. Wow. But when he died, his obituary listed him as a mechanical engineer.
Sarah:That's what he wanted it to say. He wouldn't fly unless he could fly his own plane. He wouldn't travel. Just insane. He died at 55, but man, if you will link to the article because captain John Bell is fascinating.
Mark:Bell or ball?
Sarah:Ball. Sorry.
Mark:It's okay.
Sarah:Captain John Ball is fascinating. And this spear would not exist in this episode if not for him. And all of his armaments dealing Yep. Antiquarian It's
Mark:clearly related. Clearly making reference to it. Yep. That's fantastic.
Sarah:It's it's awesome. So, let's talk about Midsomer.
Mark:Okay. Do you mean Midsomer or Midsomer?
Sarah:Okay. So the flyer that David Hartley Reid prints up, doesn't it spell Midsomer the same way twice?
Mark:Yes, it does. And that's wrong. That's wrong.
Sarah:Yeah. So Midsomer, s u m m e r. I'm only gonna talk about The UK version of the Midsomer festivals. Scandinavia and and European countries have completely, you know, historical Midsomer, celebrations.
Mark:By the way, if you're gonna do Midsomer Murders research in the future, be aware that you will look at Midsomer, the movie
Sarah:Samar, which is a Scandinavian spelling.
Mark:Midsomer festivals Mhmm. S u m m e r, and then Midsomer, the television show. Mhmm. Like, it's all over the place, and the subtitles are all correct.
Sarah:Yes. Google finally has learned that when I type in s o m e r, I mean, s o m e r and not, did you mean s u m m e r? No. I didn't freaking mean s u m m well, except this time.
Mark:God for god forbid. God forbid.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:There's an actual murderer in The UK who starts killing people on Midsomer. We're doomed.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. We're gonna get a lot of fake headlines then. The Midsomer festival in The UK is usually separate celebrated on June 24. Yeah.
Sarah:Now you looked up when the sun goes down and comes up on that day.
Mark:Yeah. June 21, I looked up the sun comes up and goes down because that festival, the
Sarah:It's like seven hours long. Joyce and Tom are hanging out in the dark.
Mark:The sun goes down 09:28 Mhmm. On that day, and the sun rises because they're there to the morning at 04:46.
Sarah:That's a long night. There
Mark:are no chairs. The Barnabas have been out all night, and all they've had to eat is a hot dog.
Sarah:Yeah. And then Joyce goes home and he's got to investigate another murder. In The UK, Midsomer day is traditionally what they call a quarter day. And as you would expect, there are four quarter days in the year. It's once every quarter, right?
Sarah:Yeah. So on March 25, which is the first one, that's Lady Day. June 24 is Midsomer Day. September 29 is Michaelmas and then December 25 is Christmas.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Right? So that's how the quarters are divided.
Mark:By the way, we're recording on pancake day, so enjoy your pancake races. Nom, nom, nom.
Sarah:So originally, once The UK became Christian, Midsomer Day turned into a celebration of Saint John the Baptist?
Mark:Yes. The way it is in the Roman Catholic church. So Saint John the Baptiste Day in Canada in Quebec is celebrated the twenty fourth.
Sarah:Mhmm. Which is when it is in The UK too.
Mark:And I know this because it's day before my birthday. Yep.
Sarah:So so traditionally, they would make three kinds of fires to celebrate Midsomer. One of clean bones and no wood.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Which would be called the bonfire.
Mark:Bone fire, bonfire. That makes sense.
Sarah:Another of clean wood and no bones and that's called the wake fire.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Because it would stay, they would keep it lit all night and they would stay awake by it. Okay. And the third is made with both bones and wood, and it's called St. John's Fire.
Mark:St. John's
Sarah:Fire. What about St. Elmo's Fire? No. So the bonfire, the fire I'm
Mark:there in motion.
Sarah:The fire that they have in the episode is actually a wake fire.
Mark:Yes. Technically. Not a bonfire. Yeah. I've never been to a bonfire.
Sarah:Unless you've been to a cremation. Yeah. I don't think you've been to a bonfire.
Mark:How do you start the bones on fire?
Sarah:A lot of gas?
Mark:I don't know. Lighter fluid. Whatever that stuff that David's putting on the arrows.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. Turpentine. I don't know. Something flammable.
Sarah:I'm not sure what they mean by clean bones. I guess that means that there's no meat on them.
Mark:I guess.
Sarah:Wouldn't smell very good
Mark:at all. I don't want to cook bones.
Sarah:No. And a mix of them. Don't think that would be even any better. No. So yeah, so it's a Wakefire that they've built and it keeps them awake all night.
Sarah:Okay. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Cool.
Sarah:The other, interesting reference in this episode, which is the title of the episode is the Fisher King. Yes. And knowing what I know now about the Fisher King, I have some bad news for Gareth.
Mark:Uh-oh, what's up with Gareth?
Sarah:Because if he had actually had the injury that the Fisher King had, it would not be his femoral artery that was cut. It would be his penis that was cut off.
Mark:I was thinking that probably it's penis, not femoral artery.
Sarah:Yeah. I mean, it's your femoral artery that bleeds out if somebody, you know, just lops off your junk.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:But the the the scene of Pear with the spear stabbing him over and over again is completely different if you think he's cutting off his junk with that spear. Yep. You got your legs crossed yet.
Mark:Though based on you know, based on his previous actions, that would make almost more sense.
Sarah:Yeah. Because the idea is that the legend of the Fisher King, it all implies that he's not able to father the next generation. Yeah. So he's infertile now. Okay.
Sarah:Right? Because his junk has been cut off.
Mark:Maybe somebody should have cut Roger's junk. Yeah, really?
Sarah:It's a genital wound and there's lots of different versions of that story, but basically But
Mark:Pear calls it a different kind of wound.
Sarah:He calls it the dolphin wound.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Right? Which is doleful, sad. It's the ending wound.
Mark:I would be very sad.
Sarah:Well, dollarus wound is a fatal wound basically. So there's lots of dollarus kinds of wounds, but this is a genital wound. It would make me
Mark:very sad.
Sarah:But the idea is that then he's impotent, right? He's a king who can't have a child. He's a king who can't give fertility to his lands. So the ceremony is to bring it back.
Mark:Which is more David. Though David's not actually infertile. He's just not married to his sister.
Sarah:Yeah. He's he's practicing some some prudence there.
Mark:If you don't remember, David goes to The Uke The USA to do postgraduate work.
Sarah:Because that's where an archaeologist from The UK goes. Yeah. To The US where nothing is old.
Mark:No. Nothing is old here. And then he meets Mystery Maniacs there. They fall instantly in love. They get married, and then they tell their parents by postcard.
Mark:Apparently, they didn't have telephones
Sarah:at this point in time either. It's more romantic to send a postcard.
Mark:And then they find out that they're brothers and sisters and instead.
Sarah:Of immediately getting divorced, they decide they're gonna they're gonna live together as brother and
Mark:sister. Any judge, if you went to any judge, he would be like, done. I'm sorry. No problem. That's horrible.
Mark:We'll unknow your marriage right now.
Sarah:Yep. I can only imagine what the people at home were thinking when they got the postcard. You did what?
Mark:Excuse me? Yeah. Who?
Sarah:No. Come home right now.
Mark:Hate to break it to you. Yeah. But you might know her.
Sarah:And their mothers must have been dead by the time they got home. Otherwise, they would have put a stop to that whole living together thing, would think.
Mark:David's mom and Mystery Maniacs mom get barely a passing, like they really get short shifted in
Sarah:But this that that whole deal. So the idea that the Fisher King would be involved in some kind of ceremony that would restore that, it fits. So the title here, it works. Unfortunately, the way it actually happens in the myth to restore and heal the wound of the Fisher King, you have to pour the blood from the spear on the wound.
Mark:Oh, on the junk? You gotta pour the blood
Sarah:on the junk and that heals it.
Mark:And where's the blood come from?
Sarah:That I wasn't real clear about.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:But he's called the fisher king because he can't hunt anymore. Yeah. He he just sits in a boat and goes fishing. And if you go visit him, you can go fishing.
Mark:So you need junk to to hunt?
Sarah:Yeah. How how good are you gonna be at running around if your junk's been lopped off?
Mark:I suppose.
Sarah:I think you're gonna slow down a little bit.
Mark:I guess so. I guess you lose the killer instinct.
Sarah:Without, you know, the antibiotics and all that stuff to help you heal. I think you'd be a little slowed down.
Mark:I guess. I don't really want to experiment with that.
Sarah:So so Gareth should have had his junk cut off and, David clearly does not understand the whole myth and how he's going to fix this thing. I could find no reference to a flaming arrow into the sun to fix problems.
Mark:Well, it's clearly what you need to do. Well, he's obsessed. He is. He's driven mad. His sister is absolutely right.
Mark:Like, at first, you feel like, oh, poor David's kind of a hippie guy, But then you really realize that because of his unrequited love for his sister, he's been driven mad. He's nuts.
Sarah:He's obsessed with fixing it. Yeah. And and fixing it is not dissolving the marriage. Fixing it is somehow making her not his sister. Yeah.
Sarah:Which he thinks he's gonna be able to do magically. And everybody knows that that's not possible.
Mark:When she throws that dollar store ring in the river Wow. That's a cheap ring. Wow.
Sarah:It almost bends when she takes it off the Yeah.
Mark:It does.
Sarah:But the title makes sense. Yep. Yeah. The the bar, the pub should have not been the plow. It really should have been like, you know, Arthur or something.
Mark:Well, bookstore is called the golden bow.
Sarah:Ah, there's another version of this myth that involves, cutting off the Fisher King's father's head
Mark:Oh.
Sarah:And carrying it around, and it continues to tell entertaining stories and keep people company.
Mark:Good on him.
Sarah:Yeah. You know? But and his dad was called Brand the Blessed.
Mark:Like Brian Blessed.
Sarah:It just made me think of Brian Blessed's head. If
Mark:Brian Blessed's head was still talking after I took it off,
Sarah:I wouldn't be surprised at all.
Mark:I would carry it around everywhere.
Sarah:Sorry, son, that your junk got cut off.
Mark:If you're okay. Everybody in The UK knows that Brian Blessed. Yes. If you're American and you don't know who Brian Blessed is, well, first of all, he's the hawk guy.
Sarah:He's the king of the hawk guys from from, Flash Gordon.
Mark:But he is the very definition of a big burly British guy who's loud and boisterous and fun.
Sarah:He has a smile that goes literally from one ear to the other. He's the largest mouth I've ever seen, and it's always smiling.
Mark:And you you cannot but fall instantly in love with him.
Sarah:That's the fisher king.
Mark:Well, there's a couple of things. So Ashmolean.
Sarah:Oh, yes. So the
Mark:they actually go to the Ashmolean. They go there's film of, Barnaby and Scott going to the Ashmolean.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:And they go inside, and it is in the Lavery's office. They also have thousands of Ashmolean posters. Mhmm. But that's clearly not in the Ashmolean. Right.
Mark:They clearly filmed walking up to it, and that was it. Yeah. Do you know what's at the Auschmolean?
Sarah:Lots of things.
Mark:Like, do you do you know a couple of things that you might you might have an idea of what's there? No. Okay. Well, first of all, Alfred's Jewel Yeah. Which is talked about in Time Team is there.
Mark:Mhmm. So this is, Alfred the Great's it's a piece of jewelry that's supposed to be related to him. Mhmm. Guy Fox lantern that that he had under the house of parliament is there. Nice.
Mark:And then there's a crossover with Lewis here.
Sarah:You Lewis takes place in Oxford. Does that make sense?
Mark:So Lewis takes place in Oxford, and he they have an episode. I I wonder if you remember this where they go there's a postcard of a painting sent to them, and it's called the hunt in the forest.
Sarah:Oh, uh-huh.
Mark:That painting is actually at the Ashmolean.
Sarah:I think they also have all of, JR Tolkien's stuff because he wrote when he was in Oxford.
Mark:Yes. And they have a very famous apotheosis of Germanicus there Mhmm. Also. There's some really cool stuff. I I didn't go to the Ashmolean ever that I've I've never been to Oxford, but if we get back to The UK, I would like to go to the Ashmolean.
Sarah:So we got three corpses.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Gareth, David, and Lavery.
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:Gareth is stabbed. David is shot with an arrow. Lavery is drowned in the mill. Yep. Who's the best?
Mark:It is by far Lavery. Yeah. I agree. Like, he is discolored, nonmoving
Sarah:And face down in water.
Mark:Down in water.
Sarah:They flip him over. It's not a dummy. It's him.
Mark:Yeah. They flip him over. He's not gasping.
Sarah:No. And granted, he may have only been face down for two seconds, but he's wearing a full suit, bow tie, shoes, everything. Yeah. Face down in the water even for a few seconds. So Lavery wins best corpse of the week.
Mark:Now and now it's not Lavery who gets knocked into the chute and goes out into the river. No. That is some bulky, big old
Sarah:Yes. Barely fitting into the suit.
Mark:There must be work for slight stuntmen. Yeah. I'm sure.
Sarah:Because There's body doubles.
Mark:Would think that most stuntmen are big burly guys, and not all actors are certainly like that.
Sarah:Right. So they they need but this is the kind of guy who might be, you know, driving a vehicle dressed as a woman in Midsomer.
Mark:Yes. For
Sarah:example. After the credits, the girls win.
Mark:The girls clean up. Okay. Pear's in jail. Pear's in jail. Gareth is dead.
Mark:Paul, David David is dead. Okay. So Vanessa Stone and Mystery Maniacs are the only real half heirs of the estate, the Heldman Estate. Right. Which has the barrow outside the window.
Sarah:Yes. So Anne might be sad.
Mark:Yeah. Anne's going to be sad. She loses her son.
Sarah:She was sad already. Yep. She's she said she felt guilty But she now putting a stop to her husband's fornication.
Mark:Yes. And she now knows who killed her husband. Yes. And it's not Nathan like she thought it was.
Sarah:But Mystery Maniacs stand to inherit. Mystery Maniacs got that beautiful house. Yep. And I think Nathan and Jane are gonna get back together again.
Mark:I absolutely think that they're gonna be fine together.
Sarah:And Vanessa and Harry will be fine.
Mark:Well, and Vanessa and Mystery Maniacs find out they're sisters and
Sarah:they're best friends. So that works.
Mark:So that works out.
Sarah:You know who else is best friends? Who? Scott and Harry.
Mark:Oh my god. What happened? So
Sarah:They juggle Scott together.
Mark:Goes to have a drink with Harry to ply him for information. And next thing we see, the two of them together juggling at hippie night. I'm like, what are you best friends now?
Sarah:And then when Lavery is down in the mill, they're like helping each other too. You could do a montage of them to a song like best friends. They're like, you know, they seem to juggle all night, by the way.
Mark:They're buddies all night now.
Sarah:Yeah. So Scott's got a friend too. So that's kinda nice. Yes. So that's the Fisher King.
Mark:Which is a whole lot of craziness. I can't believe that ball stuff. That's amazing that that that the spear actually exists.
Sarah:We'll post a link to all of it so you can also fall down the rabbit hole that I fell down. Absolutely. Pictures and all that good stuff. What's our next episode?
Mark:So our next episode is sins of commission. It's the author fair episode. Oh. With the horrible woman in the car.
Sarah:That blonde in the convertible playing that same song everywhere she goes, and it's horrible.
Mark:It is a musically challenging episode. Yes. I'll I'll I'll let you know that. A couple of things. First of all, just today, we set up, midsomermaniacs.transistor.fm.
Mark:Mhmm. And that has all of our episodes on it, and it has all of our show notes on it. So if you're looking different people online have asked me where to see the show notes. Mhmm. But if you go there, you will see the show notes for every single episode.
Sarah:So that's midsommarmaniacs.transistor.fm.
Mark:Yep. And that that has a featured episode and everything, and that will be automatically updated
Sarah:for them. Awesome.
Mark:So it makes it easier because we do have a website, but I I have a million things to do every episode and putting it up on the on the website was the last thing. And if you've ever been to our episode, it looks remarkably the same as the transistor page. I don't mind using the transistor page.
Sarah:No, it's easier to update.
Mark:So it's all automatic.
Sarah:But we're also on the Midsomer subreddit.
Mark:Yes. Though there's weird things afoot on the Midsomer subreddit. It hasn't been posted to in a long time, and I'm not sure if anyone can actually post on it right now.
Sarah:Interesting. Weird. It may Midsomer be a lot Facebook page, the Acorn Facebook page.
Mark:And Twitter, Instagram, and our email is MidsommarManiacs@Gmail.com.
Sarah:And you can leave us a voicemail there too.
Mark:Yep. So please anywhere else we find Maniacs. And then the final thing I wanna talk about is I I cannot believe all of you constantly, more and more of you listening to our show.
Sarah:It's so exciting. It is
Mark:unbelievable that the amount of downloads we had Monday because of the episode we dropped is the best by an a a huge amount, and then it just keeps going. I just am absolutely stunned by everybody. Thank you so much. The social media really picked up this week. We got an answer to our question about where the house was.
Sarah:Oh, house with the little bridge?
Mark:The house Hanging with the little
Sarah:put me out of my misery.
Mark:And a lot of other things. In fact, we were told that there's a red slice water that's holding up one of the curtains in the Barnaby's kitchen that we have to watch for.
Sarah:That's interesting.
Mark:We'll have to
Sarah:look for that. Yep. Never mind that light switch in the middle of the wall
Mark:that hugs Oh, you so
Sarah:God. Hate that. It's just so much fun to hear from you guys, to hear your thoughts, to hear answers to questions, things that you noticed that maybe we didn't notice. You're certainly going to have some information about Barrows and Celtic people and Midsomer festivals and all that good stuff. We love to learn from you guys.
Sarah:Absolutely. So keep it coming.
Mark:This is a, this is an episode that also has a ton of extras in it. So if you were on this episode, let us know. Yeah. But we have would love to hear about anybody's experiences with the show.
Sarah:Yeah. So until next time.
Mark:Bye, Maniacs.
Sarah:Bye, Maniacs.
Mark:Every time they mentioned it in the credits, they use the right the the the stuff at the bottom of the screen.
Sarah:The subtitle?
Mark:Just now wash your hands.
Sarah:Hey, Maniacs.
Mark:Hey, Maniacs.
Sarah:It's Midsomer Maniacs.
Mark:Hey, the return of Midsomer Maniacs. Oh, we only took
Sarah:a week off. We're Thanks. Thanks everyone for understanding that we needed to take a week off. Boy, if we thought last week was busy, we had no idea what this week was gonna be like.
Mark:It is it's craziness out there. First of all, please everyone be safe. Self isolate, wash your hands, do all those good things.
Sarah:Take care of yourselves and the people that you love.
Mark:Absolutely.
Sarah:As a result of the coronavirus and all of the fallout from that, we are actually at home for a few weeks.
Mark:My school is, closed. The classes are moved online, and, I will have loads of time to work on podcasts.
Sarah:I don't know that I'll have loads of time because I'll be working from home, but
Mark:I'll have
Sarah:a little bit more flexibility, certainly. Yep. And as a result of that, we thought just to kind of keep everybody cheered up and, you know, in that British killing people mood. Yes. We've got a little treat for you coming midweek.
Mark:But not like a twenty eight days later mood.
Sarah:Not like no. Not like a zombie breakout mood. It's not that No. Not yet anyway. Though the grocery store is a bit scary.
Mark:I I did go grocery shopping yesterday, and it was kinda crazy.
Sarah:You even went, what, 07:00 in the morning?
Mark:07:30 in the morning.
Sarah:And it was already nuts.
Mark:It was already nuts.
Sarah:We are gonna have a little treat for you, midweek. Look for it Wednesday in all the social media places. We're gonna post a list of 10 things to watch while you're at home self quarantining that you'll like if you like Midsomer. And, of course, if you have suggestions after you see our list, please reply and contribute to the list. Everybody will benefit.
Mark:Absolutely.
Sarah:Things to keep you busy while you're at
Mark:home. Busy.
Sarah:Alright. Let's get busy. With sins of commission.
Mark:Sins of commission episode four of season seven and our episode 32. And Midsomer Maniacs is a podcast dedicated to the ITV series, Midsomer Mirrors. Each week, we dig into an episode, the show including the murders, the mayhem, the loonies, and everything else we love.
Sarah:And we should say, as we always do, if your kids can handle Midsomer, they can handle the Maniacs. I'm Sarah.
Mark:I'm Mark.
Sarah:We're still ourselves. Okay.
Mark:And we got so much love. Taking a week off, we get so much love from people. It was so nice. I just wanna thank everybody for all the kind words you said.
Sarah:You mean nobody replied, I'm not gonna listen to you anymore then. Ugh.
Mark:No. No one did that
Sarah:at all. Of course, they didn't because there are beeps. They are. They're like us. We wouldn't do that.
Mark:So sins of commission filmed in July and August 2003. Broadcast date 01/18/2004, not '19. We're we're into the new century now.
Sarah:Nineteen o four.
Mark:Yeah. 9,710,000 viewers directed by Peter Smith and written by Elizabeth Ann Weil.
Sarah:And it takes place in Midsomer Saint Michael.
Mark:Which is a weird name. I gotta say, I'm okay with Midsomer Magnum, but Midsomer Saint Michael sounds weird.
Sarah:Yeah. It's the most kind of Catholic name we've heard so far, I think. Mean, there's been some Latin names like Magna, but
Mark:There's definitely a girl school tacked on here. I don't know why it's here.
Sarah:I don't know either. It's just an excuse to have a bunch of girls together.
Mark:I guess.
Sarah:It's set in the summertime when the school, which is a boarding school, is out of session. So the girls that are there are there because they're taking like summer classes. Kay calls them a cram session. So there's not very many of them.
Mark:They're there because they're hippies.
Sarah:They're there because they're going going to be oggled apparently, but we'll get to that.
Mark:We'll get to that.
Sarah:We're gonna do
Mark:Certainly not music classes.
Sarah:We're gonna do like a quick overview with summary of the episode. We've assumed that, you've at least seen it once. Maybe you watched it recently, so you don't need a whole lot of detail. We'll go over that, and then we've got some fun stuff to dig into. Are you ready?
Mark:So this episode is really centered around a writing competition. The Midsomer Saint Michael's writing Maplin Prize. It's the literary festival. The literary festival. They get, 20 k for the winner of the literary festival that was a gift by Connor Maplin.
Sarah:Right. And it's for first time authors.
Mark:And the trustees of this fund are Tim Settingfield, Grace Maplin, who is Connor's ex wife, and Camilla Crofton.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:So they're choosing who's gonna win.
Sarah:Wait a minute. Grace Maplin isn't Connor's ex wife. She's his widow.
Mark:Yes. She's his widow. Yeah. Correct. Correct.
Sarah:He just he just didn't leave her much. No. No. Yeah. So they're the trustees, for the prize, but they also organize the festival every year.
Sarah:And you know there's a literary festival because there's a giant book.
Mark:Yes. And Camilla Crofton is a author. Tim Settingfield runs a bookstore, and Grace Maplin's the the widow of of Connor Maplin. Now there's another author who's on the committee. Well, there's a couple of other authors on the committee.
Mark:They're they're guest judges. Yes. Harry Paulson is one.
Sarah:He's a former copper and now author.
Mark:And oh, oh, boy. Jezebel Tripp.
Sarah:She's a Tripp. Alright.
Mark:She is. And we get to talk all about her. And they're they're both represented by Sam Callahan, who is a publisher, and Neville Williams, who is the editor. Though Jezebel thinks he's like marketing.
Sarah:I don't we're we'll talk about the misunderstandings about publishing in this episode here in a minute. So we get we get Jezebel coming into town. Prior to that in the cold open, we've got mister red shoes who discovers Richard Rackham's dead body in his home.
Mark:But doesn't kill Richard. Nope. He discovers his body. And this is Neville in the red shoes.
Sarah:Yes. And steals the thickest laptop I've ever seen.
Mark:With so many peripherals attached to it.
Sarah:Which apparently, according to some folks online, don't actually work with the printer that's sitting there next door.
Mark:No. They don't.
Sarah:And a USB cord that rearranges itself. It reverses itself between scenes.
Mark:No. It's there's no USB cord there. There wouldn't have been USB then.
Sarah:But some kind of cord. Some kind of cord. They're all serial port cords. Yeah. Richard's dead.
Sarah:The literary festival goes on. Jezebel's a handful. She's got everybody hopping on her command.
Mark:One thing we didn't plan out, and I wanna talk about really quickly here, is Jezebel has a theme song.
Sarah:The song that she plays in her red convertible every time we see her in the car.
Mark:Yes. That song, as far as I can tell, and I looked, was created for this episode.
Sarah:Yeah. And I can't find a credit for it anywhere.
Mark:It's not in the credits at all. So they had to I would assume the guy who does the music for the episode, he wrote and performs that song.
Sarah:But she cranks it up like it's a jam, and it's not.
Mark:It's no jam. It is it is it is no jam.
Sarah:No jam at all.
Mark:It makes no sense at all.
Sarah:It makes her look lame rather than cool, which she's clearly supposed to be.
Mark:Well, it gives her something to do when she's almost almost kiss killing Scott.
Sarah:Yeah. She shows up. She starts throwing her weight around, bosses people around. She's got a flunky with her, whose name I always wanna say is Ludlow. No.
Sarah:It's David Lowry Yeah. Who's supposed to be her personal trainer, but is actually her ghost writer, who's not a ghost writer yet because she's not a writer.
Mark:I'll tell you how much of a flunky he is. He doesn't even make the who's who page in the magazine. Magazine?
Sarah:The Midsomer Murder Magazine.
Mark:I hold in my hand the Midsomer Murders official collection on DVD with magazine published fortnightly.
Sarah:Oh my gosh, guys. We are so excited about this. So I, in doing research for another episode, found some images that were screenshots of a magazine dedicated to Midsomer murder. It was clearly a guide that went along with the DVDs, but it was in German. Yeah.
Sarah:I'm like, okay. So this magazine exists. Why don't we own it? Yes. So I found out that it was only released in Germany, Australia, and one other country.
Sarah:I can't remember right now. So Australia was the only one that was in English. So I went on the hunt. I found somebody on eBay who had, like, 50 issues of it that they were selling as a lot, and I bought those babies.
Mark:Oh, and we got them. He's sitting
Sarah:here flipping through it, looking at it like like there's a centerfold in it. He's so excited.
Mark:So this includes a who's who of every episode plus and and this is why we we saw it.
Sarah:That's how I found it because it had the family tree in it last The family tree from the last fisher king. Yeah.
Mark:It's not every episode. It's got a murder map, which actually is pretty nice.
Sarah:It shows you where everybody lives and where they were killed.
Mark:Midsomer, Saint Michael. There's a thing on a couple of the guest stars. There's a thing on the house, which is the manor. My favorite article was about Derek Bain who edits Midsomer Murders.
Sarah:It's an interview with the editor.
Mark:Yep. And finally, there is a whole thing about the director of the episode as well. It's just fantastic.
Sarah:Maybe we can scan like a page.
Mark:Well, I think at the very least we can scan in the murder map so people can see what where everyone's house is.
Sarah:Because they're not available anymore. I realized that somebody owns the copyright to them, but since they're not available, you can't buy them anymore. We're not really taking money out of anybody's pocket if we scan a page.
Mark:No. And I don't think we'll scan a page for every episode. No.
Sarah:Just to give you an idea.
Mark:At least give you the cover so you can see what you're missing because we have them all now.
Sarah:Mark's been petting them kinda like, my precious.
Mark:We also have a few friends in the town that we live in who listen to the podcast who, when they find out we have the magazine, may be like
Sarah:Quarantine. Shmarantine. I'm coming over.
Mark:Can we borrow some of those
Sarah:magazine? Alright. Let's get back to the episode. So Roger Richard Redman is dead. Right.
Sarah:And Kay Settingfield finds his body. Yep. They're friends. She comes by. She finds the body.
Mark:She calls the police. It's murder.
Sarah:She steals a postcard from the mantle.
Mark:Right in front of Tom.
Sarah:Yeah. And we find out that Richard's very successful first novel, which won the prize of the year before, is called Narcomania.
Mark:What is Narcomania? It's a narcotic addiction. Yeah. It's a fancy name for that. And also, he's the gay.
Mark:Note the the gay because of his gay magazines.
Sarah:They're gay gay magazines. They're super gay magazines apparently because they just say this is a gay magazine on the cover.
Mark:And the both those magazines, Gay Life and Gay Times, I think the other one is, are both real magazines. I couldn't get back issues back that far to see which ones they were.
Sarah:Not naked man magazines. They're
Mark:like They're like
Sarah:Gay lifestyle magazines. Yeah. Right? They're they're lifestyle way oversimplify that whole issue with those magazines.
Mark:Yeah. They're like, they're just out in the open here.
Sarah:Yeah. Because they're just magazines.
Mark:They're just magazines.
Sarah:It's not porn, people. Nope. But they make it look like it is.
Mark:Everybody arrives for the contest. Mhmm. But Tim and his sister Kay have something planned.
Sarah:Yeah. It's it's clear that there's a couple of groups of people who are conspiring. So we've got Kay and Tim, brother and sister, they're conspiring to do something behind the scenes within
Mark:With John Denton.
Sarah:Right. With John Denton. So that's one group of people, and then there's Neville and Sam and Jezebel who clearly have some conspiring going on between them, but we don't know what it's about.
Mark:Yes. And then also we have Grace and missus Honeycutt who are obviously up to new good in terms of the festival itself and money. It's a big red herring, but I love missus Honeycutt. She's so strangely weird.
Sarah:Well, and missus Honeycutt and Grace's I I mean, I I guess they're stealing money.
Mark:They're they're overcharging. They're having the people at the festival overcharge the
Sarah:The trust. Trust and then splitting the difference.
Mark:Splitting the difference.
Sarah:But that gives, John Denton and Cully Barnaby a reason to hang out together and play Tommy and Tuppence.
Mark:Cully Barbie? Is she, like, related to Tom Barnabas and somehow?
Sarah:Well, you can't tell that she's related by looking at her, but you can recognize her from the previous episode because she's wearing the same damn outfit. Yes. Is Cully's wardrobe budget that small?
Mark:I think she probably had to wear her own clothes.
Sarah:But she can only wear that one boat neck top, which is super cute. I like that top, but I don't like it that much.
Mark:Well, you know who else likes it? John Denton likes it.
Sarah:Yeah. He likes it. He's a pheasant plucker. He's a He works for Fife's Fine Foods
Mark:Fife's Fine Foods.
Sarah:As a pheasant plucker. No. Yeah. He works for the catering company.
Mark:As well as being an author.
Sarah:And a former bad boy.
Mark:And he went to the army.
Sarah:Yeah. Tom and Harry both know, John Denton because when he was younger, he got into some trouble with the law. He was on the wrong path. Harry kind of straightened him out, then he went into the military. And when he came out, he was a writer.
Sarah:Yep. And indicator or a pheasant blocker.
Mark:And Harry Paulson is a ex copper who now writes crime novels, but it turns out he only goes he has somebody ghostwrite him, and he just basically reads them and says, yeah, this is okay or it's not.
Sarah:He's come he comes up with the plot. Yeah. Somebody else writes it out.
Mark:Somebody else
Sarah:writes it good money doing it. Yeah. Right? He's oh,
Mark:he's also the gay.
Sarah:Yeah. So we find out that the postcard that Kay stole was actually to Richard from Neville and it was, had some kind of live message on
Mark:it. So
Sarah:now we know that Neville and Richard had a thing going. Then we later find out that Richard and Harry had a thing going.
Mark:So Richard and Neville
Sarah:Harry's kind of an old dude to be getting it on with guys like Richard and Neville who are young and handsome.
Mark:Richard and Harry. Richard and and Neville and Harry, I think too. And Richard and Neville. As well as Tim and Grace and Grace and Helen. Doug.
Mark:Grace and
Sarah:Sam. And Sam. Not Grace and Helen.
Mark:Grace and Helen. They're not that gay.
Sarah:There's gays, but there's no lesbians in this episode. We've got just about everything else. We've got brother and sister who are I don't think they're too close, but they're weird.
Mark:But it's weird how the Tim Grace thing is thrown in. It's just like an afterthought.
Sarah:Yeah. Because he clearly idolizes her her dead husband. He calls he was willing to have an affair with her behind his back.
Mark:Tim says that Connor was his soulmate. Yeah. Which led me to think that maybe they were the gay.
Sarah:No. I don't think so.
Mark:I think
Sarah:they were just really close friends. Kelly's serving drinks at the literary festival kickoff dinner. Jezebel apparently tells a really funny joke.
Mark:Well, is the funny joke, I don't know how to wear clothes that show off my figure. Wow. That's wow.
Sarah:Whoo. Can we get her a bra,
Mark:please? It's it's not a matter of a bra. Okay. I'm gonna try my best here.
Sarah:Well and let me say, hey. Wear a bra. Don't wear a bra. I don't care, but that dress needed something. That red dress needed some kind of foundation garment to make it look good.
Mark:The blue shirt and the red dress both need some lift. I'm just saying.
Sarah:And for a character who's supposed to be super hot to try Yeah. They don't do her any justice.
Mark:No. And she looks it makes her look bad.
Sarah:Yeah. Makes her look less Sloppy. Less sexy and sophisticated than she's supposed to.
Mark:More sloppy. Yeah. I I just don't think I think they could have done better with her outfit.
Sarah:She's also got that she's rocking that hairdo at the dinner when she's wearing the red dress that Yep. That women at that time, some women at that time wore, which was where you pulled all of your hair over to one side and, like, stuck a comb in it to keep it there. Yes. But it wasn't really up?
Mark:Yes. So at the party, Neville dies.
Sarah:Yeah. And we find they find Neville on the patio. So it looks like he fell from the roof and smashed his head, but George almost immediately goes, nope. He was bludgeoned with a big rock or something and then fell off the roof. Like, does Georgie know that?
Sarah:Because George knows everything.
Mark:I'm calling him Georgie now from now on.
Sarah:Because Tom calls him Georgie.
Mark:Tom calls him Georgie.
Sarah:And, of course Is this
Mark:the first time we see Tom in a tux? Because he's at the party, of course, for
Sarah:Yeah. I think it may be the first time we see him in black tie. Yeah. Yeah. I think it may be.
Sarah:Because when he was he he said didn't dress up when he went to the play. Or
Mark:What's her name's funeral?
Sarah:No. You don't wear a tux to a funeral. That would be weird. That's weird.
Mark:It is a weird funeral already.
Sarah:I think we see him in a tux again, but I think this may be the first time we see him in a tux.
Mark:So they go to Neville's room, they find the red trainers, and they also find the broken piggy bank that got stolen.
Sarah:Yeah. It was on Richard's mantle, and it's been stolen. So now we've got Richard dead, Neville dead, and still Kaye and Tim and John Denton are still conspiring.
Mark:And they have their great scene in the the bath tub where
Sarah:It's not a bathtub. It's a swimming pool.
Mark:Swimming pool. They have this great If
Sarah:the three of them were in the bathtub together, that would be a completely different scene.
Mark:Very different scene.
Sarah:They're at the Ludo Yeah. Which is part of the school, which because Kay is kind of running the school for the summer, she opens up to the public. Isn't that nice? So Camilla can also be there.
Mark:Yes. So they're talking and they're like, well, we didn't kill them. Did you kill
Sarah:them? You know, if you wanna have a secret conversation, don't have it in an echoey indoor pool because there are no secrets in an indoor pool.
Mark:Absolutely not. But that shot is well done. Yeah. It's really well done. Fun.
Sarah:Yeah. And they're clearly not the bad guys. No. Like, they're conspiring, but they're not evil. No.
Sarah:Like, when Sam and Neville and Jezebel are talking, they're clearly up to no good.
Mark:Speaking of Jezebel, her and her boyfriend, what's his name? Layton? Lipton? Lowry. Lowry.
Sarah:Sneak off. I just call him mister bad wig. Oh, he is bad. In my notes. Though, I don't think it's a wig.
Sarah:I think it's just really bad hair.
Mark:Sneak off and hide a laptop outside. Though there are a number of inside locations, they could have hidden it.
Sarah:Well, she meets up with Lowry with Richard's laptop because she wants him to destroy it. Yes. But he doesn't feel good doing that, so he just leaves it in the bushes
Mark:Behind a stump.
Sarah:By the coolest gatehouse
Mark:ever. It's all black.
Sarah:That black gatehouse is actually the gatehouse for Hall Barn.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Which is a an estate that we've seen before in Midsomer.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Because Hall Barn was also, the estate of the Talbots in Saint Malley's day. That gatehouse. Oh, it's so awesome. It's like black black, but black black black. Yep.
Sarah:It's super cool.
Mark:It's all black.
Sarah:So I needed to find out where it was. Turns out it's the gatehouse for Hall Barn, which was which is the the worst name for a beautiful estate.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:It was the family home of the Talbins in the murder on St. Malley's day.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:That one that's kind of like a, it's like a three story cube with a pond behind it and the folly on the other side. Yeah. So that's the gatehouse for that house. Oh. I found all kinds of pictures of the outside of it, but I can't find a darn picture of the inside of it.
Sarah:It's too dark. I well, I wonder if there is an inside.
Mark:There might not be.
Sarah:Or if it's just kind of like a fixture and not really a building.
Mark:Could be.
Sarah:But, hey, if anybody out there can find a picture of the inside of the Black Lodge, which is the gatehouse Well,
Mark:the Black Lodge is a whole different podcast. Kate. Yeah. But That's my Twin Peaks black lodge.
Sarah:But this thing's called the Black Lodge, which makes it even cooler.
Mark:That's even cooler. We gotta put a picture of it in the show notes
Sarah:for sure. If anybody's been there, if you've been I think it's in Berkshire. Yeah. Beaconshire. If anybody's been there and you've know anything about it, leave us a comment.
Mark:Yes, please.
Sarah:I'm dying to know. I I want to own that thing.
Mark:Tell us about the black lives.
Sarah:I would gladly live in that thing. Yes. It's so cool. Anyway, I'll start peeking out about that. So Richard and Neville are both dead.
Sarah:Jez has tried to hand off the laptop, but Mr. Badwig wouldn't take it. Now we've got a key to a locker because it was in Neville's pocket that he got out of the piggy bank from Richard's house They figure out it's a locker key to a locker at the Ludo where they find a box of royalty statements and one conspicuous love letter.
Mark:And who gives them the tip? Camilla. Yeah. Who hid the love letter in there?
Sarah:Who's the killer and planted the whole thing in the first place.
Mark:Yes. So they find a box of royalty statements.
Sarah:And they are not only Richard's royalty statements, they're Jezebel's royalty statements too. Yes. So clearly, Richard thought there was something going on with Sam, his publisher.
Mark:Because it's tiny, it's barely ever talked about, but Richard was also a bookkeeper as well as a book writer.
Sarah:Yeah. He kept the books for for Grace Maplin, but he also kept some of the books for the publisher.
Mark:For Sam.
Sarah:Yeah. Missus Honeycutt's taking money. Cully and John see her doing it. And then we see her at the travel agency cook booking a trip to Barbados. Austin Travel.
Sarah:A one way.
Mark:Is that where Kelly used to work? I'm assuming so.
Sarah:There can't be more than one travel agency in Costa.
Mark:Even then, in the two thousands, travel industry was out on the way out.
Sarah:Travel agencies are so quaint now. Yep. To think of somebody actually going to a travel agent to book a trip is so funny.
Mark:The first time I went to England, I booked a bunch of travel through a travel agent that I never met.
Sarah:And they probably mailed you your plane tickets in the mail?
Mark:They mailed my plane tickets.
Sarah:And you had to keep track of them because if you lost them, you were screwed. Rude. And now here's my phone. Just scan this QR code. See?
Sarah:I'm on this flight. Yeah. Ta da. Off you go. John and Cully arrest.
Sarah:They do a citizen's arrest of missus Honeycutt to stop her from leaving, bring her into
Mark:Well, before that, before they do the arrest on her, she finds Jezebel dead.
Sarah:Oh, just skipped right over Jezebel being dead. Yes. How could I forget Jezebel being dead? Because when she dies, you're like, oh, good. Okay.
Sarah:Because, god, she's annoying in every way.
Mark:But she
Sarah:There's not one redeeming quality about that character.
Mark:Richard Rackham falls down the stairs. Yes. Nibble falls off a height. Right. But Jezebel gets sticked with a pokey poke.
Sarah:She gets bludgeoned and stabbed with a tent pole. A tent stake.
Mark:Yes. A
Sarah:wrought iron tent stake. At first, thought it was a crowbar.
Mark:Yeah. This literary festival is in the middle of being tore down and picked put up all through this episode. I never know what they're doing to it.
Sarah:I know. In those in all the b roll shots, it's like random people just kinda moving things around between tents.
Mark:Yeah. And you don't
Sarah:know if they're, like, disassembling everything. I'm you know, we know Camilla has some kung fu anyway. Right? Because she was in the gulag and then she was a secret agent. But the fact that she can go over and pull a pentag out of the floor, out of the ground, which you know is driven in with a sledgehammer for a big tent like that, they're not just, you know, stomped into the ground.
Mark:Camilla is actually black widow, though.
Sarah:Apparently Yeah. She's a superpowered person.
Mark:So after Jezebel is found dead, then they do the citizen citizen's arrest.
Sarah:Yes. Missus Honeycutt. Missus Honeycutt. And that's when Colley has to admit that she and John have been sleuthing. Yes.
Sarah:And Tom says, well, I'm disappointed you didn't tell me, but keep doing it.
Mark:Which he would never say, no. Not a policeman. No.
Sarah:No. No. No. He goes to confront Grace about the money, and she admits it. Yep.
Sarah:In her sitting room well, it's not her sitting room. I think it's an office in her house because there's a a draftsman's table there, and then there's it's clearly maybe somebody paints or I don't know. But we've already had a postcard and a piggy bank on a mantle. On her mantle, there's a weird sculpture that I think is of a diving otter.
Mark:Yes. But it doesn't look like a diving otter.
Sarah:Well, it's all white. It's ceramic, so there's no details painted on it. It's just white. It's either kind of an abstract diving otter or a giant sperm with feet. Yep.
Sarah:Viewer, you be the judge. You be the judge. It's behind Grace Maplin
Mark:We were
Sarah:the mantle.
Mark:Completely obsessed with it.
Sarah:I just kept pausing looking at it going, what is that? I looked it up. I tried to find a a sculpture that was similar. I couldn't find anything like that, but I did not search for sculpture of giant sperm with feet. I looked for diving otter.
Sarah:It was bad enough
Mark:that I look up all the gay magazines.
Sarah:Done. There's nothing wrong with gay
Mark:magazines. Wrong with gay magazines, but I I looked all over for gay magazines from that time. And then you went back.
Sarah:How many past issues do you have online? Can I look?
Mark:Yeah. Yeah.
Sarah:So Then Kelly makes out with Denton. Now we never see him again.
Mark:No. No. No. She doesn't make out with Denton till the very end.
Sarah:Oh, she goes to his house. Yeah. That's not at the very end.
Mark:Oh, yeah. There's a kissy kiss. You're right Yeah. In my notes. He's actually doing writing there.
Mark:The first and only time that we see someone doing writing in this episode, an episode about writers.
Sarah:We're gonna talk about that.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:If we can get through this summary, we're gonna talk about that.
Mark:We have the citizens arrested, missus Honeycutt, and then the award ceremony. Oh, no. No. Wait. We have the break in at Camilla's before then.
Sarah:Well, we've got two break ins. So one, Camilla's alarm clock alarm goes off. It's not her alarm clock. Her security alarm goes off.
Mark:She could kung fu the alarm clock too.
Sarah:So the coppers come running, and Tom and Scott reach they sneak into the house to find her and Sam on the couch pretending to look like they've just been interrupted making out, which, ew, because he's so gross. He is repulsive. Never mind that we've already seen him make out with Grace. Ew.
Mark:And okay. She is a a wonderful woman.
Sarah:Camilla or Grace?
Mark:Camilla is very handsome.
Sarah:She's sophisticated and beautiful.
Mark:Yep. This just feels like catching teenagers, and it just was gross.
Sarah:Yeah. Then we have another break in, which is where Lowry tries to get into Grace Maplin's house and Mrs. Honeycutt hits him over the head with the skillet.
Mark:Yes. Bonk. And then
Sarah:he has to admit he's not a personal trainer. He took off because he was actually Jezebel's ghost writer.
Mark:Going to be Jezebel's.
Sarah:Yeah. Because Jezebel was selling a book that Camilla wrote, and Camilla was gonna out it. So Jezebel was gonna be stuck with no books. Yeah. Right?
Sarah:And if they killed Camilla in the which was their plan all along between Sam and Neville and Jezebel Yes. Then they would need somebody to write the next book because it wouldn't be Camilla anymore, and it was gonna be Lowry. That's so confusing. I'm sorry.
Mark:So this book that Camilla wrote that Jezebel supposedly wrote, it's called chromosome wars. K?
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:Now Camilla characterized it as chick lit. Mhmm. During her speech.
Sarah:But it's sci fi. It's sci fi. But it can be chick lit sci fi at the same time.
Mark:Can be. It's it's weird that it's sci fi.
Sarah:I just I don't like the label chick lit. Just because a book is about women doesn't mean it's chick lit.
Mark:It doesn't
Sarah:I don't know what that even means.
Mark:It doesn't need to be either.
Sarah:No. But Barnaby It's obviously not very good, though.
Mark:So Barnaby figures out that Camilla wrote the Jezebel book.
Sarah:Because there's a line in it that was also in the love letter.
Mark:And he probably thinks that she's the killer at that point. Yeah. So what does he do?
Sarah:Goes to her house.
Mark:No. No. No. No? He goes to bed.
Sarah:Oh, that's right. He goes, uh-huh. I've got it. I'll do something about that
Mark:in the morning. Let's wait till the award ceremony.
Sarah:Yeah. Let's wait till she's on stage.
Mark:After receiving an award. John Denton wins the
Sarah:If Camilla winery if
Mark:Camilla disappears that night, it's gone. It's over.
Sarah:Yep. That's it. Yeah. Though he has a lot of respect for her.
Mark:He does.
Sarah:He talks to her quite a bit way before he ever suspects that she's a murderer.
Mark:Oh, also, he goes to the library sometime in there. Remember?
Sarah:Oh, yeah. Because he looks at the computer.
Mark:Because he's forgotten about the Research Dungeon.
Sarah:That's right. Well, the the research Dungeon maybe doesn't have that newspaper in it. And it means that Kali can be useful because she knows how to search an archive.
Mark:On a computer.
Sarah:With a browser. Yes. It's so it's not old for its time, but wow. Does it look ancient to us?
Mark:Did we ever use it? I don't know.
Sarah:And when we were using it, we thought it was the thing too. Absolutely.
Mark:There's the award ceremony, Camilla gets an award, and Barnaby arrests her. Yep. So then she confesses. But it's an interesting confession because she says this was entirely done in self defense.
Sarah:Yes. Because Richard and Sam and Neville and Jezebel were going to kill her to prevent her from admitting that she wrote Jezebel's books.
Mark:Yes. And Camilla's body is a deadly weapon, unable to stop itself from killing people.
Sarah:She can't help it. If somebody tries to
Mark:attack She
Sarah:just goes into automatic kung fu mode. Why did why was Richard going to kill her?
Mark:Richard was the first who was trying to try to kill her because they it was he she was gonna expose the whole, publishing company, and Sam had offered him a two book deal.
Sarah:Oh, that's right. So Sam paid Jezebel for the books, but then she turned right around and paid all of that money back out again to a company Which has Inc. Or something. Reiterations Limited. Yep.
Sarah:Which was actually Camilla. Richard discovered that he was gonna expose it. Then Sam Sam said, no, if you don't, I'll give you a two book deal. So he said, okay. So now he's in.
Mark:And he has to kill Camilla because she's coming over to help him write.
Sarah:Yes. And so he tries to kill her. She accidentally, oops, kung fu, and knocks him down the stairway.
Mark:I don't really understand how they both end up upstairs in his house. Maybe that's where
Sarah:his writing room was or something?
Mark:Because it's downstairs with the laptop.
Sarah:In a lot of cottages like that, the only bathroom is upstairs. I can understand that. So maybe she went up to use the bathroom and he followed her and then tried to kung fu her and she kung fu ed him instead.
Mark:Oh, he he got the kung fu alright.
Sarah:She had to kill Neville because Neville was trying to kill her because now it's his job. Like, they draw straws for who's gonna kill Camilla now.
Mark:Yep. And she uses a rock to kill him. Doesabel is A
Sarah:rock that's on the roof? Yep. That's convenient.
Mark:Yeah. It's convenient.
Sarah:So she hits him on the head and knocks him off, and then, of course, Jezebel is gonna do away with her before she can admit that she's the one who wrote the books.
Mark:And then Sam breaks in, the silly man, and just as he she's about to kill him, Barnaby walks in.
Sarah:Yeah. So really She goes,
Mark:managed not to kill again.
Sarah:The whole make out session really was a tussle to the death. Yep. Yeah. That is my favorite line of the whole episode. She says, at least I managed not to kill again.
Mark:So Scott bought bought tickets for Sergio's, which is a restaurant.
Sarah:He made a reservation for him and Jezebel to go out to dinner, which has now turned into a golden envelope.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:I've never made a reservation anywhere no matter how fancy that resulted in a golden envelope.
Mark:Never mind that Sergio's is not the fanciest place in the world.
Sarah:The waiters wear T shirts and jeans. Yeah. It may have fancy food, but it's not a fancy place. So Tom Certainly not a gold envelope place.
Mark:Tom takes Joyce instead, says the publishing world thinks and says to Camilla, while Cully and John Denton are kissy kissing.
Sarah:At his place because he can also cook.
Mark:But, again, we never hear of John Denton ever again. No. No. You know who the loser of this episode is? The other author in the contest.
Sarah:Yeah. The the Indian girl.
Mark:Thing is her is her name.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:She's 21.
Sarah:We know that because Scott interrogates her.
Mark:Scott interrogates her, but that's like, she's the loser in the episode.
Sarah:Well, but John earned the award. He didn't get it because of a conspiracy.
Mark:No. No. I So I agree completely, but she
Sarah:Maybe maybe she's not the loser. Maybe she's lucky.
Mark:Maybe she's lucky. Because she survived. Yes.
Sarah:So let's talk about a couple of important things in this episode, things that we found interesting. Let's start with the title.
Mark:Okay. Sins of commission, which at least one person online was like, don't you mean sins of omission? I was like, crap. Did I get the title wrong? I'm feverishly looking through the episode.
Mark:No. No. It's sins of commission.
Sarah:And sins of commission is correct. Yeah. So sin there are sins of commission and sins of omission.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:They are two separate things.
Mark:What are the differences?
Sarah:Sins of commission are acts that are sinful. So if you actively kill someone, that's a sin. Yes. Right? Of commission.
Sarah:You committed it. Yes. Sins of omission are sinful because of things you didn't do. So if you don't pray every day, that would be a sin of omission.
Mark:Or you leave something out. Or if you If
Sarah:you don't help someone who needs help Yeah. That would be a sin of omission. Okay. And they are both in the bible.
Mark:Okay. Sins of commission.
Sarah:But I think sins of omission is just kinda more common common in our language that it's not because a sin is kind of the connotation is that that's an act. Yeah. So a sin of omission is kind of the the sin that isn't an act. Yeah. It's a non act.
Sarah:Exactly. So it it it bears more detail there when we say it. Mhmm. But commission is also another word for, like, royalty.
Mark:Royalty or advance.
Sarah:Not royalty as in, like, nobles. No. Like, commission as in, like, a percentage of sales money. Right? So it could be a reference to that.
Mark:I think it's a sly reference to both things.
Sarah:And even though Neville and Richard and Sam and Jezebel were unsuccessful in killing Jezebel. There was Camilla. Sorry. Killing Camilla, they were still bad people.
Mark:They were.
Sarah:So even though they didn't pull it off Yes. They were still bad. They were. She's the one who actually killed people.
Mark:It's just a reaction.
Sarah:But maybe in self defense, so maybe hers wasn't a sin even though it was the commission.
Mark:I don't buy the self defense thing. You don't? Mel is a serial killer.
Sarah:Tom thinks she's gonna get away with self defense.
Mark:Tom has a little problem with older women who are just slightly cute. K? He gets a little bit of the blinders on there.
Sarah:So let's talk about publishing industry stuff because that's what this episode is supposed to all be about.
Mark:Let's frame this in that you used to work in the publishing. Yep. I've published books. We both have published books. Yep.
Mark:So we understand how this work. Yep. Now it is another country, so it might be slightly different, but I don't think it's that different. No. First of all, nobody writes in this book in this show.
Sarah:Well, to be fair, you're not gonna see a lot of people write at a literary festival. Writing is a solitary job.
Mark:Yes. But the the fact that, everybody has a ghostwriter except for Camilla and John Denton. John Denton. And Singh. Is in no way realistic.
Sarah:No. And the fact that so Sam is a publisher, right? So we assume that just because we only see Sam, that there is a bigger company behind him because otherwise they wouldn't be carrying a book like Jezebel's, which is this big bestseller everywhere, right? So she's a big time author. So he must represent a bigger company than we see him just at the daily desk.
Sarah:Right? Company. Maybe it's often cost him or something.
Mark:By the way, I've never met my publisher face to face. Certainly not had parties with her.
Sarah:Oh, see, I worked with publishers. I knew all kinds of publishers. Right?
Mark:But you worked in the publishing industry.
Sarah:Right. But I never saw an editor who acted like Neville.
Mark:No. An editor just edits the material.
Sarah:Editors are your guide as an author. Right? So when you're stuck or you want somebody to review something, you send it to your editor. They're also the ones who sort of keep you on schedule and usher your book through the publishing process. Yes.
Sarah:An agent is much more likely to be the one to book a hotel room for you at a literary festival than your editor.
Mark:Which Jezebel has none of and should. If Jezebel is this big best selling author,
Sarah:she should have an agent. She'd have a big fancy agent.
Mark:Yeah. And there would be agents all over this competition because that's one of the ways they find new people to represent.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:Like, when John wins the competition, there should be an agent going, I'd like to represent you.
Sarah:Right. Instead, they go straight to a publisher Yeah. And cut the agent out. And maybe because there's no agents represented here, maybe that's why everybody's getting ripped off by the publisher. Because that's an agent's job is to keep them straight.
Mark:The agent acts as a go between between the publisher and the author, especially around areas of money and contracts.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And they are there to protect their clients and make money for their clients.
Sarah:Right. Because they get a They
Mark:don't work for the publisher. They work for the author.
Sarah:Right. Speaking of of agents and hotel bookings. So when when Jezebel first checks into the hotel, she's complaining about how yucky it is. Lowry's giving her a back massage, and she tells Neville that it's a pants pub.
Mark:Yes. So I tried to find this.
Sarah:I did. I found it.
Mark:I I found one review where this guy reviewed this poor little B and B in Oxfordshire and called it a pants pub, and he was not happy about it.
Sarah:Well, know, so Brits call underwear pants. Mhmm. So you wear your pants under your trousers. Mhmm. So it's underwear.
Sarah:So it's just saying that it's it's an underwear pub. Like like, it's it's so bad that it may as well be underwear. It's slang for bad.
Mark:Okay. I know it's slang for bad, but I didn't I couldn't find many references to it.
Sarah:It just made me giggle because I thought, what would that be in America? We would say like
Mark:The underwear shack.
Sarah:We would say you know, if it was if it was a bad bar, we'd say, oh, this panty bar. It's a panty bar,
Mark:which actually It's something completely different. Again, completely different.
Sarah:Maybe we would call it, like, like, whitey tighty pub. No. No. No. Boxer bar?
Mark:Boxer bar is better. Fruit of the
Sarah:Womb bar?
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:Banana hammock. Yeah. It certainly would not be pants. No. Pants pub.
Mark:Nope. Pants pub. Which By the way, that's the worst massage ever.
Sarah:Well, he doesn't know how to give a massage because he's actually a writer with bad hair.
Mark:Yeah. You don't oh, ma. Poof.
Sarah:So speaking of publishing Yep. Joyce makes me really mad in this episode.
Mark:But why does Joyce make you really mad? Because Joyce is hardly in this episode only to talk about how much how little money Tom makes and how he can make a killing
Sarah:being Ghost writing books like Harry does. Now I'm saying, woman, get your own damn job I'm gonna be you want more money. What do
Mark:you do all day? Hold on. I'm gonna be nice and say that maybe Joyce is a little tired of her husband working such a dangerous job.
Sarah:Okay. Then encourage him to retire. Don't add another job.
Mark:But but he's too young to retire.
Sarah:Well, then he's too young to do two jobs.
Mark:So maybe I just think
Sarah:Like, she's she's not gonna see him any less if he's also if he's a cop and a writer.
Mark:No. I just think that she thinks that a cop is a dangerous job, and he could make a much more lucrative lifestyle for her and her flesh waters.
Sarah:It's that if she he was just publishing. You're being very kind.
Mark:I I think Joyce doesn't like that he gets called away all the time.
Sarah:Well, if she wasn't sitting around on her butt all the time, she wouldn't miss him all the time because she'd be doing something else.
Mark:Exactly.
Sarah:Besides going to clubs and stuff where people get killed.
Mark:It's like every episode, they're like, which of Joyce's traits are we gonna caricature in this episode?
Sarah:And I like Joyce in general, and I like their relationship, and I'm glad they have a good marriage.
Mark:I like Joyce. I love Joyce.
Sarah:I love Joyce. But in this this episode, I just wanna go, woman, get off his back. Yeah. Stop trying to guilt trip him while he's trying to solve a triple murder because you want him to have a little meeting with a publisher.
Mark:Never mind. They set up a meeting with the publisher, and all the days in this episode are completely bonkers.
Sarah:I have no idea where one day starts and another one stops. It just doesn't
Mark:all wrong.
Sarah:And you can't even do it by outfits because Culley never changes clothes.
Mark:No. I tried.
Sarah:Neither does Tim. He wears that Che Guevara T shirt half the episode.
Mark:I tried to figure out the the days, and I got lost halfway through.
Sarah:So what are you talking about about Joyce's flyswatters?
Mark:Yes. So in Joyce's kitchen, the Barnaby kitchen, for some reason, in the curtains in the background so we're at the the the far end of the kitchen, not the end that has the hub and the the island.
Sarah:Mhmm. The dining room end.
Mark:It's the dining room end. Mhmm. And there's a shot, and somebody on Facebook mentioned this to me, that there is a flight's water stuck into the curtains. What?
Sarah:Yes. Like wedged into them?
Mark:Wedged into stuck on them. It it's like it's you know how the curtains are swayed off to one side and there's a little belt around it? Yeah. The the fleece water is stuck in that belt.
Sarah:Okay. That's called a swag. Yeah. Right? Okay.
Sarah:And I I don't know exactly what they call the the little belt that you're calling it, the little band.
Mark:Yep. The swag belt.
Sarah:The curtains we have that are similar that have a little hook on the outside edge of the window sill that you sweep them back into instead of having a fancy little belt for them.
Mark:The swag belt.
Sarah:So it's just tucked in there just so it's an easy reach in case she's gotta whack something?
Mark:Kind of. It's everything else is either blue or yellow in that room, and this fleece water, I think, is red. I'll put a picture of it on in the show notes.
Sarah:Joyce has got some issues with flies.
Mark:Clearly a weird situation that that fleece water is right there.
Sarah:You think somebody left it there by accident?
Mark:I think that it might have been an accident. This set is alright. Don't touch anything.
Sarah:This is a dressed set.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:So let's talk about Tim and Kay Settingfield. They're brother and sister. She teaches at the school, and he runs a bookstore.
Mark:Okay. Tim is mister revolutionary, mister hippie dude, mister hanging out with the teen girls, mister everything I'm speaking in Latin, the educated erudite elite. Mhmm. Who runs a secondhand bookstore?
Sarah:Dad, the secondhand bookstore doesn't bother me. He's a hippie. So he's all about, you know, being good to the planet and recycling the books, and it me makes him independent. He can do his own thing.
Mark:Certainly doesn't give him skills in dancing. That's for sure.
Sarah:Or music choice.
Mark:No. No. No. That song also, I think, was made for the episode.
Sarah:Yeah. And at the beginning of the episode, when he's going to see Connor Maplin's grave with the girls, it's kind of sweet. He's like the pied piper, and they're clearly enjoying it, and they're into it. Not playing instruments, but they're having fun. Yeah.
Sarah:They're having fun. But later when they're at the pool He's all lecturing. We got all these close ups of girls' asses and bikinis and It's just Ugh. And he's ogling them, and that grossed me out.
Mark:He doesn't need to be there at
Sarah:all. And it doesn't suit his personality.
Mark:They could cut that scene out. Yep. And it wouldn't make any difference at all.
Sarah:Yeah. He's only there so that Kay can yell at him and get his attention.
Mark:That is it?
Sarah:Yeah. That's all. I was disappointed by that.
Mark:He's such a great actor. Tell us about that actor.
Sarah:Tim Settingfield is played by Donald Sumter. He's been in lots of things.
Mark:Tons of things.
Sarah:He was, he's one of only a handful of actors who were in the original doctor who's and in the rebirth episodes, the revival episodes of Doctor Who. He was also in the original TV version of the ABC murders, Bag of the Christie, which is really, really good.
Mark:Yes. He plays the
Sarah:He plays the salesman.
Mark:The salesman who really doesn't know whether he's not. He's the murderer at some point.
Sarah:Yeah. He's very tortured. He's tortured. And he plays that character really well. He also starred in the Black Panther series back in 1977.
Sarah:Yes. Which is a very cool show. But most recently, he was master Luin in Game of Thrones. He was the maester of Winterfell.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:But he was the Like, he's in
Mark:the first episode of He he's
Sarah:he's in several seasons. There are seasons where he's not in it Yeah. Because they're just not in Winterfell. Yeah. But he his actions basically save the Stark children.
Sarah:Yes. Allows them to get away.
Mark:So He absolutely has a love of the Stark family.
Sarah:Yeah. So Game of Thrones fans really like Donald Sumter. Yep. Grace Maplin is played by Stella Garnett. Yep.
Sarah:She's also in another Midsomer house of Elliot. Yeah. Oh, no. I'm sorry. She's not wrong note.
Sarah:She's in two seasons of a show called House of Elliot. That's what she's kind of known for. Yeah. But she's married to Nicholas Farrell, who played John Merrill in Stranglers Wood. He was the dad
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:Yeah. Whose son was Yeah. Screaming No eggs. Miss Merrill. So Celigonnet is married to Nicholas Farrell who played John Merrill.
Sarah:Okay. I never noticed those rhymed before. Beryl Merrill. Let me tell you something interesting about John Denton.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:He's played by Robert Whitlock. Yep. Who's he's been in a lot of things. Not not a ton of things, but a lot of things. But what's interesting about him is shortly after filming this episode of Midsomer, he sort of took a break from acting.
Sarah:Okay. Started a publishing house.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Became a lecturer in art because his big love, other than acting, is graffiti art.
Mark:Oh, that's cool.
Sarah:And so his publishing house only publishes books about graffiti. Okay. And it's a series called monochrome, m o n o k r o m e. Oh. And they are beautiful.
Mark:Well, I'll put a link in the show notes to them.
Sarah:You can also put a link to his Pinterest account.
Mark:Oh, he has a Pinterest account?
Sarah:Excellent. He pins a ton of graffiti stuff. It's beautiful stuff.
Mark:Of course, he does. He's he's pretty
Sarah:cool.
Mark:He is a pretty cool guy.
Sarah:Kinda cool. Yeah. Tim Tim's character goes awry. I'm sorry. I kind of ran aside there.
Sarah:But while we're talking about leches. Yes. Ledgling. Yes. Barnaby finds Scott sitting at his desk in the police station reading a magazine that looks a little bit suspicious.
Sarah:Oh my gosh. Right. Because it's a story about Jezebel, and she's in it like a full page spread wearing, like, black leathery things.
Mark:Nope. She's wearing nothing. I I made
Sarah:sure to look. Kind of like the cover of Chromosome More.
Mark:Yeah. It's kinda like That
Sarah:X-ray kind of nakedness. Yep. It's kinda like that. But you, I'm sure, read every word of the article that
Mark:he's reading. Boy, did I ever, and it gets so interesting. First of all, the title of the episode of the article is Jezebel's doesn't have a title. It just says chromosome wars.
Sarah:Right. But it's an interview with Jezebel Tripp. Right?
Mark:So one of the sort of subheadings is Jezebel Tripp's latest novel sees baddest guys take on the baddest girls in the ultimate battle of the sexes. And then there's a couple of quotes from Jezebel. I'm looking for a guy who's confident and very aggressive, extremely aggressive. Okay. And then she says, need a man to take charge and who will tell me to shut, and then it doesn't have you can't see what else it says.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:So those are the big quotes and the subheading.
Sarah:And Scott's like slavering over this article.
Mark:But then I read the text of the article and found a gem.
Sarah:Did you like zoom in?
Mark:No. No. You can read it.
Sarah:If you
Mark:pause at the right the right frame, you could read it. Okay. And you find out that it's actually instructions of how to install Microsoft Office 98. What? Yes.
Mark:They include such gems as if the name of your folder you install Microsoft Office 98 includes a comma, single quotation marks, or an exclamation point, you may have to rename the folder.
Sarah:The whole article, it's like a two page spread is all just copy paste from Windows 98 Office.
Mark:Installation. The version of this file works both with Internet Explorer and Office like web features. Wow. Like somebody just took something that they found on their desk or around where they were sitting and filled out that article.
Sarah:Wow. I
Mark:could not believe it. When I I was like, what does that? Where's what does this say? And I remember I told you about it because I couldn't keep it a secret. It was secret.
Sarah:So funny.
Mark:Yeah. Like, in this show has been really great at writing articles.
Sarah:And it could have been Lorem Ipsom or something like that.
Mark:It could
Sarah:have one placeholder text. They've never That would have been completely acceptable.
Mark:They've never used Lorem Ipsom in the obituary, that one character, they wrote the whole obituary. Right. And they wrote
Sarah:they've written Somebody dropped the ball here.
Mark:Somebody dropped the ball here. Installation instructions for Microsoft Office '98.
Sarah:Somewhere there is a technical writer who was responsible for writing that instructional copy who has no idea that their instructions So are in
Mark:I tried to find the exact instructions like, it was from a manual or
Sarah:anything.
Mark:That? I even searched a Windows 98 office instruction manual because they used to come with instruction manual.
Sarah:Oh, yeah. They used to come with disks too. Floppies. Stacks of floppies. So you had to swap out.
Mark:No, I couldn't find it.
Sarah:You couldn't find it? Wow. Well, if you ever need installation instructions for Office 98, you know where to find them.
Mark:This episode is for you.
Sarah:Yeah, and you can just pause it and just read them right there. Excellent. From the Jezebel Magazine article. That's epic. It's absolutely That's almost as good as this is a dressed set.
Mark:Yes. Almost. It's pretty close to that. It's certainly along the lines of the credit card with the woman's name on it.
Sarah:Yes. So I got curious because you and I both have our little things that we get curious about. The piggy bank. Yes. So Richard has a piggy bank.
Mark:The the most stereotypical piggy bank you
Sarah:can Yes. It's ceramic. An iconic piggy bank. It's pink.
Mark:It's a piggy bank.
Sarah:It's fat as a piggy bank. Yep. And Neville steals it so he can smash it because there's a key in it, and he knows there's a key in it, he wants it.
Mark:Right? Wait a minute. Isn't there, like, a stopper at the bottom of a piggy bank that you just open it up?
Sarah:Or Yeah. But it may not be big enough for that key to come out of. It might have fit in the slot, but not a bit out of the hole. That would be bad design, but, you know, it just wouldn't be as dramatic if Neville was in his room just shaking it, shaking it, shaking it, shaking it, waiting for the key to drop back.
Mark:Speaking of Neville in his room with the piggy bank, so he steals the piggy bank in jeans and the red trainers. Yeah. And then when we see him breaking the piggy bank, he has breast shoes on, socks, and dress pants, and nothing else.
Sarah:It's like he's in the middle of putting on his tux, and he goes, oh, yeah.
Mark:I wanted
Sarah:to smash that bank.
Mark:Smashing the piggy bank. That's what I was supposed to do. I couldn't do it with my rate trainers because I might get something on them.
Sarah:Because they're so
Mark:red. They're pretty.
Sarah:You know where piggy banks come from?
Mark:No idea. Enlighten me.
Sarah:How old do you think piggy banks are?
Mark:Well, I gotta think that piggy banks go back to the beginning of coins. So I'm thinking two thousand twenty five hundred years.
Sarah:They go back pretty far. Now the idea of a bank of a hollow sort of, clay jar that has a slot. Yes. It goes back to Roman times. Yes.
Sarah:But shaped like a pig. Yeah. Pig. That's a bit more recent. Okay.
Sarah:Fourteenth century Java.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:In Indonesia. Okay. Is where the first pig shaped ceramic bank was found. Okay. But in Europe, they come more from the middle ages, and there's a reason that they're shaped like a pig.
Sarah:The reason they're shaped like a pig is because at the time when people wanted to save money, there were no banks yet. Right? So you had a few coins. You wanted to stash them away, keep them. Wood and metal were expensive.
Sarah:Yes. But clay was cheap. Okay. And there was a common clay that you could find in England by just digging a hole in most places that is kind of an orange pinky color. Okay.
Sarah:And they called it PYGGE. Y
Mark:g g e. Okay.
Sarah:So then as a joke, people started to make their banks look like pigs. Pigs made out of pigs. Okay. And since then, there are piggy banks. Piggy banks.
Sarah:Now you know. Now I know. There's a beautiful, image of that fourteenth century Javanese piggy bank. Oh, we'll put
Mark:that in the show notes.
Sarah:It's on Wikipedia. It's clearly been smashed and then restored, but it looks almost like a sow. Like, it's got big floppy ears and everything. Oh. It's incredible.
Sarah:And it's huge.
Mark:That's cool.
Sarah:I don't know if you could lift it if it was actually full. Oh my gosh. But, yeah, piggy banks are made of pig Oh. But not pork.
Mark:Now you know.
Sarah:The other thing that I got stuck on is my favorite bit. If your favorite bit of this episode is the Office 98 instructions, this is my favorite bit. When they have the protest at the awards ceremony and the girls come up on stage with Tim and Kay and they're all in blood. Covered in fake blood and singing the pen is mightier than the pound.
Mark:And they sing it to the the tune of onward Christian soldier. Right? That's onward Christian soldiers.
Sarah:It is. It sounds like
Mark:the battle hymn of the republic. Which is onward Christian soldier that you people stole from us. Sorry.
Sarah:Us upstart colonialists. So the pen is mightier than the pound is a reference to
Mark:The pen being mightier than the sword.
Sarah:Yes. Do you know where that comes from?
Mark:That comes from Shakespeare. No. Oh, Bible?
Sarah:No. Oh. That does where
Mark:The shake bible.
Sarah:The bible is where can a leopard change his spots comes from, which is something that
Mark:Scott says. To plowshares is bible too.
Sarah:Scott says, where I come from no. He he says a leopard can't change its spots, can it? Well, they don't in the jungle that I'm from. Yeah. Leopard changing its spots is a biblical reference.
Sarah:Yes. But the pen is miner than the sword is part of a book written by Edward Boulware Lytton in 1839.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:He also came up with It was a dark and stormy night.
Mark:Oh, cool.
Sarah:Which is the first sentence of one of his books, which is now infamous. And because it's so infamous, there's now a fiction, a literary award given each year to the book with the worst first line.
Mark:Yes. I've heard of this competition, and they are fantastically done.
Sarah:The Bolder Litten Fiction Contest.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:I would like to share with you the winner of the twenty nineteen Bolder Litten Fiction Contest.
Mark:Wait on this. So this is the worst first line of a novel Yes. In 2019.
Sarah:Yes. And I have to tell you, this is one sentence. That's the the award goes for one sentence. Are you ready? Sentence.
Sarah:Okay. Space fleet commander Brad Brad sat in silence surrounded by a slowly dissipating cloud of smoke, maintaining the same forlorn frown that had been fixed upon his face since he accidentally destroyed the phenomenon known as time 13 inches ago. That's it.
Mark:You know, you want your first line of your novel to be catchy. You know, the clock struck thirteen is nineteen eighty four's starting line. It's the best of times. It was the worst of times as tale of two cities starting line. Like, you want it to be engaging and draw you in, and that's just weird for weird sake.
Sarah:Okay. Do you wanna hear one more?
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Okay. So they have they have, sub awards for genres. Right? So this one is the runner-up for the mystery category. Okay.
Sarah:As he pounded on the door, Billy foretoes Capaloni wondered, not for the first time, if he wouldn't have been better off in the joint or even taking a concrete nap, but instead, he straightened his tie and gripped his bible, determined not to blow his cover in the Jehovah's Witness Protection Program.
Mark:That's so cliche.
Sarah:It's almost so cliche it's good. Yeah. It's a big setup for Jehovah's Witness Protection Program. Yes. And all of this is a big setup to say, that is where the pen is mightier than the sword comes from, which is why they're saying the pen is mightier than the pound.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And we'll we'll post the link because this this award has an awesome website. The subtitle of the website is where w w w stands for wretched write wretched writers welcome.
Mark:No. I was wrong. It's not onward Christian solder. It's glory glory hallelujah.
Sarah:Yes. Which is what I was thinking of too.
Mark:Yes. Not Onward Christian Soldier.
Sarah:So we didn't steal from you.
Mark:Steal you've stolen Onward Christian Soldier for something else too.
Sarah:Well, and there's a A colonist. A song associated with the queen that we
Mark:God save the queen.
Sarah:God save the queen. We've given that new Yes. Lyrics in The US too.
Mark:I'm sure there's a list. I'll put it in the show notes of colonists stealing songs from the motherland.
Sarah:Is that one of your angry lists that you keep? Yes. Okay. Alright. So the time has come for us to talk of corpses.
Sarah:Yes. We have three corpses. We do. Richard Rackham, who died on the stairs, Neville Williams, who fell from the roof, and Jezebel Tripp, beaten with a tent pole tent spike. Who is your favorite corpse?
Mark:I'm gonna say Jezebel. Why? Couple reasons. One, Richard Rackham doesn't even rank a credit.
Sarah:We don't even see his face. Nope. Except in the picture of him and Neville Smooching.
Mark:Yep. Okay. So no. The devil is breathing. There's just no way around it.
Sarah:That's kind of the first rule of being a corpse is don't breathe.
Mark:You could clearly see him breathing.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:And Jezebel is covered in blood and does a good dead body stare.
Sarah:So she's still? Yeah. Her eyes are open. Yep. She's all in that chalk outline position with the arms akimbo and the legs akimbo.
Mark:Yeah. In that horrible blue shirt.
Sarah:Yes. I agree. Jezebel Tripp is our corpse of the week. Let's talk about after the credits.
Mark:Okay. John Denton cleans up. He gets $20 and the girl.
Sarah:And his book published probably. Yep.
Mark:Certainly, it's gonna be popular. In addition, Harry Paulson. Paulson is involved with all these people and doesn't get and doesn't get charged with anything.
Sarah:Well, he didn't really do anything wrong.
Mark:Do anything wrong.
Sarah:Mel's gonna go to jail Yep. Unless she gets away with it because of self defense.
Mark:Almost everybody else is dead.
Sarah:If she manages to not kill the judge, then maybe she'll get away. Oops. I killed another one. Man.
Mark:Grace is out of money, though.
Sarah:Yeah. Grace and missus Honeycutt might be going to jail for embezzlement.
Mark:And Tim knows it. Yeah. Tim's the really the last trustee that's alive and not in trouble.
Sarah:Tim and Kay both are gonna be just fine. Yeah. They're they just go back to normal. Sam and his wife, Helen Callahan, they're certainly getting a divorce. Yes.
Mark:But we
Sarah:going to jail for fraud.
Mark:Sam has a wife?
Sarah:Yeah. Helen.
Mark:This is the first time we've mentioned her.
Sarah:Yeah. Because she's not entirely important.
Mark:It's Completely useless. She's
Sarah:not really important.
Mark:Yeah. No. At first, when she first shows up, I'm like, who the hell is this person?
Sarah:You know who's really screwed? Lowry, mister Badwig.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Who's he gonna write for now? Yeah. Nobody. No. He's back on the streets?
Mark:No. The fans of Jezebel Tripp, by the way, Jezebel. That's quite the name. I did some looking up of Jezebel.
Sarah:That is a biblical name, isn't it?
Mark:Yes. So Jezebel is a sinner.
Sarah:Yes. She's a prostitute, right, in the bible? Okay. Which fits the character. It's it's a good name for the character.
Sarah:But do people really name their kids Jezebel anymore?
Mark:I yes. In fact They do? Yes. There are 1,656 people in The United States named Jezebel.
Sarah:Isn't that like naming your kid Harlot?
Mark:More than more than likely.
Sarah:Oh, the baby's so pretty. Oh, her name's Harlot. Yes. What? Jezebel.
Sarah:Her name's prostitute. So then
Mark:I was like, okay. What about Jezebel Tripp? There's less than one person in The United States named
Sarah:Jezebel. That would mean none.
Mark:So none.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:So then I was like, my last name's Bell. Is there a Jezebel Bell?
Sarah:I hope not.
Mark:That would be a crazy name.
Sarah:That would be really bad.
Mark:There are no people in The United States with the name Jezebel Bell.
Sarah:Good. Which is sad. But are there any Jezza Bells? Because that would be even worse.
Mark:I didn't look that up.
Sarah:But Did you ever consider naming a daughter Jezza if you had a daughter? No. You didn't think about that, But did
Mark:my first wife and I briefly considered the name Isabelle because I really like that.
Sarah:Isabelle Bell?
Mark:But Isabelle Bell is just an accident waiting to happen.
Sarah:The answer is yes. Yes. A bell is a bell.
Mark:Yes. Isabelle Bell.
Sarah:Uh-huh. It is. I would have just called her ding dong all day long.
Mark:People call me that anyway. Wow.
Sarah:Who oh. People give their kids funny names for all kinds of reasons. Maybe they've got a good reason. I don't know.
Mark:It's a family
Sarah:no. We come from a long line.
Mark:It's a prostitute. It's a biblical no.
Sarah:No. No. It is a biblical name, but
Mark:Jezebel, go get your brother Satan. We're getting in the car.
Sarah:No. They would be gigolo. This is my daughter, Jezebel, and my son, gigolo. Gigolo, no bell. Wow.
Sarah:We're slap happy now.
Mark:Lot and his wife. Yes.
Sarah:So that's sins of commission. Where we have next? What's coming up?
Mark:Next is made in splendor, which is the most aptly named pub episode ever name
Sarah:ever Finally, you get an aptly named pub.
Mark:Because the the well, the pub in this one's called the Quill Inn.
Sarah:Oh, yeah. Okay.
Mark:But this the episode is about a pub named the Maid in Splendor and a painting named the Maid in Splendor and a story named the Maid in Splendor and a crazy old man named the Maid in Splendor, and the episode is called Maiden Splendor.
Sarah:There's a man whose name is Okay. Maiden
Mark:But there is a crazy old man.
Sarah:So we've got, two two little things going on. One is that by, Wednesday or so, we're gonna post a list of things that if you like Midsomer, you may also like. So if you are stuck at home like we are and need some diversion from Corona, maybe you like some of the things that we list. We'll try to find, put some things on the list that aren't so common that maybe you haven't watched yet. And we encourage you to contribute your suggestions.
Sarah:The other little thing is something I'm working on that Mark doesn't even know about until now.
Mark:Oh.
Sarah:I have a theory Yes. That in Midsomer Murders, certain kinds of crime happen in certain kinds of villages.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:I am conducting an analysis Okay. Of the kinds of murders that happen in each village. K. And for next week episode, I will have my results. Oh, excellent.
Sarah:So I'll be able to tell you why badger's drift is so bad.
Mark:Oh, I'm interested. Badgers.
Sarah:Bad badgers. And, you know, diving otter sperm. It's just strange. Yes. So far, I have uncovered some interesting patterns.
Sarah:Excellent. I will have data to share.
Mark:You can find Midsomer Maniacs on Twitter, Instagram, and email. Also posted on the Facebook groups for Midsomer and Acorn subreddit, which we're pretty sure is run by a person who's not interested in the show. So I'm gonna try to
Sarah:Yeah. If anybody knows who who the moderator is of the Midsomer subreddit
Mark:Yeah. We can't post to it now.
Sarah:It's completely frozen, and he seems to not he or she seems to not be responding.
Mark:He hasn't posted in three years.
Sarah:Yeah. So if you have any idea who that is and you can reach them, please do. Otherwise, we have to go through this convoluted process with Reddit to try to
Mark:But you never know. I I might be the moderator of the Midsomer Maniac Midsomer Murders Reddit subreddit.
Sarah:Yeah. That'd be fun. Next week, Made in Splendor.
Mark:Yes. Until then Episode thirty three zero seven. Season seven, episode five made in splendor.
Sarah:Until what then? Be well. Take care of yourself. Do what you need to do. Take care of the people you love.
Mark:Jezebel, wash your hands.
Sarah:Dirty Jezebel.
Mark:Bye, Maniacs.
Sarah:Bye, Maniacs. If you keep flipping through the magazine, you're gonna have a lot of editing to do.
Mark:That's true.
Sarah:Because I can hear it. Okay. Just saying.
Mark:I know.
Sarah:But you
Mark:know. So stop. Okay.
Sarah:So the fan the family's big house with the put it away.
Mark:Sorry.
Sarah:I'm gonna have to say all that
Mark:again. Okay.
Sarah:Because all I can hear is
Mark:Okay. Hey, Maniacs. This is Mark. The audio for this episode isn't quite right because of something we ended up doing in the studio, but it'll be all back to normal next week. Thanks a lot, and hope you're having fun on quarantine.
Mark:Now on with the episode.
Sarah:The pheasant moves.
Mark:The pheasant
Sarah:moves. It's us. It's Ed moves.
Mark:Oh my gosh.
Sarah:Hey, Maniacs.
Mark:Hey, Maniacs.
Sarah:Midsomer Maniacs.
Mark:Midsomer Maniac.
Sarah:I'm a Maniac. Are you a Maniac?
Mark:Oh, man. We are in the throes of mania right I've been in
Sarah:the house for a really long time.
Mark:You know, I really wouldn't suggest gooping yourself up in a house with three teenagers working on major projects. No. It's just, it's not great.
Sarah:But you know, we're lucky. That's the only thing we're dealing with right now.
Mark:The kids are awesome. The kids are awesome.
Sarah:But you know, we know as we're putting this episode out that many of you like us are on self quarantine, social distancing, extreme, stuck at home, don't go outside unless you have to ness.
Mark:Yep, first of all we hope everybody is safe, absolutely, and if you're not safe you should be washing
Sarah:your hands. Jezebel.
Mark:Jezebel. And then second of all, we hope that everyone's, doing mentally okay with all this. It's a lot to go on. This is the most traumatic thing that's happened to the world since I've been alive.
Sarah:Yeah, and it's weird because you have the news and the trauma of the news. And then, you know, if everything's kind of okay where you are and you're doing what you have to do, then you have to deal with the I'm really tired of being in this house ness and all that that can bring on. So hopefully you have lots of projects and work to do. Yes. I have lots of work to do.
Sarah:I'm really tired of people saying, Wow, I'm so bored. Like, Okay, I can give you some work.
Mark:Yes. A couple of things. One, because I had more time, I've been experimenting with music off the top, as you probably heard. So we're trying to know a couple of different things, let us know what you think. And also, the last mini episode that we did was, our suggestions for what to watch other than Midsomer Murders and we asked for your suggestions which were all great absolutely famous
Sarah:keep them coming
Mark:keep them coming I think that thread helped a lot of people build in a few holes of what they wanted to watch. And the official Murdoch Twitter account gave us a little shout out too. So that was nice to see.
Sarah:I know that when things are kind of rocky or tough, sort of want things that are cozy and reliable, but you can't watch the same things over and over and over again. So it's nice to have a recommendation from somebody who likes the same things you do so that, you know, if you start watching it, it's gonna be okay.
Mark:So if you do watch an older episode of Midsomer than these, and you haven't listened to the podcast, watch the episode and listen to the podcast.
Sarah:There you go. There's an activity for you.
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:And, you know, maybe there's a a recipe that Joyce makes that you might wanna try. You never know.
Mark:Actually, I I haven't looked in this week's, issue of the Midsomer Murders magazine. The the recipe in here is Irish stew. It's a type of stew. It's a
Sarah:kind of stew.
Mark:It's a kind of stew.
Sarah:Oh, Joyce. She makes a splotchy fruit salad, though. I can tell you that.
Mark:Yeah. This is like a lamb stew. A traditional Irish dish that's hearty and should turn out better than Joyce's Bardby's sort of stew.
Sarah:Wow. Wow. So if you have a snack that you're making at home, let us know about it. Yeah, absolutely. We can all keep each other company.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:So this week, we're talking about so if you've got a snack at home that's keeping you sane, recommend it to the rest of us.
Mark:Absolutely. And now onto our regular schedule program, which is Midsomer Maniacs podcast dedicated to the ITV series, Midsomer Murders. Each week, we dig into an episode of the show, including the murders, the man, the loonies, and everything else we love. There's a loonie in this episode I really love. I love Benbo.
Sarah:I wanna cuddle Benbo.
Mark:Oh, he's
Sarah:so good. He's so cute.
Mark:Don't count. Especially when he's set lighting the place on fire.
Sarah:Yeah. So we're gonna go over the episode at kind of a high level, and then we're gonna dig into some fun stuff.
Mark:Just remember, if the show is too much for your kids, the podcast probably is, even though it was a pretty same episode.
Sarah:Yeah. There's no beheading or squishing or
Mark:The next episode has stuff.
Sarah:Dismembering or anything. Anything fun.
Mark:No. Just shocked and blessed.
Sarah:The whole episode is about this pub, the maiden's splendor.
Mark:So this is a made up pub, and it goes along the lines of, like, aptly named pub pubs. Right? The the idea is that the pub is a place that reflects the story, but this pub is the story.
Sarah:Yeah. But except the so the the maid and Splendor that are referred to in the name of the pub and the name of the episode Splendor is supposed to be Lake Splendor, but it's a pond that doesn't even look deep enough to go fishing in.
Mark:It's not even a pond. It's a ditch.
Sarah:Yeah. It's a ditch filled with water.
Mark:That has, like, a smooth rock right beside it, like, that Jamie falls on but isn't concussed by.
Sarah:Convenient. Easiness. Yes.
Mark:The hotel that they use is actually the George Hotel in 25 High Street, Dorchester On Thames.
Sarah:That's the pub, and it's an inn too? Yep. Cool. You could go stay at the George. Yeah.
Sarah:Well, in the Maybe later.
Mark:In the magazine, there's a whole two page spread on Dorchester.
Sarah:Oh la la.
Mark:It's not a very big place, but I I went through the whole town on, Google Maps. Not a very big place, but it looks
Sarah:very nice. I'm sure it's nice. Yeah. So the pub is owned by, Steven Bannerman. It was formerly owned by his dad, Michael Bannerman, who has now kind of retired from the pub running business and handed the reins over to Steven and his wife, Lorna.
Mark:Now Steven Bannerman looks awfully familiar to me.
Sarah:He should look familiar to you. He's played by Alan Cox. Yeah. He was Watson in young Sherlock Holmes.
Mark:So we've had the two leads from Sherlock young Sherlock Holmes. A great movie. 1985. If you've not seen Young Sherlock Holmes Oh, go watch it. First of all, go watch it.
Sarah:It's like candy for your brain.
Mark:It's bizarre and crazy and fun and Spielberg. It's Spielberg.
Sarah:Yeah. Remember? Yeah.
Mark:And it has some of the best visual effects at the time.
Sarah:Oh, definitely.
Mark:Like there's a scene in which a person is hallucinating that a knight comes off of a stained glass window and fights them, and it is beautiful.
Sarah:Well, and Alan Cox playing Watson hallucinates about, dessert pastries attacking us.
Mark:Those are
Sarah:CGI too. Little more chubby. He is. Do you know he's the son of Brian Cox?
Mark:Oh, he's Bernie Cox's son.
Sarah:Yes. The actor.
Mark:Oh, I love Brian Cox.
Sarah:Got something to live up to there.
Mark:Right? Yeah.
Sarah:What
Mark:did you do today? Oh, I was only in five movies and six shows. Is that it? I was in 16 movies.
Sarah:And I beat people up in every one of them even though I'm 75 years old.
Mark:By the way, Brian Cox is an awesome guest star in Sheldon, one of the shows that I recommend. He's in either the first or second season, he plays the guy who's like the crazy Benbow character. Yeah, yeah. He does such a good job.
Sarah:So Steven's got some plans for the pub, he wants to update it, he wants to take out the- the snug. Thank you. I was like, koozie, snuggle, hug, the hug bar? No. The koozie bar?
Sarah:The snuggle bar? No. The
Mark:snug is like this little room at the back of the pub.
Sarah:It's like a mini pub.
Mark:And I I haven't even told you this yet. The the the reason why I know snug is because my father used to drive us to town to get groceries and do whatever we were doing, and then I'd sit in the car watching the snug.
Sarah:Well, doesn't, traditionally doesn't a snug have like a pass through from the main bar instead of a little bar like this one has?
Mark:I looked up zulms and I did a little bit of research on them. Mostly it's meant to be a place where you're not seen so
Sarah:yeah it's like a private room
Mark:curtains are pulled down, women like I remember in Canada, there being a men's and women's entrance to the bar.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And that that women's entrance would go directly into this nug.
Sarah:Well, unlike in Peaky Blinders, the snug is like a private room.
Mark:Mhmm.
Sarah:And and the drinks are passed through a little window.
Mark:It's like their private drinking room there.
Sarah:Yeah. So there's a couple old guys who hang out in the snug.
Mark:Old. Old guys.
Sarah:Yeah. You got Clive Cruikshanks, who's terminally grumpy.
Mark:I don't know why Clive hates everybody. He's got a garage. He's got a family.
Sarah:Yeah. A nice wife,
Mark:a nice son. He's got
Sarah:a business.
Mark:It's not like his son is robbing people like the butcher's son.
Sarah:I think I know why he's so grumpy.
Mark:Why is he so grumpy?
Sarah:His hat doesn't fit.
Mark:Well
Sarah:He can't pull it down over his ears. It just sits on top of his
Mark:head all the time. I don't think you could cover those ears ever.
Sarah:And you've got Wesley.
Mark:Wesley, who reminds both of us of a person that you've never met, which is a friend of ours.
Sarah:Yeah, but he's got the ponytail and the dog, and he's kind of So Clive is super grumpy. Wesley Wesley is kind of the normal one of the three of them. He's got a vehicle, a dog, a home presumably. He looks like he showered sort of.
Mark:He may even have a wife.
Sarah:And then there's Ben Bo.
Mark:Ben Bo?
Sarah:Played by Freddie Jones. No work clothes. Freddie Jones was also in young Sherlock Holmes.
Mark:Yes. He was.
Sarah:He plays Chester Cragwich.
Mark:Yes. Who's
Sarah:a crazy professor. What do you know?
Mark:Yep. So we've had three people from young Sherlock Holmes in, I think, this season.
Sarah:You Do know, Freddie Jones was also in three David Lynch movies.
Mark:He was in
Sarah:Can you name them?
Mark:He was in Dune.
Sarah:Yes. He was in
Mark:No. Hold on.
Sarah:I'm not gonna tell you. I'm just laughing and silent.
Mark:Blue velvet? No. No.
Sarah:That would've been Lost Skywood? No. Elephant man. Yes. Wild at heart.
Mark:Oh, yes.
Sarah:He was also in
Mark:I've only seen wild at heart twice.
Sarah:Freddie Jones is also in Eric the Viking. I have some people in that recently. Kroll.
Mark:Kroll is a fantastically bad movie if you ever wanna watch one that's really bad. Yeah. It's an eighties fantasy crazy fever dream.
Sarah:Yeah. Well, makes Flash Gordon look fancy and sophisticated.
Mark:He has a special weapon that he throws that has blades on it. There are blades all over it, so I always wondered how he threw it.
Sarah:Or how he catches it.
Mark:Yes. He certainly can't catch it.
Sarah:And then, Freddie Jones was also in an awesome Hammer movie called Frankenstein must be destroyed in which his brain is replaced with a weird brain. Yeah. And he becomes a monster. Yes. But he's so cute.
Mark:But I remember you telling me he was in an Hammer movie, and it's the one with Peter crushing. I'm like, mhmm. Mhmm. And You
Sarah:need to That's not narrow it down fast.
Mark:Great. See you in Bill Ward.
Sarah:And it's a really weird crazy Hammer movie. Yeah. Uh-huh. Mhmm. I've not narrowed it down at all.
Sarah:Yeah. Yep. But, yeah, he's forcibly has a brain swap, and then he becomes a monster. Nice. Poor Freddie.
Mark:I need to watch
Sarah:well, he's Toby Jones' dad.
Mark:He's Toby Jones' dad? Yeah. We've talked about that before. Oh my gosh. So everybody else is everybody's dad in this episode.
Sarah:Yeah. The well, these actors, you know, England's small.
Mark:What about Michael Bannerman? What does he bid?
Sarah:Michael Bannerman. He's also in another episode of Midsomer called the dark rider. He plays Ludo de Ketfield.
Mark:Yes. Who is when there's a high a headless rider.
Sarah:Yes. Yes. And, his name is William Gaunt, by the way, the actor. My favorite movie from his long history of acting gigs is a movie from 1971 called The Sinister Man. Have you heard of this movie?
Mark:No.
Sarah:I'll give you the one sentence summary. You're gonna wanna watch it. Are you ready? When a corpse is found in the Thames, the only clue is that the dead man was killed by, wanna guess, a karate or judo expert. What?
Sarah:Yeah. You heard me.
Mark:Okay. I need to see this movie.
Sarah:It's called the sinister man in 1971.
Mark:What we're watching tonight, can we?
Sarah:William Gaunt.
Mark:He's out every night of the quarantine. Sinister man.
Sarah:It's not that bad yet. We've got lots of things to watch.
Mark:Yes. We do.
Sarah:Yeah. So that's that's William gone.
Mark:Excellent.
Sarah:So we've got Steven and his dad, Michael. Right? Who, Steven Steven owns the pub with his wife, Lorna.
Mark:Because Michael gave him a pub.
Sarah:Right. Because he
Mark:had heart problems, when his wife died and he's not supposed to drink.
Sarah:But he drinks constantly.
Mark:He is an alcoholic. Oh my god. He drinks right now.
Sarah:But, you know, if you owned a pub, it would be hard not to have a drinking problem. It would either be incredibly easy to not have one or really hard not to have one or the other.
Mark:Both ways, but in the alcoholism is the word that should be in this episode that isn't.
Sarah:The maiden alcoholism?
Mark:Yeah. I think so. The maiden alcoholism.
Sarah:The alcoholic and splendor. That's a completely different show. And so we've also got another family there. We've got the Mondays, Audrey and her daughter, Bella, who both work at the pub.
Mark:Who both worked at the pub as long as he can remember.
Sarah:Yeah. Audrey is madly in love with Michael. And I think you can see it all the way through. You said you didn't notice it early on, but you can see.
Mark:I didn't notice it in other viewings, but I noticed it right away.
Sarah:Yeah. One of
Mark:the first things she says kneels down beside him.
Sarah:No. One of the first things she says to him is she catches him in his office with a drink looking at a photo of his wife, and he says she says it's time to move on. It's been three years. Yeah. Which I I think is not a good way to encourage somebody to move on.
Sarah:Like, come on. Come on. It's been three years. Love me now.
Mark:It's time for grumpy puppy with me.
Sarah:That's, that's not motivating. No. No. So Bell and Audrey also work there and as does Jamie Crikshanx, son of grumpy hat doesn't fit. Yes.
Sarah:Who's our first victim? Yes. He gets shot with a shotgun out in the woods outside the Cottage Of Love.
Mark:So the Cottage Of Love that we see in the cold opening is where Bella meets somebody. We find out
Sarah:that it's Steven. Mhmm. It's a hunter's cottage.
Mark:And Michael notices this, but doesn't kill them on that night because I guess Bell is there.
Sarah:And he owns it. Yes. Michael owns that hunter's cottage.
Mark:So then he comes back the next night because he thinks that they're gonna meet again, and it's actually Jamie trying to interrupt Bella and Steven, and so Michael kills Jamie. Because Did I get all the names right?
Sarah:Yes. Because Jamie is unfortunate enough to have gotten a new hat and jacket from his parents as a gift. Yes. So he looks like Steven from a distance.
Mark:So he gets two in the back. Come on. Come on. With the old shells.
Sarah:Yep. Then, of course, Michael has to kill Steven. He failed the first time, but Steven's still moving forward with selling the pub. He's gonna sell it. He's not just gonna renovate it.
Sarah:He's gonna sell it to Lawrence, who's, you know, mister, frosted hair from the big city.
Mark:Yes. By town. His buddy says town. He's
Sarah:from town.
Mark:Right on. To town. We're going back to town.
Sarah:He's clearly trying to buy up the whole village. He's been trying to buy Kirk Shanks' garage for a while.
Mark:Yeah. So The thing that we're not telling you is that Audrey is kind of instigating or moving forward or suggesting all these deaths?
Sarah:Audrey wants Michael for herself, so she's telling him things that he would otherwise wouldn't know, like that Michael has plans to sell the pub and that Steven and Audrey, Steven and Bella, sorry, are gonna meet at the Hunter's Cottage and basically egging him on. Yes.
Mark:Right? And I think this is all caused because Bella knows that Steven's gonna sell the pub.
Sarah:Yeah. So Audrey knows that.
Mark:Sorry. Audrey knows that.
Sarah:Well, Bella tells her everything.
Mark:Yeah. Right? So then I have a problem because I don't know the exact words, but when Steven is confronted by Michael in the alleyway Mhmm.
Sarah:Before he shoots him.
Mark:He goes, what are you doing here? And then sort of laughs at him and then gets two to the chest.
Sarah:Well, in the reenactment at the end when they're going over what actually happened Yeah. It's Michael says something to him like, I've heard you're gonna sell the pub. I won't let you do that. And Steven goes, yeah. You can't stop me.
Sarah:Whatever.
Mark:Like, Steven's out there. Well, soliloquy here.
Sarah:He's on his way to Lawrence's to sign the paperwork. Where's Lawrence's?
Mark:Oh, right over
Sarah:here. On the other side of that wall next to where he's shot.
Mark:When when they find Steven's body, Bartleby goes, where's Lawrence's? And he had been there that day. Yeah. It's right over the hedge.
Sarah:Oh.
Mark:It's not a big village.
Sarah:I think it was that day. I don't know. You can't even begin to delineate days in this episode. It's weird.
Mark:I'm not
Sarah:The timeline is so weird.
Mark:So this episode takes place in Midsomer worthy, and the map that's in the murder map, yes, I did say murder map, the, magazine shows a town much larger than the actual town that this pub is in.
Sarah:So they've invented streets and Yes. Whole neighborhoods and everything else? Yeah.
Mark:Yeah. Don't believe Dorchester has a stoplight.
Sarah:That would make a big difference. Yeah. So Michael wants to stop Steven from selling the pub, and Audrey is like, oh, he's out there right now. He's off to sign the paperwork. So Michael shoots Steven, and then Michael sort of loses it Yeah.
Sarah:And grabs Bella and says, let's go out to the woods. I need to talk to you. And
Mark:Because the real thing is that Michael isn't in love with Audrey. No. He's in love with Bella.
Sarah:Which is Ew. Which is
Mark:why I hashtag the reminder for this episode, creepy old man. Because okay Michael Bannerman is easily 65
Sarah:and
Mark:Bella is shown to be probably less than 22. Yeah. So there is easily a 40 age difference. Yeah. And okay.
Sarah:All we can say is that maybe she looks a bit like his dead wife.
Mark:Well, except for the eyes and the nose.
Sarah:I can't believe Audrey says that.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Michael shows her a picture of all of them at the hunter's cab cabin when they were younger. A badly photoshopped picture. A very badly photoshopped photo. And says, look, and look at your mother in this photo. And she does.
Sarah:And he says, she looks a lot like you. And she says, well, yes, she does. Except her nose is much bigger and her eyes are too close together. This is what Bella says. Like, she thinks Bella.
Sarah:That's nice.
Mark:I gotta tell I'm I'm blowing the lid off this episode. Bella is not a nice person. No. Bella She completely manipulates Scott.
Sarah:Yes. She is played by Sophie Hunter
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Who is married to Benedict Cumberbatch.
Mark:Sherlock again.
Sarah:Yes. I know. The connections never cease. Yes. But she's not an actress anymore.
Sarah:She's an avant garde playwriter and director. Oh. She's won a lot of awards.
Mark:Oh, that's cool.
Sarah:Here's a weirder thing, though. Okay. Audrey Bundy, her mother in the episode, is Yes. Played by Frances Tomlilty.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:She was married to Sting.
Mark:Oh, so we've had two Sting wives.
Sarah:Yes. They had two kids together.
Mark:Tintra kids.
Sarah:I don't wanna know about that. Do not wanna know about that. Did I mention I don't wanna know about that? But there yeah. It's interesting.
Sarah:Anyway, there's no Sherlock connection there.
Mark:No. It's just sting. Sting?
Sarah:Just sting.
Mark:Ding in his bits everywhere.
Sarah:So Michael admits that he's in love with Bella and says, if you won't be with me, I'm gonna kill myself. He's gonna shock her. Saddest thing ever. She's he's even talked her into taking his boot off for him.
Mark:So that he can use it to
Sarah:To pull the trigger with his weird green socks.
Mark:Yeah. Those green socks don't look would be like, oh, I'm not gonna touch your boots.
Sarah:Yeah. She's very nice to have helped him out of his boot.
Mark:Boot that sock smells like old man. You can tell.
Sarah:And and that's basically the whole episode. Yeah. There's some
Mark:Oh, and instead of shooting himself, he dies of heart attack. He has a
Sarah:heart attack. Yeah. I mean, there's some little red herrings here and there, and, of course, Collie is back running a movie festival.
Mark:They have an erotica section. It's all sold out.
Sarah:But in all safe, Joyce is like, oh, good.
Mark:Don't And what was sad was this episode was like last we watched it last week when, you know, all the craziness happened, but Maxwell Encito just recently died, and he's in Seventh Seal
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:Which is a great movie. And, like like, I think Scott gets screwed in this episode.
Sarah:Yeah. They make him out to look pretty stupid. I don't think he's that stupid.
Mark:I don't think
Sarah:and if he likes Ingrid Bergman and Ingmar Bergman mixed up. And if he was Which I understand, but I think he's smart enough to have looked into it a little bit.
Mark:And if he likes Ingrid Bergman, you know, I'm not saying they're the same person, but he knows quality.
Sarah:Yeah. If he likes Casablanca, he he's not like a bro movie guy. Yeah. And that and there's a poster outside the theater that clearly is not Casablanca.
Mark:Yeah, Seventh Seal.
Sarah:Seventh Seal, which is an iconic movie, it made me think about, and Scott even mentions it, that death plays chess in the movie, right?
Mark:And
Sarah:if you've never seen the Seventh Seal, you don't even get the reference in everything else. There's so many other places where that's referenced. Death playing chess is in Bill and Ted. Yeah. Last action hero.
Sarah:Yeah. And even the Animaniacs did a thing about it. Yeah.
Mark:It's all referencing Seven Seals.
Sarah:Yeah. It's that classic of a movie.
Mark:And and it's a good movie.
Sarah:Mhmm. It
Mark:goes along. It's not like, oh, well, we just sit and talk. There's interesting things going on, and then you sit there and go, oh my gosh. Max von Zito is 15 in this movie.
Sarah:So while we're talking about that movie in the movie poster, it's a double feature. Yes. At the top it says the Seventh Seal. Yes. And at the bottom it says the Spanish Writing School.
Sarah:Yes. What is that?
Mark:I have no idea.
Sarah:Oh, God, I thought you'd know.
Mark:I looked everywhere.
Sarah:Come on, man.
Mark:Don't know.
Sarah:I looked everywhere. Yeah.
Mark:The only thing that got me off of that was they walk out into this square area, and there's a lot of stores in the background. So I'm trying to find out where they are in reality. And it has this thing that says the bell shops or something off to one side, which Audrey goes down. This weird scene with my cold that doesn't need to be there.
Sarah:No. She's shuffling off in a trench coat like Casablanca. If only she had a fedora on too.
Mark:I found a reference to that lane in Oxfordshire City Council notes. Oh, wow. But it didn't give an address.
Sarah:Did it mention a Spanish writing school? No. Okay.
Mark:I easily look for that place for two hours.
Sarah:You know, I trust you to look up all the stuff in print and have answers.
Mark:I I couldn't that movie doesn't exist.
Sarah:Well, audience, if you know what that's a reference to, let us know. Yeah. Because we're clearly stumped about that
Mark:like the maiden splendor legend. Don't even get us started on that.
Sarah:Alright. Let's talk about
Mark:pubs. Okay.
Sarah:Because clearly pubs are important in this one.
Mark:So pubs are like okay. I wish we had pubs here. I know. I do.
Sarah:We've talked about that often.
Mark:Wish it it I miss pubs. I had pubs in Toronto. I used to go to pubs all the time in Toronto, play darts in pubs all the time in Toronto. I I definitely miss pubs.
Sarah:It's one of the downsides of living in a college town. All of the bars are really geared either towards students, which means they're rowdy and obnoxious, or the professors and professionals, which means they're uppity hoity toity. Or or they're, like, hard drinking places. I just want a place to sit
Mark:and talk to my friends.
Sarah:Maybe play some trivia
Mark:sometimes. Maybe maybe play a pub quiz.
Sarah:Yeah. Not trivia. A pub quiz. A real pub quiz. Not computerized trivia.
Sarah:Yeah. No. Doesn't exist in Bloomington. No. There used to be one called the Players Pub.
Sarah:It's gone. Gone.
Mark:Couple of things I looked into. One was, I wanted to know if they let dogs in pubs.
Sarah:Yeah. Because Wesley brings his dog in.
Mark:This is a dog episode. Wesley has a dog. Michael has a dog.
Sarah:Yeah. So what's the story there? Can you take a dog in a pub?
Mark:It's up to the pub owner. Oh. Completely up to the pub owner. There's no law against it.
Sarah:You know what else is up to the pub owner? What? You're banned.
Mark:Oh, tell us about banning.
Sarah:This is so interesting. So Steven bans Clive. Right? For life. He's been wanting to do it for a long time.
Mark:For life.
Sarah:And I thought, okay. So as long as you own the pub and you're there, maybe you tell your employees, look, don't let Clive in. He's banned. Yeah. Right?
Sarah:He's bad. Yep. Then if the pub changed ownership or whatever, that would be it. Like, it'd be over. Right?
Sarah:And maybe you're banned for a period of time. Like the bartender says, look, I don't want to see you in here again for a week.
Mark:Well, he just pulled a gun. But anyway.
Sarah:Yeah. Well, there is that. But he's banned before that.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:In The UK, banning somebody from a pub is a bit more serious than that. At least now it is.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:It's so serious that well, it started out as kind of an informal network of people who owned pubs and like restaurants where they would share information with one another about, hey. You know, five was in here last night. He brought a gun in. He's banned. Now you might wanna keep him out of your place too.
Sarah:Right?
Mark:Word-of-mouth. Absolutely.
Sarah:Word-of-mouth has now become formalized. Oh. And there's an app
Mark:There's an app. Called PubWatch. PubWatch.
Sarah:Where owners of pubs can register their pub, and they can enter information about people who are banned. Hello? And you know what? If you're banned, there's nothing you can do about it.
Mark:That's it?
Sarah:You might not even know.
Mark:They're all private stuff.
Sarah:Right? It's all private stuff. You can't appeal
Mark:called the public house. It's it's weird English.
Sarah:Yes. It's like private school. Public school. So you can't appeal it. There's nothing you can do about it.
Sarah:It's like having your mugshot in an app that only few people can see. Yes. So you might go into a pub in a completely different place, and they would say, you're not welcome in here. And you'd be like, why? What what did I do?
Sarah:Well, I got you on the list because somebody two villages over said you're a troublemaker.
Mark:I never got banned from pub.
Sarah:It's it's like a whole it the website is impressive. PubWatch. I'm telling you.
Mark:PubWatch. Go have a look.
Sarah:It's an industry now.
Mark:The other thing I wanted to know about well, two things, and they have to deal with time. First of all, if you haven't been in a British pub as an American or a North American, time is at roughly 11:00.
Sarah:You mean the the end of serving hours? Yes. Yes.
Mark:Which took me by surprise at first.
Sarah:Far earlier than it is here.
Mark:I was like I I remember I went I was like I went to England the first time. I'm in a hotel in Piccadilly. My time's all warped off. It's, like, 09:00 at night. I'm like, I'm going to a pub.
Mark:I go to a pub, and the guy's like, oh, you did. But this is the last call. I'm like,
Sarah: Mark:on Friday night,
Sarah:dude. I'm sure there are clubs now that are open later, but they're clubs, not pubs.
Mark:Yeah. Clubs, not pubs. They call time.
Sarah:Now Steven And they play
Mark:a fox hunting horn. Yeah. Steven does. Not everybody knows. They usually
Sarah:have a bell.
Mark:They usually have a bell, but Steven wants to be extra annoying. So he plays the fox hunting horn.
Sarah:I just wait for a big pack of dogs and just rush into the bar and shove everybody out the other side.
Mark:So then they take a towel. Now remember towels? I I told this fact already that the first time I watched Mastermind in England, the guy was an expert in towels of pubs.
Sarah:Pub towels. Yeah.
Mark:Pub towels. And puts them over the taps. And I could not find why they did that.
Sarah:Just to say that they're done.
Mark:I know, but why is it a tradition? Who started it? You know, is there a special name for it? All those things.
Sarah:I think it's just a tradition. Yeah. Because people know that's what that means. Yeah. And you might have also noticed that when Steven is opening the bar, he puts towels down on the bar and by the taps.
Mark:Yeah. There's special rules with the towels.
Sarah:And that's because when they fill a beer, they fill it all the way to the top, very, very tippy top.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:And then they set it on the towel and you poke pick it up off the towel. So if there's any, like, spillage
Mark:It goes on the towel. It goes
Sarah:on the towel. Yeah. The other thing they have is beer mats.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And in the Maiden's Funder, they have beer mats on the rafters.
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:There's it's like a collection. Mhmm.
Mark:Yeah. I know there are people who collect beer mats.
Sarah:Yeah. Oh, yeah.
Mark:Did you go find some strange people?
Sarah:No. But I found some really freaking expensive beer mats.
Mark:How are they expensive? Oh my gosh.
Sarah:There was somebody on eBay UK who had a pack of 1940s Guinness beer mats. They're like 20 to the pack unopened.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Dollars 25,000. What? They're unopened, never used, pristine. Insane. Crazy, crazy.
Sarah:Yeah. I also love
Mark:the pub when they take the knife and put it across the top.
Sarah:When they shave the foam off? Yeah. The other thing is that, I guess, a lot lot of in smaller pubs like this one, like in village pubs, the waitress will keep your tab on your beer mat. Oh, okay. So as you order a beer, they'll just mark it on your mat.
Sarah:Okay. And then they can tally you up.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:But I also learned a very interesting thing about beer mats about where they're made.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:They've been around for a long time.
Mark:So these are the now they're not
Sarah:coasters? It's like a coaster.
Mark:It's like a coaster. Yeah.
Sarah:It's a little square Yeah. Press Yeah. Originally, they were ceramic. Oh. Now why you would want a ceramic coaster?
Sarah:I don't know. No. But they originate in Germany.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:And it's really when they moved from steins with lids to steins without.
Mark:Right.
Sarah:And as soon as you get into steins without lids, you get
Mark:Without putting lid.
Sarah:You get spillage. And they're like, hey, I don't want stuff spilled everywhere. We're gonna put a coaster under that.
Mark:I have to keep opening up my lid and drinking my beer.
Sarah:So in a town called Wiesenbach, which is in the Black Forest.
Mark:You know it is.
Sarah:There is a company called the Katz Group.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:They the Wiesenbach only has a population of about 2,500 people.
Mark:How many of those 2,500 people are employed in making beer?
Sarah:All of the adults. Okay. Every single person, they manufacture between five and eight million coasters a day.
Mark:A day?
Sarah:They manufacture beer mats for the world Wow. In this one place. Nobody has started to make them somewhere else? I don't know. Maybe they've got, like, a patent on them or something.
Sarah:Wow. So they take wood from the Black Forest. They pulp it. They turn it into beer mats, about 7,000,000 a day. It is the industry in Wiesenbach.
Mark:Now you know.
Sarah:Now you know. That that beer mat collection you've got, it's all German.
Mark:It's all German.
Sarah:Yeah. And they started be between the wars.
Mark:So what happened in the second World War? Was there a beer mat shortage?
Sarah:I guess there was. There was a beer shortage, so there probably wasn't a need for as many beer mats. What I've tried to find was what that factory was repurposed to make. During the war? Yeah.
Sarah:Oh. I couldn't find anything. Maybe they were making that cardboard armor like that fat kid wears in Jojo Rabbit. Maybe.
Mark:If they You haven't seen Jojo Rabbit.
Sarah:Oh, you gotta watch it. Crazy. So awesome. But, yeah, all those Guinness beer mats, all the Corona beer mats, you name it, you think they're so local? No.
Sarah:No? Wiesenbach.
Mark:Well, see, now I wanna go to Switchyard and say, where did you get your coasters? Mhmm.
Sarah:Which is a local brewery here.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:People don't know that.
Mark:If I could go outside. You
Sarah:can go outside. You just can't be around other people.
Mark:Grocery store was insane. Every man for itself and no crushed man.
Sarah:Of all the things to be out of.
Mark:It's so strange being out now because when you go to the grocery store, it's not that they have shortages of regular things, just weird things.
Sarah:Well, it's because people the people at those companies aren't working or they're not shipping or they can't get it or it's delayed or whatever.
Mark:Like the pasta aisle was decimated.
Sarah:Pasta lasts.
Mark:Yeah. Right? So anyway.
Sarah:It's so easy to get off on the topic of we've been stuck in this house for a long time. I mean, I'd rather be in that situation than everybody around us. Like, we're
Mark:so lucky. We have
Sarah:We're lucky, lucky, lucky.
Mark:Nice house. We have great kids. We're really not bad off. No. There are a lot of other people Not
Sarah:at all.
Mark:But it's it's everybody, man.
Sarah:You wanna talk about somebody who's not bad off?
Mark:Who?
Sarah:Lawrence.
Mark:Lawrence?
Sarah:He has a PA who serves him champagne every day at 05:00.
Mark:Yeah. She does one of those. She does a little more than serve him champagne.
Sarah:Well, I
Mark:don't She's there till two in the morning
Sarah:I don't want that.
Mark:Servicing him and the guy who's going to town.
Sarah:Speaking of 2AM, Clive's alibi is that he has has had an anglers club meeting in Costin until one in the morning.
Mark:Well, you see, that's the fishing club from the other episode. And so he was avoiding getting hit in the face by
Sarah:By a dead lady?
Mark:By a dead
Sarah:lady. I'm just thinking that maybe there's a strip club in Costin called the anglers club.
Mark:Yeah. I
Sarah:think so.
Mark:Gentleman's club.
Sarah:They stopped serving at eleven, but, you know, we hung out. We stayed for a while. Lawrence Lawrence is With his crappy backyard. His wealth is weird. Right?
Sarah:He's a he's a property developer. His house is not bad. He has a nice house, but it's not nice enough.
Mark:And why does he have a house there? He's just buying up stuff and redeveloping.
Sarah:Why does he live there?
Mark:I don't know.
Sarah:He does have a nice convertible that he drives Bella around in at the end.
Mark:Yeah. Bella's Bella's the winner of this episode.
Sarah:But he has rifles that cost a $120,000 each.
Mark:Is that possible?
Sarah:I could not find, and I looked, I could not find an antique shotgun going for that much. Now I found some that were close.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:And they were all the same brand Purdy. Purdy? P u r d e y.
Mark:Is that an English brand? Mhmm. Okay.
Sarah:I found, a website that specializes in antique weapons, antique shotguns. Okay. And they had a pair of purdies. Mhmm. And they sure were purdy.
Sarah:They were purdy. You cannot make that joke. And they were going for $50,000 apiece. Now these are from the eighteen nineties. So 50,000 American dollars or £50,000?
Sarah:Pounds. Sorry. Okay. But, yeah, who knows what that equates to the stock market? Woo.
Sarah:Woo. You know, coronavirus again. Populace. But there were no there were none over, like, you know, 80,000.
Mark:Well, maybe he got the two special ones.
Sarah:Maybe he got a bad deal.
Mark:He Maybe
Sarah:he got ripped off.
Mark:There's a really good episode of love joy that revolves around antique guns.
Sarah:So they know that the shotgun that killed Jamie is the same one that killed Steven because of the shells?
Mark:They don't know for sure, but they can check that the firing pin makes a unique mark on the end of the shell, and I did some research into this, and this is actually one of the advancements in forensic science in the last ten or fifteen years of that they now can really tell if a shotgun shell has been sent by shot by a particular shotgun because of the placement and of the marks that leave because they put it under a microscope, and they can see the marks that it leaves and compare them to another.
Sarah:Well, because with a pistol, you have a casing and there's rifling inside the barrel that ensures that the bullet will shoot straight. Right? And they compare that. But a shotgun isn't like that. It just has a hammering pin that just hits the back of the shell.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:And sets off the charge.
Sarah:Right. That Shoots the pellets.
Mark:The wad and the pellets out.
Sarah:Right. So it's looking at the impact of the firing pin on the back end of the shell? Yes. Oh, wow. That's a much smaller footprint than it would be on
Mark:a It's a
Sarah:much smaller footprint, but they
Mark:can now do it. So
Sarah:Interesting. Yeah. Okay.
Mark:Because I guess the article I read that said that there was a kind of vogueness of shotguns once they figured out rifling.
Sarah:Well, and you could saw off a shotgun. And plus the 1988 legislation that Barnaby references in this episode still made owning a shotgun easier than owning any other kind of gun in England.
Mark:Well, and that was because so that was in response to the Hungerford Massacre in 1987, which is a horrible event.
Sarah:I never heard anything about it.
Mark:Yeah. I don't remember hearing anything about it. 16 people were killed by a man using two legally owned semiautomatic rifles.
Sarah:So then after that, every gun had to be registered, including farm shotguns.
Mark:Yeah. And he had a handgun in England. Mhmm. That's a no no.
Sarah:That's right out. The police don't even have those. Yeah. Well, they do now, but they didn't always. Yeah.
Sarah:Speaking of police, Scott calls them wooden tops.
Mark:He does.
Sarah:You know where that comes from? Nope. So I thought maybe it was cockney slang?
Mark:No. For, like, tops? Yeah. Wooden tops.
Sarah:No. No. It refers to their helmets. Okay. Way back when when they were bobbies Yeah.
Sarah:Their helmets were wood.
Mark:Really? Because like in Murdoch and miss Fisher, they're leather.
Sarah:Over wood.
Mark:Oh, they're actually over wood.
Sarah:You know that peak at the top that kinda comes to a little point? Yeah. And the the old fashioned ones? That's wood up there. Wood.
Sarah:It's supposed to to protect your head. Somebody hits you.
Mark:I guess.
Sarah:It's like a helmet. Yeah. Right? Not a hat. Yeah.
Sarah:They're called wooden tops. How Scott would know that? Why he would have that slang? I do not understand.
Mark:Joyce, Scott, and Kelly get the short shift in this.
Sarah:You say Scott is not very stupid because he didn't know about Ingmar Bergman that he might have known that, but he is stupid in another way. He's stupid enough to catch free meals off of Joyce.
Mark:Yeah. Okay.
Sarah:Of all the places to get a free meal.
Mark:He shows up because he wants a free free meal from Joyce, which is where the great Joyce line, it's a condom stew. Yeah.
Sarah:Comes from.
Mark:So whatever that kind of stew has, it has green bits and yellow bits. I'm assuming peas and and corn, and then brownish bits.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:But that's all we know about that stew.
Sarah:And kind of a sludgy consistency. And barbeets
Mark:also. I don't want you here. You can't drink my wine.
Sarah:Maybe he just wants to be off work for a little while.
Mark:But he's not there to work. He's there to eat. He If still he eats more, there's less leftovers
Sarah:than this trick
Mark:over to him.
Sarah:In the second meal that we see them eating at home, Kali goes over to the sideboard and gets something out of a bowl. What caught my attention is it makes a sound when it hits the bowl. It's like, What is that? It's fruit sound.
Mark:And then told me so none plus that he took off doing his job.
Sarah:Yeah. But he did ditch her. He didn't say he didn't say get your own way home.
Mark:He is forgetful. I'll give you that.
Sarah:Yeah. But he was working.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:And, you know, he did ditch her in the big city.
Mark:Big city of Costa. Yeah.
Sarah:So dangerous.
Mark:Couldn't sing for the Spanish writing.
Sarah:Oh, man. I miss the Spanish writing school Mystery movie. Aw. Yeah. That fruit salad.
Sarah:I've never had fruit salad that went Yeah. Joyce. She's bitter. Holly's bitter about the whole thing. She's
Mark:and she doesn't need to be there at all.
Sarah:Oh. But she organized it.
Mark:I guess.
Sarah:The erotica season. So we've got a couple of corpses. Let's talk about who's the best.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:I have my own opinion.
Mark:Okay. Before we talk about who's the best corpse, I want to talk about the Maid and Splendor thing.
Sarah:Okay. Go ahead.
Mark:So the first time we hear the Maid and Splendor story. First of all, okay, let's back up. There's two pictures that they've made for this show.
Sarah:Yes, there's a painting in the pub and then there's the pub sign.
Mark:In the pub sign. Two different things.
Sarah:Mhmm. They're identical.
Mark:So they've made this legend up.
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:The idea is that some a knight goes to crusades
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:Comes back. This is a common story.
Sarah:He's gone for a long time. A long time.
Mark:Lots of knights did this.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:Comes back, and his fiance is so beautiful still it's like she hasn't aged.
Sarah:So
Mark:then he throws himself into the pond?
Sarah:To save her from her commitment to him because so that she can marry somebody else.
Mark:Okay. And then she's so upset.
Sarah:She throws herself in the lake.
Mark:Now if you look at the picture closely, and I did, it's not like she's drowning. You think it is.
Sarah:She sort of looks like she's waiting to catch a beach ball.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Like, throw it to me. Throw it to me.
Mark:Like, she's not even really all that upset. Yeah. I'm looking at the picture in the magazine here. Like, she's just she has hair, like, hair.
Sarah:She's naked.
Mark:She's she's nakedy naked.
Sarah:Her hair's covering her breasts like Lady Godiva.
Mark:No. No. No. Her breasts are underwater. Oh, okay.
Sarah:It's deep enough. They don't float?
Mark:Just just what you were wondering. If we watch these episodes too closely, I'm staring at a picture of the payday trying to see if her boobies are out of the water.
Sarah:As a woman over 40, I can tell you they float.
Mark:Her boobies are not floating.
Sarah:She's too perky for that.
Mark:Okay. And that that's the story. Right? And then they Scott's like, that's a weird story.
Sarah:He's right. It's a weird story. Because then Benbo at the very end is like, oh, that's not how it goes.
Mark:That's not how the story goes. He tells this whole other story about a brother, and he throws the mane in the water because he's upset with her. None of this has to do with the main story of the show.
Sarah:No. It's not it doesn't parallel the plot of the episode at all.
Mark:If you were making up a story and doing two paintings, should at least relate somewhat to the story.
Sarah:Right. So the story should
Mark:Especially because they're following the same splendor.
Sarah:The story should be that the old knight comes back, His fiance has married someone else and now has a daughter, and he's in love with her, but she doesn't love him back.
Mark:So he of ours today.
Sarah:So he throws her in the lake.
Mark:After he kills his own son?
Sarah:Yes. And another guy back. How could he have a son if he was at the crusades? You don't know. Okay.
Sarah:Corpses. Jamie? Steven.
Mark:Steven. And Well
Sarah:count count Michael because he's not really dead. All the camera pans away
Mark:from him. All we see is his foot Yeah. On the stretcher.
Sarah:And you gotta give it to Jamie because Jamie is the only one that we see, really.
Mark:Lying on that rock.
Sarah:But there's a better corpse.
Mark:Who's the better corpse?
Sarah:The pheasant.
Mark:The pheasant.
Sarah:The pheasant moves.
Mark:The pheasant moves.
Sarah:It does. Its head moves.
Mark:Oh my gosh.
Sarah:And I don't think it's a real pheasant, so I don't know how it moves. But its head goes, ah.
Mark:So they show this pheasant that supposedly
Sarah:Wesley. Shot.
Mark:Shot, and they show Jamie as a moment of, you know, it's a dead thing and it's another dead thing. Right. It got haunted.
Sarah:But then the pheasant moves its head lols. I'm giving it I'm giving best corpse to the pheasant.
Mark:Okay. Best corpse to pheasant.
Sarah:Let's talk about after the credits.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:So Michael's dead. Yeah. Audrey's in prison. Yeah. Bell is with Lawrence.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Clive and Maureen.
Mark:Yeah. Clive and Clive is still angry, and Maureen's still upset.
Sarah:Forever? Yeah. They don't sell the pub?
Mark:They eventually gotta sell the the gas station because Lawrence is putting them out of business.
Sarah:Yeah. I would think so. What about Lauren's restaurant pub? Wait. Yeah.
Sarah:How much time passes between Michael dying and Barnaby going back to the pub because wow, it's transformed completely.
Mark:Wait a minute. Wait. Okay. At what point in time does it seem like an intelligent thing for Clyde to do to say, get out there and pump some gas, woman. She's crying over her dead child while pumping gas.
Sarah:Yeah. He doesn't even seem upset.
Mark:Not letting her not letting her. He's He an
Sarah:asshole. Diesel's on sale. Jamie love diesel.
Mark:Jamie love diesel. He's a jerk.
Sarah:Of course, he makes her pump the gas.
Mark:Okay. Now let's talk about Laura.
Sarah:Lorna.
Mark:Laura. First of all, why is she even in this episode?
Sarah:To be the example of the worst teeth.
Mark:There is no reason for her to be in this if if she wasn't in this episode, right, and Steven because Steven told Bella that he wanted to go away with her.
Sarah:He could have left the pub to her.
Mark:Could have left the pub to her. He could have he could have still wanted that if he was a single guy, Right?
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:There's no reason why is she there?
Sarah:I don't know. To to kick Michael out and make him desperate to confront Bella about his love, because he was gonna be homeless, and he's gotta live with somebody.
Mark:I guess. And then she tells Lawrence that she's not selling the pub, and she makes it into this fancy, fancy place. No work clothes.
Sarah:Park Bend, Bo.
Mark:And no one's gonna go there. No. No one is gonna go there. I looked at that pub at the end and went, I don't wanna go
Sarah:there. No. No interest. She is gonna
Mark:fail miserably.
Sarah:Ben Bo and Wesley make out okay. Life goes back to normal. Yep. They'll have to find another pub. They'll have to go all the way to Badger's Drift to drink.
Mark:They will, in fact, have to find another pub, including going all the way to Badger's Drift. That's Benbo says that, doesn't he?
Sarah:Yes. I love when Benbo's in the hospital, and he's still got his sock hat with a feather on. Yeah. He's so cute. Guess what I'd squeeze up.
Sarah:Cute little bimbo.
Mark:But then, Bella. Oh my gosh. So Bella, who manipulates Steven and didn't.
Sarah:The man she loved is dead, and her mother is in prison. Yeah. That's not good.
Mark:And she's already in Lawrence's car.
Sarah:Yeah. But how much time has passed? Lorna had enough time to completely renovate the entire pub.
Mark:And Bella must own the cottage now because Audrey went to jail too.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:So Bella
Sarah:She does okay. She's probably sad. She's close to her mom.
Mark:I don't know. I don't trust the emotion that she portrays because she takes Scott and wraps him right around her little finger.
Sarah:That's not her fault, that's his fault. Okay. Drooling is not in the handbook.
Mark:Drooling is not in the handbook. Scott is culpable, but she doesn't.
Sarah:Well yeah, she's a pretty girl and she knows she has an effect on men. How could she not? That's everything.
Mark:Yeah, absolutely.
Sarah:Can I tell them about my project before we go?
Mark:Yes, we got lots of time.
Sarah:Okay, So We got
Mark:nothing but time.
Sarah:We've got weeks of time.
Mark:Yeah. People were like, are you guys still still do the podcast? I'm like, yes. Keep us safe.
Sarah:Yeah. It just means that we get to close the doors on a room for a little while and be in it.
Mark:It really eats out time.
Sarah:We we should pretend we're recording for a while longer.
Mark:Think Really? We should do a couple
Sarah:of episodes. My project, my secret project. Yes. I kind of I referenced it last week, but I wasn't ready to kind of tell what it was. And now I feel like I've built it up too much, but I'm not done with it yet, but here it comes.
Sarah:This is what I'm doing.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:I have a hypothesis.
Mark:That's good. You started your research with a question. Yes. Nerds. Scientificists.
Mark:That's what we are.
Sarah:My hypothesis is that some villages are more violent than others in Midsomer. Oh. So I've begun an analysis thrift. Of the kinds of deaths that happen in each of the villages.
Mark:Because this is Midsomer worthy. There's at least two other episodes in Midsomer
Sarah:worthy. Oh, yes. I have a massive spreadsheet now.
Mark:And, actually, there's a mapping on the murder map page of the whole county.
Sarah:Oh, so we can see the relationships.
Mark:Yes. So for instance, it's North Of Mallon Bridge and West of Costin and South of Marshwood and Morton Fendel.
Sarah:So here's what I'm going do. Before we record the next episode, I will have completed my analysis and I will share my findings.
Mark:Can we record the next episode tomorrow?
Sarah:But the other thing I'm going to do is I'm going share the spreadsheet. Yes. We're going to link it out. It's a Google doc. Yeah.
Sarah:So people can make a copy of it and do their own analysis.
Mark:Can I make a graph? Excellent.
Sarah:Anybody can.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:So it'll be a lot of fun. Yeah. And maybe other people will see things that I didn't see, and that'll be cool.
Mark:I've had a relationship with this show for a long time, and technology has changed over that time. And I always wanted to start Midsomer Wiki, I always did.
Sarah:And folks have.
Mark:I did Wiki research early
Sarah:on. Right.
Mark:And folks have the Wiki for Midsomer has It's
Sarah:great, yeah.
Mark:Reference it all the time. They absolutely have great information, great pictures is a great resource, absolutely, but it's on there's just so much stuff, you know, and so I think that's interesting that we'll do that we'll get some more information back on it. Yeah. We have another update. So the other update is I have applied to take over the Midsomer Murders Reddit subreddit.
Sarah:Yes, because the moderator abandoned it.
Mark:So if you're on Reddit and you want me or somebody like me to take over that Reddit, you have to go to what's I forget the name. Just look in my posts. I'm temporary remarked. I'm temporary remarked everywhere. And look in the post and you'll see that I posted saying that the guy who is moderator of that group hasn't posted in like three years.
Sarah:Yeah. So we're hoping that we can get an active moderator. If it's not you, then
Mark:somebody That's fine.
Sarah:So we can bring that community back because it's a great place.
Mark:It should be a place where we talk about Midsomer.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah.
Mark:You know, for the young kids. Facebook is for the older gentleman.
Sarah:I'm not old enough to be on Facebook. Alright. Maniacs, stay sane.
Mark:Stay, okay. First of all, all the love. Thank you this week again. But I've I've noticed that more people have been downloading our stuff in the last two weeks.
Sarah:I wonder why.
Mark:I've I've talked to several people about catching up, and my gosh, we took a week off and there are some people who are like, you're coming back. Right? Right? We need you to come back.
Sarah:So if you know somebody who doesn't listen who you think would enjoy it, by all means recommend it. We don't make any money off of doing this and if it gives them a little fun while they're stuck at home or under a lot of stress then I hope we can help.
Mark:We do this because we love the show. There is a tiny tiny cost incurred by the show that is enough like it's my less than my coffee money right in a month
Sarah:yeah lots less so if it makes you happy we're really glad
Mark:we we totally do it because we love it and it's fun and it's interesting and you know, it keeps me off the streets because I wander them now.
Sarah:But six feet away from anybody that you encounter. Right?
Mark:Six feet away from
Sarah:me. Finally, you can cross the street to avoid somebody walking your way, and they'll say thank you.
Mark:Yes. And we and we do plan we do plan on getting to England again at some point. And if we have not completed the series by then, which I don't think we will have, we will at least do at least an episode in England. And since everything is fifteen minutes away from everything else, you all in England can come. Aw.
Mark:We'll have to find. Maybe we go to George.
Sarah:Maybe we can rip off the George. If it doesn't have Lorna's stamp on it. If it's Lorna's George, I don't want
Mark:to go. There's no snug here. No. I can't no work clothes.
Sarah:I'm wearing my work clothes.
Mark:So good about like, the reason why I love him is because my dad knew all the characters in the neighborhood like that and sort of took care of them like if he needed some work done it was always a guy like that that he would come and do work for us. They always had weird stories and they always smelt weird and they're always interesting.
Sarah:And they're fascinating! Yeah, think my dad is one of those people now and it's awesome.
Mark:It's I'm turning into one of those people now. Not yet. Oh, I'm a OEA podcast in Bumble.
Sarah:I'm gonna get you a sock hat with a feather in it. Oh, we're rambling now.
Mark:Hey, Maniacs.
Sarah:We love you, Maniacs. Stay sane.
Mark:We will
Sarah:Stay safe. Stay healthy.
Mark:Next week for episode 34, which is, season seven, episode six, The Straw Woman. Season seven has seven episodes in it. So Straw
Sarah:Woman Life
Mark:burning. Yes. The Straw Woman is the next episode, which is the last one, and then they have their first Christmas special. Yeah. Yeah.
Mark:Which is a doozy. I love that episode.
Sarah:We'll have some fun.
Mark:With the crazy kid. The crazy kid who does all the magic tricks. Yeah. And, the weird uncle and, oh, so many good stuff. Good things.
Sarah:Alright, Maniacs. Until next week.
Mark:Bye, Maniacs.
Sarah:Bye, Maniacs. Told me it was okay. Lou. Lou. Don't get drunk on me now.
Sarah:You are being good. Is that better?
Mark:Yes. Yes. It is.
Sarah:Do we need to start
Mark:over? No. No. No. Okay.
Sarah:We'll be fine. I can see there could be some quabble, you know, quibbles, squabbles. I said quabble, squabbles? Squibble squabbles? Some scribble squabbles about who owns what.
Sarah:Hey, Maniacs.
Mark:Hey, Maniacs.
Sarah:It's Midsomer Maniacs.
Mark:Midsomer Maniacs, the podcast dedicated to the ITV series Midsomer Murders. Each week, we dig into an episode of the show, including the murders, the mayhem, the loonies. Oh, there's loonies in this episode and everything else we love.
Sarah:Right off the top, I have to say that I'm grateful that you are my podcasting partner.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Because I listen to a lot of podcasts. Yeah. And everyone I've listened to over the last week or so has started out with, well, we're not in the studio. We're all in separate places trying to record this.
Mark:We're in the same studio we use all the time.
Sarah:I know. It made no difference to us at all.
Mark:Which is like just a room in our house. Yeah.
Sarah:But I'm I'm just glad that we didn't have to figure out a way to do this at a distance, though I do have to say that it used to be putting on my headphones and sitting in front of the mic once a week was kind of a treat, and it was, you know, an unusual thing to do. We only did it once a week. But now I have so many online meetings that I feel like I live in my headphones. And I'm just glad that we don't do a video podcast because I'm really tired of being on camera this week.
Mark:And then another thing, one of the podcasts I listen to, the guy usually does his video cast and he edits it, and then he's doing a lot of live podcasts now, and you get all the ums and ums and buts and sos and all that stuff.
Sarah:So you know he's not perfect
Mark:now. Well, we knew he wasn't perfect before, but he said it was more anxiety for him.
Sarah:It it was made him anxious to not edit all that stuff out. Yeah. I feel like I'm on TV every time I have a meeting now, so it doesn't really matter anymore.
Mark:I have thought of us doing a possibility of some like a live, a Facebook live where we're watching an episode or something like that, where you could watch it along with us. But we watch in such a weird way, I don't know if it would be okay. Plus our children would come in and interrupt everybody at that Yeah, I'd
Sarah:say it's like the Netflix party mode now where you can watch something with other people who are further away, and whenever one person pauses it, it pauses it for everybody. We would just annoy the shit out of the entire Internet because we would pause it and go, what does that sign say? Rewind it. Rewind it. Pause it.
Mark:Yeah. And we'd be like, when I watched the episode the first time, I do it on my computer so that I get all the Amazon x-ray stuff so I knew who's on the screen at what time. And then second of all, I have much more fine controls of forward, back, and pause on my watching it on my computer than on our smart television.
Sarah:Yeah. Which when you press rewind can go back anywhere between two seconds and two hours. It just randomly jumps.
Mark:On the computer I have ten second increments that So I can speed through,
Sarah:we, probably like most of you who are listening, are in self isolation. We both work at schools, I work at a university and Mark works at a K-twelve, and both of our schools are online only now through the end of the semester. And it's just meant that we are home with our three 18 year olds all day, every day.
Mark:The dog wishes us all to go away. And
Sarah:as a result of not moving very much, because even though we have a big house, there's only so much distance you can cover and just having more time at home. I've been cooking so much. I think I'm going to gain about five pounds a week. The longer we're in self isolation, the fatter I'm
Mark:going to get. Well, the way our house is set up, you have to kind of go through the kitchen to get everything to go anywhere. And it's like, oh, well, I'll just grab a cookie. Grab a cookie or something while I'm going through the kitchen here.
Sarah:A big piece of that 18 pound ham you bought.
Mark:You requested me to buy ham. I said a ham. You wanted leftovers.
Sarah:Yeah. Four or five pounds would have been fine. You bought an 18 pound ham. How long did it take to reheat in the oven yesterday? Like, seven hours.
Sarah:We didn't eat dinner until 08:30 last night, even though I put the ham in the oven at, 03:30 because it's, like, two fifty, two fifty degrees Fahrenheit, fifteen minutes for every pound. I'm like, well, that'll be ready by tomorrow. Yeah. We finally just gave up and ate the hottest parts.
Mark:We hope you're doing well on self isolation and quarantine or whatever we're calling this. To me it's great that you, different people have said to us that they really appreciate our podcast continuing. Somebody posted on Instagram the other day that one of their top five favorite things right now was the podcast.
Sarah:I'm so glad. If we're helping one person get through this self isolation, I it's totally worth doing. And for those of you who aren't in self isolation because you're an essential employee somewhere, whether it's a grocery store or a hospital or a delivery person, anywhere in between, thank you so much for everything that you're doing. The rest of us could not be doing what we were doing, what we are doing, if it weren't for you.
Mark:Those are the real heroes.
Sarah:Absolutely. I just I just wanna go over to the grocery store and, like, hand out $20 bills or something to the people working.
Mark:I go to the grocery store. I'm I'm the designated sole person to go out of the house. Right?
Sarah:Because they've they've suggested that that you designate one person in your family who will go out and do run errands, pharmacy, grocery store, that kind of stuff. It's a mark for us.
Mark:So I do that, and I'm, like, in the line at the grocery store, and I'm Canadian, so I'm, sorry. Thank you. Thank you. Sorry. Sorry.
Mark:Thank you. Thank you. Sorry. And the people are just looking at me like, what? Why are you buying an 18 pound ham?
Mark:Yeah. How many people do you have at home?
Sarah:We're gonna eat this ham until this baby's over. It's our corona ham. It's gonna last us until quarantine is over.
Mark:Well, and the other thing is so we're really five adults in this house. Yes. So we have a dish load that is constant.
Sarah:Constant dishes. And and yet, three of us are teenagers, so they're all not me, not me, not me about doing the dishes. We're whining over small things. I'm glad that this is what we have to complain about and not something else.
Mark:We're very lucky. We're all healthy. Everybody we know really closely is healthy. It's we're very, very lucky.
Sarah:And there are so many little bright spots. So a couple of things, if you haven't noticed them yet, you should definitely check out. We we love Taskmaster. We just think it's so much fun. And Taskmaster is a It's British quasi game show with celebrities who complete these goofy tasks.
Sarah:They're so funny.
Mark:So if you don't know this already, Britain has this sort of tradition of putting comics on television to do game shows. Right? So Countdown is an actual game show in England, but they have this version of Countdown that has comedians on it where they don't really care about points or what's going
Sarah:on or anything.
Mark:It's all funny. But Taskmaster, they get serious about those tasks.
Sarah:Well, so the show is great. You should watch it. It's on YouTube.
Mark:But Greg Davies is the host,
Sarah:and Alex Horn is the cohost, and he's the one who created it. Yeah. Yeah. But now during the coronavirus kind of self quarantining thing, Alex Horn has been putting out a daily task for people at home to do and submit videos on Twitter. The hashtag is home tasking.
Sarah:Yep. And you should definitely check them out.
Mark:It's been fantastic.
Sarah:If you need a laugh Yeah. If you need to feel like there is sunshine in the world, check them out.
Mark:Yep. Absolutely. Lots of families.
Sarah:Yeah. Doing really fun things together.
Mark:Fun, goofy things together.
Sarah:The other thing I'm really liking right now is, Jimmy Fallon, who does the Late Show here in The US, is doing The Late Show Home Edition. So he's filming at home without all the rigmarole, and it's just very positive and happy and funny and genuine and absolutely worth checking out.
Mark:And he does it with his wife films it and his daughters are kind of cohosts.
Sarah:Yeah. They're like five and three.
Mark:Yeah. They're super cute. Yep.
Sarah:And you can drool over his house that has a slide built into it.
Mark:Yeah. We don't we have we have a spiral staircase, but we don't have a slide.
Sarah:We could turn it into one, though. Yes.
Mark:We could.
Sarah:And by the time this is over, we may. Who knows? Just for fun.
Mark:Yesterday, Moe and I organized the library, so that's the point we're at right now. Yeah.
Sarah:So hopefully you're coming up with fun things to do to keep things moving in your house. And if you have any fun ideas, leave them in the comments, send us a tweet or an Instagram post, post it on Facebook or whatever, and let us know what you're doing. I'm sure we'd all benefit from the ideas.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Are you ready for straw woman?
Mark:Straw woman. Okay. Okay.
Sarah:This is, season seven episode six.
Mark:Yes. Season seven episode six filmed in November and 12/02/2003. That's another point I wanna bring out. It's filmed in November and December, and the woman who is body double
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:For the nude scene,
Sarah:it's cold. She must have been cold.
Mark:Well, you could see her breath. Yeah. It it would have been awfully cold. Yeah. But more on that later.
Mark:And then, it was shown on the February 29, which makes it a leap year. Okay.
Sarah:Otherwise, that day wouldn't have existed.
Mark:Is that what you're saying? Yes. Yes. Okay. With 10,030,000 viewers.
Mark:Directed by Sarah Hellings and written by Jeff Dodd.
Sarah:It's not one of my favorite episodes. It has Midsomer, so it's great.
Mark:It has so much potential. It does. It has a giant straw woman.
Sarah:Yeah. Burning.
Mark:It has a pornographer.
Sarah:Yep. Gay vicars, naked photos.
Mark:Naked photos.
Sarah:Spontaneous human combustion. Yep. And he has all kinds of good stuff. Witches.
Mark:No. Wait a minute. There's no witches.
Sarah:No. Never mind. No witches. So let's let's hit the high notes here before we we dive in. So we've got a pretty small cast of characters, right?
Sarah:We've got, Alan Clifford and his daughter, Joe. Okay. And then Alan's, hospice nurse, Agnes Waterhouse.
Mark:Yes. She's taking care of him as he's dying from the big C.
Sarah:Right. And then we've got Margaret Hopkins, who's a former magistrate, and her boyfriend Doctor. Cole. Yes. And Cole's son Matthew Cole, who's an amateur photographer.
Mark:Okay. So a couple of things. One, in the Midsomer magazine for this who's who on this, they have a little line between Doctor. Cole and Margaret that says, Lovers? They're engaged.
Mark:They're engaged, and they're doing the lip lock
Sarah:But not in public, and nobody knows they're engaged. Right? Still. So they're they're a couple, but they're on the quiet. I don't know.
Sarah:Do you do you have to be having sex to be called lovers? Because I doubt she's into that before being married. Yeah. She's extremely religious.
Mark:Yeah. It's it's just but then she's like, oh, doctor Cole. Like, what? And I think it's implied. It's not shown, but I think it's implied that he's unbuttoning her shirt.
Sarah:Yeah. When Tom catches them in in Cole's office. Then we've got a couple of people from the village. We've got Kate Malpass, who is a homeopath, and then the school teacher, Liz Francis.
Mark:And we have assorted other villagers.
Sarah:You should just call them a mob. Yeah. Just a mob.
Mark:All they do is get angry.
Sarah:For no reason.
Mark:Nope. So this takes place in Midsomer Parva.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And the pub is the oak, so it doesn't really relate to the story at all. It's not an aptly named pub at all.
Sarah:Except that the oak is the tree that the witches were hung from in the village way back when.
Mark:Yeah. The witches of red herring. Yes.
Sarah:So we start with a with a ceremony of burning a straw woman, which is the first time in recent history that they're doing this in the village, but apparently it's some kind of way back old tradition. We'll talk about that. I know it can't be a tradition if it's the first time. There's a significant time gap between when they last did this in the village and now. And the reason they're doing it is that Liz Francis, the school teacher kind of dug up this old tradition and thought it would be fun to bring it back into the village to kind of build community.
Mark:Yep. I I harped on this when we were watching it, I understand, but how can it be a tradition as well as this is the first time we're doing things? But you bring up something interesting. Usually, when you have days and nights, you change clothes between days and nights, and different days have different clothes. Right?
Mark:Yeah. This episode does not follow that in the least.
Sarah:I feel like the wardrobe budget has really, really shrunk on Midsomer for some reason during this season. Holly wears the same clothes every time you see her, that stupid blue and yellow boatneck shirt. Yeah. And part of Liz Francis gets two ugly sweaters, a skirt, and a pair of pants. That's
Mark:it. Well, Joe's the same way. She has two outfits. She has the I'm a squaw outfit, and then she has the I'm a hippie outfit with the patchwork pants.
Sarah:Yep. And the leather trench coat. There are a lot of leather jackets and coats in this episode.
Mark:Well, it's November and December. You wouldn't wanna be out there naked. Wait a minute.
Sarah:So the first death is Alan Dakin. He was a curate. He's burned alive in The Straw Woman, right? Yeah. We get a second death.
Sarah:The second death is the vicar.
Mark:The vicar and the curate are lovers. Mhmm. As we see from a horribly photoshopped most uncomfortable gay picture ever.
Sarah:Yeah, of them in their swim trunks on a beach.
Mark:Yes, supposedly. And basically the reverend does nothing but run around hysterically after his lover dies. Yeah. Until he
Sarah:dies. And then he bursts into flames in the church. Right? Then you get this whole plot with the doctor and Joe Clifford
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:About how he wants to take her on a trip, and he's always licking his lips at her and stuff. Then she fools Matthew into going into the woods with her and has him take some pictures of her, which she then gives to Doctor. Cole, which then Margaret finds out he has. Then doctor John Cole dies again. He doesn't die.
Sarah:No. Right. Right. He's he's he catches fire too.
Mark:He also catches fire after being hit in the head by, like, a piece of
Sarah:Big candle stick or
Mark:candle stick or something.
Sarah:Wood or something.
Mark:He's not in a good way. He's not dead, but he's certainly not in a good way.
Sarah:Right. Because Liz Francis finds him and puts him out. Yep. Right? But that won't last because even though she has a romantic night with Scott, the very next day, she's then burned alive in the same church.
Sarah:This church
Mark:a little more than romance. He spends the night.
Sarah:I said a night of romance. This church should have been blocked off as a crime scene day one when the curette was burned alive.
Mark:Everybody goes through that crime scene tape like it's butter.
Sarah:I mean, after after the reverend burns in there, I would be hesitant to go in. After doctor Cole burst into flames in there, I certainly wouldn't have gone in. I mean, Liz is just dumb.
Mark:Well, plus they have that big, what do you call it? It's a fireproof rug Yeah. On the floor.
Sarah:Aren't you glad that they do? And Tom and Scott almost get in some stunt scenes here when they're trying to put out Liz. Yeah. They're close to actual flame. Yep.
Sarah:Now it may be a trick of the camera that makes them look like they're a little bit closer than they are.
Mark:The way they
Sarah:did close enough.
Mark:The way they did with the episode where the car bursts in flames Yeah. At the beginning.
Sarah:Yeah. But this is so
Mark:this is the by far the most pyrotechnically complex episode of Midsomer.
Sarah:Absolutely. And so we find out that Agnes Waterhouse is the killer, right? Yes. We've got these red herring plots, right? Is witches?
Sarah:And the village thinks that Liz Francis is a witch, and they think Kate Malpass, who is a homeopath, they think she's a witch. There's this whole subplot around Alan Clifford buying the big mansion and deconcentrating the church and how the village wants that church back. But in reality, Agnes's motives are far simpler. Alan wants to turn the mansion into a hospice after he dies. Which is fantastic.
Sarah:And she's removing anybody who is an obstacle to that, right? So both of the ministers wanted the church back and they might have stopped it. She's also very protective of Alan and wants him to have the death that he wants to have, and she won't let anybody get in the way.
Mark:And she thinks Kate is in the way of that.
Sarah:And then, yeah, of course, she gets jealous of Kate, but she is just absolutely loony toony by the end.
Mark:Completely loony toony.
Sarah:Like wide eyed, non blinking, smiling weirdness. Yeah. Just over over the the point of any kind of logic. In the end, it all boils down to one thing. If Alan had revealed his plans for the mansion earlier, none of this would have happened.
Sarah:Yes. Because everybody would have agreed, oh, that's a good idea. Okay.
Mark:The curate and the reverend would have been like, that's a wonderful thing that adds to our community. Doctor. Cole would have appreciated because his wife died of natural causes, I'm assuming something like cancer or something like that. He would have wanted a hospice in the community and seen the value of it. And I even think crazy that this is really the tale of two crazy ladies.
Mark:Margaret is crazy and and Agnes
Sarah:is Margaret is fanatical. Yeah. So what is Agnes' motive for killing Liz?
Mark:That she realizes because of the wind turning the book to the right pages, remember, the wind is a plot point, eerie voices and whispers, that she's trying to frame Kate Malpass Right. For all of this.
Sarah:She discovers in the old archives that it was Kate's ancestor who was hung as a witch. Yeah. So clearly somebody's trying to frame Kate.
Mark:And I don't know why she immediately knows it's Agnes, other than Agnes, Barnaby, the curate, and the reverend all visited the research dungeon
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:In the bottom of the church.
Sarah:So that's kind of the the quick overview. Yeah. Right? So let's dive into some fun stuff. Yes.
Sarah:Can I just say that I absolutely abhor the music at Clifford's party?
Mark:Okay. What
Sarah:is up with that music? It is a looping, like, ten second clip over and over and over and over again.
Mark:In my notes, I call it country polka.
Sarah:Yeah. It's country polka. The And other thing I don't understand about that party is it's clearly like a wild West theme. Everybody's dressed as like Cowboys. Cowboys and like saloon girls.
Sarah:And then Alan's dressed as Elvis. I I don't understand.
Mark:And she's kinda dressed as this explorer.
Sarah:No. I think she's supposed to be a cowgirl.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Kind of like, oh, the Woody's sidekick in Toy Story.
Mark:Okay. Okay. I don't know what her name is.
Sarah:I don't remember her name either, but that character is a toy that's dressed like that.
Mark:Or an heel cleaver.
Sarah:Yeah. It's that kind of that kind of
Mark:Well, Joe is dressed as the squaw.
Sarah:Pocahontas or something. It's just anything to show off cleavage, basically. Yeah. Oh, that music. Wow.
Mark:I even, like, listened to it a number of times to try to figure out the chords that they're playing, and it the chord progression is just horrific as well.
Sarah:I'm also not really clear on the whole straw woman burning thing and why Liz wanted to bring it back. She's a very logical, sensible person. She says that her whole aim is to remove the kind of- Prejudice. Prejudice and stereotype and ignorance- What
Mark:are you talking about? Signoing?
Sarah:Yeah. Around these women being hung way back when as witches and that whole kind of paranoia. And yet she's got her kids drawing pictures of witches that are green skinned, pointy hat wearing. Yep. Like all over her classroom.
Mark:This is another great episode of horrific children's drives. Yes.
Sarah:I just don't understand why Liz would would do that, why she would have the kids drawing these stereotypical witches when her whole idea is to, you know, kind of undo the damage of this prejudice.
Mark:Yeah. So let's build a giant straw woman and set it on fire.
Sarah:Yeah. Because that's what they used to do. Okay. Maybe may this is crazy. But maybe they should have done some research into the actual women who were killed and found out what they were really like.
Mark:Maybe did a women of the middle ages party or like a a Ren Faire kind of thing. Yeah. No. No. She's a witch burner.
Mark:Also, I'm gonna say that this this straw figure that they burn is in no way a woman.
Sarah:Well, it doesn't have legs. Yeah. Right? So it has like a skirt shape at the bottom.
Mark:It it kinda has a skirt shape, but other than that, there's no real reason to call it a woman. And in the magazine, there's a reference to Wicker Man that we've talked about a dozen times, but it's kinda stuck on there. It was like an excuse of this is something interesting to look at, so we should do that.
Sarah:So I looked into burning effigies. Yeah. And I know we're gonna have listeners who know a lot more about this than than we do.
Mark:Well, certainly.
Sarah:Apologize. The druid guy. Yeah. And I apologize if I make mistakes, but I could only find two traditions of burning women shaped effigies, female effigies. And one is Shrove tide, which is also pancake day.
Sarah:Yes. Right? And so there is a tradition of burning a female effigy then.
Mark:While you're running with your pancakes.
Sarah:Yes. If you wanna mash up some traditions together. Yes. But the other one is Valparagus night, which is I I I keep wanting to say which is, and I say which is.
Mark:Which is?
Sarah:Valparagus night is April 30 or May 1. It's like the overnight between those two dates. And, it's largely celebrated in Prague now. That's the biggest place where you can attend a Valparagus night ceremony celebration, and it is a witch burning.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:They they burn female effigies made of straw and wood, meaning to to symbolize witches being burned. There's the story about that's the night that these witches would meet on these mountaintops and hold these big ceremonies.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:So they would light fires at the top of mountains to kind of scare them off. And so now it's become this effigy burning ceremony. Though I've found some really funny news stories about, Hey, Valparagus night is back on because the drought is over! Right? So there were a couple of years in Prague where they couldn't do it because it was so dry that it was dangerous to have burning effigies, and the kids were sad.
Mark:They were sad.
Sarah:We don't get to burn anything, man.
Mark:No books, no witches.
Sarah:These ladies don't get to be burned. But hallelujah, it rained a little bit, so they were able to have the ceremony.
Mark:Well, hopefully, they'll have it
Sarah:in effigies. But, my my personal favorite effigy burning ceremony is Zezobra. Zezobra. Who's not female.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:But Zozobbra is fantastic. Look it up. Z o z o b r a.
Mark:Okay? Put this in the show notes.
Sarah:Zozobra is a giant effigy that they burn every year in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Okay? And the idea is that you burn him to destroy the worries of your prior year to start the new year.
Mark:Okay? Okay.
Sarah:But Zezobra is no regular effigy.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Zezobra is a giant marionette. Oh. Okay. He's like five stories tall.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:I mean, humongous.
Mark:Yep. 50 feet tall. He moves. Oh.
Sarah:Okay? While he's on fire, he moves. Oh. But the best part is that one man, it's been his job for years and years and years and years, as long as they've been doing this, does his voice. Oh.
Sarah:So while he's burning, he goes, oh, wow. Oh, what? While he's moving around on fire.
Mark:Oh, that sounds so fantastic. It
Sarah:is terrifying and awesome.
Mark:You gotta you gotta look Definitely put video of that. Fast. And that's in America.
Sarah:Yeah. In Santa Fe.
Mark:Excellent. Is this all about? When did they do this?
Sarah:Early in the year because it's like a New Year's tradition.
Mark:Oh, cool.
Sarah:Yeah. Oh, boy. Just imagine if this the straw effigy had been as a zobbra.
Mark:Yes. Right?
Sarah:Then they really wouldn't have noticed the vicar was incited burning alive. They would have been like, wow. He's really yelling this year. He sounds so great. Well, never mind.
Mark:Okay. The vic they set it on fire. The reverence the reverend basically kills his lover.
Sarah:Yeah. Accidentally. Yeah. Because it's his job to light it. Right?
Mark:But he starts screaming, and they all stand around like, wow. That's horrific. Maybe call the fire department?
Sarah:And by the time the cops are there, not only is the straw woman gone, but the curate is just bones.
Mark:When we get when we get to the best corpse of the episode, we have some issues here.
Sarah:Well, I wanna talk about this because this pertains to all of the deaths in this episode.
Mark:Yes. Is it doctor Cole's fat that saves him? No.
Sarah:Because if you're talking about real spontaneous human combustion, fat is your enemy. Yes. It's like your candle wax, but that's a whole another topic.
Mark:Whole other topic.
Sarah:Let's just talk about burning.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Okay? Okay. So what I wanted to know, like you just commented, how long did these villagers just stand around watching this guy burn?
Mark:The straws gonna go up pretty quick.
Sarah:And it's not like you could look away. No. And they clearly, even if they called for the emergency services, they didn't hose it down in time for anything to be left.
Mark:Never mind the fact of why would you do okay. Else in safety is not going to allow you to do this without a fire truck right beside it.
Sarah:Right there.
Mark:With the hoses already pointing at the effigy with the water in the hoses already.
Sarah:Plus, if I'm awake enough to open my eyes and yell, I am busting out of that thing. Like, you can't punch your way out a straw. I know he was drugged, but he's clearly quite awake when they light it.
Mark:He's got the one eye.
Sarah:Yeah. So I looked into this because I wanted to know if they did in fact just stand there until it till the fire burned down to the point where it is when George is poking at it, How long would they have been standing around going, wow, this is really unfortunate and awful? Mhmm. Yep. Still burning.
Sarah:Yep. Like, how long would that be? In reality, the curate would have been dead in thirty seconds to a minute.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Right? Because he would die of smoke inhalation
Mark:really quick. Before anything.
Sarah:So at least the screaming would have stopped pretty soon. Okay. So they wouldn't have been standing around, wasn't telling scream for a really long time. Right?
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:But still it burns. Yes. So a wood bonfire can burn at temperatures up to 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
Mark:Because there's wood at the bottom of this.
Sarah:Yes. Yeah. So in the center of a really good bonfire, you're talking about 2,000 degrees. Okay. Okay?
Sarah:And I'm talking Fahrenheit here
Mark:for
Sarah:our international listeners. I'm sorry. We use the old measurements here in The US.
Mark:The only place that uses them.
Sarah:Now when George is poking at the ashes, it's just bones.
Mark:Just bones.
Sarah:How long does it take or what temperature does it take to get a human body to that point?
Mark:I'd say twice as much as a wood fire. No. Oh.
Sarah:So a crematorium the oven in a crematorium reaches 1,400 to 1,800 degrees
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Which is cooler than a bonfire. Yes. That's telling you something. Yep. So if a crematorium takes three hours to burn a body to ashes Yep.
Sarah:So three hours at 1,600 degrees Yep. Then a body at 2,000 degrees would burn in about an hour and fifteen minutes. So they stood around for an hour and fifteen minutes.
Mark:I think we should tell the fire department, oh, they're way over in Midsomer Magna. No.
Sarah:It's so far.
Mark:It's too far. We would have to rent a boat, take a train. It's too far.
Sarah:But don't they show some people putting water out when George is there poking around? No, I don't
Mark:think so.
Sarah:I have a feeling there's somebody in the background kind of like hosing things off, but
Mark:The health and safety man is watching this episode going, no. No. No. No. No.
Sarah:Yeah. And I take that back. Okay. So if a body in a crematorium burns for three hours at 1,600 degrees, then a body in a a wood bonfire would burn in about two hours. Yeah.
Sarah:So they stood around for two hours Yeah. To get him to that point. Two hours.
Mark:And not throwing water on it.
Sarah:Nothing. But everybody else who's killed in this episode is killed by putting white phosphorus in a solution on their clothes. Yes. Right? Now there's white phosphorus burn It burns at 5,000 degrees.
Sarah:Wow. So more than twice what a wood bonfire does. So one of the things that bothers me about this episode is, like, Liz and the vicar, they're just piles of ash Yes. Which is exactly what they actually would be
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:If they were burned with white phosphorus.
Mark:But it would take longer.
Sarah:No. Oh. Because a body can burn to ash in three hours at 1,600 degrees. At 5,000 degrees, it would take thirty minutes, thirty to forty minutes to get to crematorium style ashes at that temperature.
Mark:Luckily, the church has a fire extinguisher
Sarah:that's empty. Well, they already used it. Yeah. I know. Like, okay.
Mark:If you've used your fire extinguisher, what
Sarah:is job one? People were a little busy to think, let's replace the fire extinguisher, and surely nobody else will come in here and catch fire in the very same way in the very same spot. Surely not.
Mark:Oh, wait. They do.
Sarah:So this problem I had with this episode about these piles of ashes, my after doing this research, really my only problem is the fact that they're kind of like clothes laying there. Yeah. It's like their bodies have burned, but their clothes haven't, but their clothes are actually what are caught fire. Yeah. So they would definitely be gone too.
Mark:Well, and the fact that they, like, I can only imagine the producers coming to the look like the location person says, I found a church. It's awesome. It's beautiful. Okay. So then the producers go to the people who run the church and are like, well, we wanna set four people on fire in your church.
Sarah:I know you've got these nice wood pews two feet away from where we wanna catch the fire.
Mark:No. No. It'll be safe. There'll be a big blanket down.
Sarah:Yeah. So, you know, long story short I can't believe they did it in realistic.
Mark:I cannot believe they did it in a church.
Sarah:I couldn't find any definitive proof of what that chapel was. I could find information about the exterior shots of that church and what church it was, but I couldn't find any proof that they actually filmed those in a real chapel.
Mark:Do you think they made a set?
Sarah:I don't think they made a set, but it could have been a lot rougher than you think it is, and they dressed it.
Mark:They dressed it. That's a possibility. Yeah. There are there are some some kind of rundown churches in England, you know.
Sarah:Yeah. Now there are some shots from the altar's point of view.
Mark:They show all the pews.
Sarah:Yeah. And it it does look, you know, like a like a real chapel. But, you know, you put a couple pews in there and an altar with some cloth on it, and it it pretty much looks like an active church. Yeah. It wouldn't take a lot.
Mark:The this episode needs a behind the scenes.
Sarah:Yeah. It does. That's my rant about
Mark:burning people. Okay.
Sarah:Let's talk about Alan's house. Okay.
Mark:Alan's house has a hedge mage in front of it. Mhmm. Hedge maze in front of it.
Sarah:A hedge mage is something completely different. That's completely different. A hedge wizard. Yeah. Completely different.
Sarah:So what do know? It's a beautiful hedge maze.
Mark:What do you know about hedge mage mazes?
Sarah:That they're really expensive and they take a long time to grow. Yes. And I wouldn't wanna maintain one.
Mark:They they started in the seventeenth century, sixteenth century in Europe as entertainment for rich people. Right? And it it was a conspicuous consumerism thing. It was like, I'm so rich, I can have a hedge maze.
Sarah:These must be very patient rich people. In fifteen years, we can go out into that maze mean, all those bushes have grown up big enough.
Mark:Now I know you know this, but some of our listeners might not know this, that there's a difference between a labyrinth and a maze.
Sarah:Yes. A labyrinth has only one way in and out. Yep. And it's really you really can't make a wrong turn in a labyrinth.
Mark:A labyrinth is technically unicursal.
Sarah:Yes. It has one path.
Mark:Well, a maze is multicursal.
Sarah:The the labyrinth in the movie, labyrinth with Jennifer Connelly and David Bowie is actually a maze. Yeah. They should have called that movie maze, but that would have been boring.
Mark:And that's a great movie.
Sarah:It's a really good movie.
Mark:Yeah. It's a beautiful maze. I tried to find where it was. I looked everywhere to find locations. I saw lots of pictures of this maze, but I couldn't find where it was, unfortunately.
Sarah:It's kind of short too. It's like maybe waist height.
Mark:You could see a, oh, it's over there. Yeah. And if you got stuck,
Sarah:you could climb over the
Mark:it's not like the maze in Endeavor.
Sarah:Yeah. That's a that's a real maze. Yeah. So the other thing about his his house is he's supposedly turning the chapel into, like, a Louvre shack or something.
Mark:Right? And they're fighting over ownership of this chapel.
Sarah:Yes. Over he said it deconsecrated. It's his bedroom. And he has this nice round beautiful bed that looks really comfy. And then Agnes gives him a gift of a new bed.
Mark:Now is that in the same room?
Sarah:Yeah. Okay. It's half the size. It's heart shaped and it looks like it's made out of plywood.
Mark:I was like, did you get the Poconos lady?
Sarah:When he sits on it, it doesn't there's like no cushion at all. It's like a sheet over plywood. Yeah. Like, wow. I don't wanna lay on that bed.
Sarah:No. And it's dinky.
Mark:It's it's really dinky. So let's let's talk about this. Alan is supposedly well, Margaret calls him a pornographer.
Sarah:Yeah. And I think he's supposed to be like a Hugh Hefner type.
Mark:Like a Hugh Hefner type. But there's no magazine or anything. There's no proof that he actually makes pornography.
Sarah:No. I I think he is retired.
Mark:But he certainly has that playboy lifestyle.
Sarah:Right. Right. His silk pajamas and stuff.
Mark:Yeah. He rebuffs Agnes at the beginning for the girl with more cleavage. Yeah. But, like, he really does no wrong in this episode. No.
Mark:And the and the chapel is attached to his house. If something's attached to my house, I own it. Right. I don't care if you think it's a chapel, I own it.
Sarah:Yeah. But you know, in The UK, it that can be different. I'll go
Mark:down to the research dungeon and prove it.
Sarah:Yeah. I mean, when you live in a semi detached house and your house is actually attached to something that somebody else owns, I can see there could be some quabble, you know, quibbles, squabbles. I said quabbles. Squabbles?
Mark:Some Quibble squabbles.
Sarah:Some scribble squabbles about who owns what, you know, that's my wall, that's my garden, no, it's mine, whatever. But this is, I think, a little bit more clear cut except that Margaret lives in the vicarage. Yeah. Which is weird, which makes me wonder where the vicar lives. Yeah.
Sarah:And why aren't they trying to take that back? Yeah. She says when she dies, she's gonna leave it to the church.
Mark:That's nice of you.
Sarah:If they had a vicar, he could live there, but they're not alive anymore. Never mind.
Mark:Church next Sunday is gonna be pretty empty.
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:This building makes everyone go on fire.
Sarah:Whole congregation.
Mark:I'm a witch, burn me.
Sarah:Well, and everybody in the village, it's it's like they're all really angry just looking for a reason to be angry. They're just rabble.
Mark:And they're like, we're gonna pull our kids out of the school. What? Why?
Sarah:And what alternative do you have? Yeah. Well, Liz is a witch. That's why. They don't want their kids to be taught by a witch.
Mark:Did you notice that school was named Saint Agnes?
Sarah:No. Yeah. That's interesting.
Mark:They show the sign, like, kinda halfway one time, so
Sarah:And there's also this theme about medicine, right?
Mark:Which is what makes it difficult for me because, okay, I agree with the doctor about the homeopathy stuff, right? I have a phrase I say which is natural the natural medicine that works is called medicine.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:And so I'm with the doctor there, but the naked pictures of the 19 year old and the let's go away on a trip on a Viking cruise.
Sarah:And the way he lies to Margaret.
Mark:Yeah. I'm not so much on his team there.
Sarah:And, you know, you you might you may be pro or anti homeopathy. That is neither here nor there. Kate is actually a doctor.
Mark:Yeah. She's the least effusive homeopath.
Sarah:She knows what she's talking about. Yeah. Right? And yet he's, you know, he's threatened by her. He calls her a fraud and a mountebunk.
Mark:He bangs on her door.
Sarah:He kicks her door.
Mark:He kicks her door, and and and Scott and Barnaby look at him and go, the doctor's upset. You should go over there.
Sarah:I'm sorry. If somebody is kicking our door in the middle of the night, something better happen.
Mark:Well, and they just left her house. Yeah. It's like they pass him in the driveway. Yeah.
Sarah:He's walking by all angry. I'm gonna go kick a door. And they're like, oh, okay. Mhmm. Do you know what a mountebank is?
Mark:No. What's a mountebank?
Sarah:It's the the term is a contraction of the Italian manta I bunco. Okay. Which means mount a bench. Okay.
Mark:So Well, the doctor's all into what people's names name mean anyway.
Sarah:Yeah. Mile pass. People who used to sell snake oil would stand in the village square on a box or on a bench Yeah. And gather people around to show them their, you know, quackery medicine, and that's why they call them mountebanks. In in Johnson's, original dictionary, the definition of a mountebank is a peripatetic quack.
Sarah:Oh. Do you know what peripatetic means? No. It means wandering. Oh.
Sarah:So it's a wandering quack. Wow. She's a fraud in a mountebank, but he is a lecherous gross person.
Mark:What does doctor Cole bring to a relationship? Lying, deceit, and, the love of 19 year old naked girls.
Sarah:Yeah. I mean, nothing good. No. Nothing beneficial. She's a witch.
Mark:Yeah. You know, I feel so sad for Liz in this episode. She's trying to do things. You've been here five minutes. K?
Mark:She's still trying to do things, and she doesn't get very good outfits. She wears that gray sweater up to her neck the whole time. I just wanna unzip it and be like, you could breathe, lady. Right? And then second of all, in her house, when she's talking to Scott, there's a sticker on the cupboard.
Sarah:On the kitchen cupboard?
Mark:Yeah. And I'm completely obsessed with this sticker.
Sarah:What did the sticker say?
Mark:It said Ella Friendly. So it has a little person and an elephant. Like, the idea is that you support animal rights. And, like, for me because my school mascot's a rhino I'm kind of rhino friendly.
Sarah:Right. Right? So So maybe she gave to a charity for elephants.
Mark:If you want to see something super cute go look at the Denver's I think it's the Denver zoo who have a new baby rhinoceros.
Sarah:He's so cute.
Mark:And they have photos of and video of him online.
Sarah:He's not as cute as Fiona the hippo in Fiona Cincinnati
Mark:the hippo in Cincinnati zoo has a special place in my heart. And and she's not it's not as cute as that, but it's pretty darn cute.
Sarah:But when you looked up Ella Friendly, you found things that weren't cute.
Mark:Yeah, so I am not a person who judges other people for their tastes, okay? If you're into something that I'm not into, that's okay. But I'm just gonna say that the furry community has ruined Ella Friendly.
Sarah:They've taken it. Yes. The phrase Ella Friendly.
Mark:And I did an image search for Ella Friendly because I wanted to find the sticker, and I don't know if I'm the same person now.
Sarah:You didn't have your safe search on,
Mark:No. No. Didn't have safe search on.
Sarah:See Well, that's okay. I was googling how long to burn a body to ashes. No worries.
Mark:Because before that, I was trying to find out if Gemma, what's Jemima what's her name had any tattoos to see if they used a body double for the naked pictures or not. And so I was looking at all these pictures of her, and then next thing you know, I'm Ella Friendly.
Sarah:I won't judge you on your browsing history. It's okay.
Mark:Oh, jeez. It makes me not wanna play bingo. Oh. So there's a scene. It's stuck right in the middle.
Sarah:When Margaret is, they're in the village hall, and she's trying to rouse the entire village to, like, burn Liz or something.
Mark:What are they trying to What or Kate. What are they trying to accomplish there? Because I tell you what one thing they're not trying to accomplish is play bingo because they have a bingo sign behind it.
Sarah:Yeah. And it's just like a poster board with bingo written on it, and I I guess they must
Mark:It's got, like, some numbers that make no sense at all.
Sarah:Yeah. They must pull the balls out and then cross them off on there, I guess.
Mark:Just makes no sense at all. Worst bingo game ever.
Sarah:Yeah. I don't wanna play that bingo game. So that's Liz's sticker, but she's also got a weird mug or something. Doesn't she?
Mark:Yeah. So she has a mug that has absolutely the most ironic words on a mug ever. So they give her a mug, and I don't think the people who gave the mug, like, put the mug in there, really read through the script because the mug says, old teachers never die, they just lose their class. Wow. And in the next scene, she dies.
Sarah:Old teachers never die, but young ones do.
Mark:It's just one of those little hidden jokes in there that the set dressers must put in. They're like, oh, we gotta use that one.
Sarah:Oh, I meant to tell you this already. Yeah. So the actress who plays Margaret Yes. Richenda Carey
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:She used to be married well, she was married to him until he died. She was married to Nigel Stock
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Who played uncle Rupert t Waxflatter in young Sherlock Holmes.
Mark:Oh, another Sherlock Holmes.
Sarah:He's the the girl, the main character. He's her uncle. Oh. He goes off the roof in the winged machine. Yep.
Sarah:Yeah. She was married to him. So two weeks in a row, we've got young Sherlock Holmes connections.
Mark:If you missed it in last week's show notes, I put a picture that had young Sherlock Holmes, young Watson, and the the professor, which are all three people who've been in this season. Yeah. One picture had them all in it.
Sarah:And Agnes is the school teacher, but her name is is Maggie O'Neil, the actress's name. She's the school teacher in the Simply Red music video for Holding Back the Years. Oh. You remember that song?
Mark:Oh, yeah. I know that song. Yeah. I'll have to put the music video in the show notes. Yeah.
Mark:She's just like wandering in a graveyard and stuff like that.
Sarah:He's like packing up to leave and he's reflecting on his life. And there's a scene where, it's a school, it's a classroom and all the students are in their seats and they're throwing paper everywhere, and the teacher's sitting up in front looking like she's about to cry.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Because clearly, she's lost control of her classroom. Yeah. Yeah. That's Maggie O'Neil. Oh, okay.
Sarah:That's her first acting credit.
Mark:Oh, okay. I'll have to put that in.
Sarah:Yeah. I had to look it up. I had to watch it. It's like, oh, yeah.
Mark:But certainly the person in this episode, and we we make fun of this, but the person in this episode that becomes most well known is Jemima.
Sarah:Yes. Jemima. I I'm guessing her last name is actually pronounced Roper, but it's r o o p e r.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:She's been in lots A of
Mark:busy working actress.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:Yeah. And she's in movies and TV, and you see her all the time. She's she was, like, in a show with witches too and Hexed. Hexed. Yeah.
Sarah:It's good. She was also in Lost in Austin, which is, it's a miniseries about a girl who really likes Jane Austen, and she gets.
Mark:That's right.
Sarah:She kinda like gets stuck inside the novels. Yeah. It's fun. Yeah. The other person who's in a lot of stuff is Matthew Cole.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Which he's really young in this, but, the the actor's name is Daniel Wehman. And right now, he's in Gentleman Jack. He was in the most recent episodes of Foils War
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:After Acorn took it over. Yeah. I mean, he's been in all kinds of stuff, super recently.
Mark:Oh, that's good. It's good to see him working.
Sarah:But the the person whose acting history I was most interested in was, Alan Clifford.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:He's played by Keith Baron.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:And, again, he's been in tons of stuff. He's been in EastEnders. He's been in Doctors. He's been in, know, blah blah blah, all those shows that everybody's in. But you you already mentioned Countdown.
Sarah:Yeah. He was in 99 episodes of Countdown Wow. Between 1999 and 2008.
Mark:Like, as the host? No. He played Countdown.
Sarah:Or he was in Dictionary Corner.
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:If you've never seen Countdown, it basically has two kinds of games. One is they draw a set of random numbers, and you have to mathematically manipulate those numbers to get a target total.
Mark:Using all the numbers. It's a hard game show.
Sarah:Yeah. And then the other challenge is, basically scrabble. They, they draw random letters and you have to make the longest word possible to win. And so they have this dictionary corner, which is the person who verifies that the words that the people spell from those letters are real words. And he he wasn't always just in Dictionary Corner, but, yeah, he was on 99 episodes of that Okay.
Mark:I had no idea.
Sarah:In nine years. Wow. That's a lot.
Mark:That's a lot.
Sarah:But he was also in a movie in 1974 called The Land That Time Forgot, which I'm sure you've seen.
Mark:So this is the American land time that forgot.
Sarah:Yeah. And it's it's set during World War two, a British ship sinks a German U boat and they take the sailors onto their boat and then they get caught in like a, I don't know, like a whirlpool or something, and when they come back out, they're in a different different parallel universe. Yeah.
Mark:It's got dinosaurs. Right?
Sarah:Yeah. But the hole that I really fell down was this, game show in The UK that I'd never heard of, based on Clue. It's called Cluedo, which is what Clue is called, the board game is called in The UK.
Mark:Yeah, if you don't know, Midsomer, American Midsomer fans, there is a version of Clue or what's in
Sarah:England called Cluedo. It's the original Clue.
Mark:Yes. With Midsomer characters in it.
Sarah:Yeah. But the so the original Cluedo board game the reason why it's called Cluedo is it's Clue plus Ludo, which is ludology. The study of play is ludology. Right? So ludo is play.
Sarah:So it's play murder, basically. But there was a game show
Mark:of Clue.
Sarah:K. So over a series of six episodes, they had celebrities as, like, house guests who had to solve the murder.
Mark:Oh, they need to remake this.
Sarah:And all of the characters were there. They're, you know, captain colonel Mustard, miss Peacock, all those people were there. And every season, it was an a new murderer.
Mark:Oh, no.
Sarah:So they had to interrogate them and capture clues and stuff. It was on between, 1990 and 1993, and he was on a couple episodes of that.
Mark:Oh, obviously, that would be full of people that we've seen.
Sarah:Oh, so many people. And then I found it on YouTube and, yeah, lost like an hour and a half.
Mark:I'll put a I'll put a link to an episode on YouTube.
Sarah:Yeah. Oh, and we can't forget that, the reverend Yes. Plays a reverend in another Midsomer. So we've talked about him before. Jonathan Hackett is his name.
Sarah:Yeah. He was also a reverend Thorne in Who Killed Cockrobin.
Mark:Now are they
Sarah:So he plays to
Mark:Are they in Midsomer Murder? Midsomer
Sarah:Parva? Parva? No. Who Killed Cockrobin takes place somewhere else, and I'd have to refer to my spreadsheet on locations.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Yeah. So he plays a a reverend twice.
Mark:Oh, he just kinda runs around with his hands in the air here.
Sarah:I think they just have a a priest outfit that fits him. Yeah. So when they need one, they just call him back.
Mark:I I can see that.
Sarah:And he's so nondescript, you know, somewhat receding hairline, brown hair, Caucasian, brown eyes Yep. Normal, average height, average weight, whatever.
Mark:Yep. Call up him. He does a vicar good.
Sarah:You said there was something interesting about phone codes.
Mark:Yes. So the phone code And
Sarah:that I obviously missed.
Mark:The phone code in this episode is 01632, which is the beginning of phone numbers in England, which is equivalent to the 555 in The US. Oh. So you can't actually call numbers that have 01632 at the beginning. So it's so in okay. Tiny divergence.
Mark:Up until the mid eighties, early eighties in The US, there was no 555 prefix code. So if you see a number on television, if you're watching any American show, Canadian show, and they list a file phone number, it's always 55562
Sarah:because it's a fake number.
Mark:It's a fake number. You do you know why the reason that that fake number was created?
Sarah:Well, I mean, just so that people didn't try to dial people.
Mark:Do you know what caused it, though? No. Jenny. The song by two 867-5309. Yeah.
Mark:Tommy two tone, made that song Jenny 86758309, and millions of people across The United States called that number in their area code and annoyed the crap out of people. So that is why, because of that song, they added 555 to the North American number going, I know far too much about telephone numbers. Because I worked in the industry, and that's why they added it, and that's why you can't call numbers that show up in movies.
Sarah:It's so crazy to me that I remember. It's 867-5309.
Mark:You dial that number now, and it doesn't work in any area code in North America.
Sarah:Well, they should have charged him all the trouble that that caused.
Mark:Yeah. He changed telephone numbers in North America. Wow.
Sarah:With one song. Yeah. But, boy, you put something to lyrics, and it's it really sticks in your head. What? And I can't remember the phone number I had as a kid, which is when I probably heard that song last, and and yet I can remember that.
Mark:Well, and that number he just made up because it fit the music.
Sarah:Right. It had the right number.
Mark:So the right numbers. He was more concerned about Jenny.
Sarah:And he could say, nah yeine. Yep.
Mark:So that's the equivalent of that.
Sarah:So I also know, talking about, like, weird media artifacts in this episode.
Mark:Well, I got the weirdest one, but they're
Sarah:like the website.
Mark:Yeah. So wow. Barnaby gets on the web. This is the first time Barnaby's on the web by himself.
Sarah:Yeah. Without Kelly or Scott assisting. Yep. And Pretty much. He wants to know about spontaneous human combustion.
Mark:Right? Somebody mentions it. It's kind of this add on in this episode that is silly.
Sarah:Well, be because there's no source for the fire. There's no obvious source for the fire. Right?
Mark:They go to a website, and across the top of the website, it says The Body is Human Candle. By the way, don't Google that either.
Sarah:No. Unless you want to be disturbed. Yep.
Mark:Yep. Did that. And it shows a website that he prints off as he's watching it, looking at it. As a desktop computer, the the printer's on his desktop, so he's looking at the web page and then printing it at the same time. Anyway, when he shows the screen for just the tiniest of moments
Sarah:You were able to pause it.
Mark:I was able to pause
Sarah:it. Of course you were.
Mark:And get the URL for the website that he's at, because I was kind of amazed that they had that. So it is alternativescience and then it's clearly not a website at this point in time because written after the slash is
Sarah:There's no .com or .org or anything?
Mark:No, it's alternativescience.com, and written after the slash is the body as human candle with spaces.
Sarah:Right, which you'll never see. Have to have an ampersand or hyphen for seven twenty.
Mark:Right. So for spaces in web page names, nerdy, but I wrote a book on it. Believe,
Sarah:nerd alert, nerd alert.
Mark:So you can't do that. So I went to alternativescience.com. Do not go to alternativescience.com. My browser freaked out. I tried on three different browsers.
Mark:They all freaked out. They were like, you really don't want to go to alternativescience.com. It's a bad, bad, bad, bad place.
Sarah:So you did it on our behalf. So none of us have to risk our computers Okay. Going to this
Mark:addition, so they made this website.
Sarah:People are typing in the URL right now.
Mark:Yes, they you very much. Doing it. In addition, I looked up who owned that website and it was all crazy foreign like weirdness. It was like no registration I'd seen before. It was clearly not.
Sarah:The mumbo jumbo?
Mark:Oh, yeah. There was stuff in there. Like, you're there's supposed to be address and telephone number. All that stuff was weird. It's all very strange.
Sarah:So did you actually go to the site? No.
Mark:I couldn't. I couldn't no browser would let me. It was just like, no. No. No.
Mark:I saw warnings I've never seen in my browser before. I was like, oh, this is bad stuff.
Sarah:Like, when Google thinks you're going someplace that might, you know, install a virus or something, you can you can click on the more information button and reveal a go ahead if you want to button.
Mark:No. I didn't even get that choice. It's bad news.
Sarah:Maybe you should download Opera or some kind of really thin web browser, do it in incognito mode on a junk computer, like on a Chromebook at school. Because now I wanna know.
Mark:Yeah. Wow. It was not good. In addition to
Sarah:that One of our listeners is going to do this.
Mark:That website along the left hand side has other little, like, biscuits with different areas that you can search, right?
Sarah:Like a navigation menu.
Mark:Yeah, they include air crashers, atomorphs, which I don't know, couldn't I looked up alternative and skeptic science for both of those and none of them are there. Myths. CSI COP which is the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:And finally just the last one said Randy's Million and I knew exactly what that was So right this Canadian magician, he was an illusionist Mhmm. And a skeptic in the seventies and eighties really predominantly named the amazing Randy. He was on all the television shows Yeah. And he had, sped primetime specials.
Sarah:He's a very cool guy.
Mark:I remember seeing primetime amazing Randy specials Yeah. When I was a kid. And he he's still alive first of all, which I was like, woah.
Sarah:Yeah. He's he's
Mark:93. He's the same age as the queen. Wow. So but why it says Randy's million is because he put up a million dollars for anyone who could prove the paranormal existed. Definitive
Sarah:proof. Yep.
Mark:And no one did it.
Sarah:Is it still available?
Mark:No. The society that runs, it's called the Amazing Randy Skeptical Society or something, they discontinued the million dollar pledge in 2015 because it had been thirty years and no one had even come close.
Sarah:And wow, people did try.
Mark:They did.
Sarah:But he just shot him down one after another after another, just to prove whatever it was they thought they had. Yeah.
Mark:I love skeptics. I love people who still like, the best part is, like Penn and Teller, he was still an illusionist. He did all these amazing hard card tricks and things like that, but he was like, this is all bullshit. You shouldn't believe any of it. It's all illusion.
Sarah:Oh, I've got one more fun thing. Joe takes the picture of Matthew with the hog head in his lap, and there's also the hog head that is on the
Mark:The altar.
Sarah:The altar. We find out that, of course, the hogs had come from the fact that they did a hog roast at Clifford's house.
Mark:I wanna go to Clifford's party. He's got, like, full gambling gear and lots of people.
Sarah:Looks like a pretty
Mark:funny party. Episode has a lot of extras in it. And if you look closely, there are people from the village who are like, witch, barter, who are also at his party.
Sarah:Yes. Of course they are. So the but the symbol of a hog head being evil Yeah. Is actually a it's a it's a reference to Satan. Right?
Sarah:But there's the the connection is interesting. So if you look up hog head plus evil or something like that, everything is a reference to Lord of the Flies, the book Lord of the Flies.
Mark:Yes. Because they cut off a hog's head.
Sarah:And put it on a stake.
Mark:Put it on a steek.
Sarah:Right? But the reason they did that is the same reason why this hog head is seen as evil. Because of Lord of the Flies is another name for Satan.
Mark:Yes. Right? Beelzebub. That's what they call, like, the mysterious thing in the forest that they never see is the lord of the flies.
Sarah:Yes. And the reason why a hog head is lord of the flies is because almost immediately it's surrounded by flies.
Mark:Like a halo, I think.
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Right? So the whole idea is that it evokes that image.
Mark:Ah, okay.
Sarah:Even though there are no flies in the episode, but that's that's why the hog head is seen as a symbol of of evil.
Mark:Okay. There's something that we haven't talked about in this entire episode that once we say it, you will be able to you will not be able to unsee it for the entirety of the episode. We're gonna ruin this episode for you.
Sarah:Lay it on me.
Mark:There is something wrong with Dan Scott's lip.
Sarah:Yes. There is.
Mark:He's not in a fight. If you notice, Cully, Barnaby, Joyce Barnaby, and Scott are barely in this episode. The three of them.
Sarah:Yeah. But he Dan Scott on his it would be his left side Yes. On his upper lip. It's like his lip has been split up into his face.
Mark:Like he's been in a big fight or a car accident or something. Yeah. It's a major injury.
Sarah:And at some points you can almost see that there are stitches. Yes. And at other points it looks either like they've put more makeup on it or that it's healed a little bit.
Mark:Like he is completely shown only from one side for most of the episodes.
Sarah:Very deliberately shot from his right side. Yeah. And I think you could you could cut this episode into scenes and rearrange it by the chronology of his lip healing. Yeah. Because it's clearly not shot in order.
Mark:Television shows and movies are not filmed in order. Right. Makes no sense to film them in order.
Sarah:But there are scenes where his lip looks freshly injured Yes. And others where it looks like it's almost healed. And they make no reference to it No. Which they could have done. They could have been like, wow.
Mark:That's Maybe he ran into the firefighters at the start, and that's why they didn't get there for two hours. No.
Sarah:That would be Troy's driving, not his. Right? Of course. But they could have said they could have made some reference to a brawl that he broke up or something, like, well, you're looking worse for wear. Oh, it'll heal or whatever.
Sarah:And then they could have shot him from whatever angle they wanted to, but they clearly tried to hide it. Yeah. If you if you rewatch it, just look at Scott's lip. You will see it.
Mark:The other thing about Scott is he's constantly on the make in this episode. Yeah. Like, Liz is, like, waving her booty out of her little orange car, and he's like, he like booty.
Sarah:And then he's drooling over Joe too. Yeah. Like But she's flaunting it everywhere. But But I felt like his relationship with Liz was kind of sweet.
Mark:I did too. I thought
Sarah:they had And of she has to die.
Mark:Yeah. Well, you know
Sarah:And he seems
Mark:to old teachers.
Sarah:He he seems never die. Genuinely bereft.
Mark:He's very upset in the church.
Sarah:He's in the schoolyard, and a little girl says, oh, are you looking for miss Francis? And he says, yeah. I guess I was.
Mark:Yep. It's sad. It is.
Sarah:He should know better. Troy should have told him.
Mark:Don't do this, man.
Sarah:Don't. Don't fall in love with anybody related to any of your cases. They're all crazy.
Mark:They're all crazy. They're either the murderer or they're gonna die.
Sarah:Date somebody from outside the entire Oxfordshire area. Yes. Long distance love affairs are the best.
Mark:But we're already halfway through his time on the show.
Sarah:Yeah. So we've got three and a half bodies.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:We've got Alex, the curate, who dies in, straw woman. Yes. We've got only bones. And an eye.
Mark:We see his eye, but that's it.
Sarah:Right. Well, yeah, there's not an eyeball just sitting
Mark:in the ashes. That would be weird,
Sarah:especially if it was still looking around. George would be like, wow. This is really strange. He there are a lot of people who poke at those ashes with a stick Oh
Mark:my gosh.
Sarah:Throughout the whole episode.
Mark:And they, like, just it's just in the middle of town, and we know how police tape doesn't stop these people.
Sarah:No. They're just like poking it. Maybe it's because they see that eyeball still looking around in there. Right? So then there's the Reverend Jim Hale, who burns in the church.
Sarah:Doctor. Cole burns but doesn't die, and Liz Francis burns. So who's the best corpse?
Mark:I'm gonna say that Hale is the best corpse because it's the best effect of the burning.
Sarah:Yeah. The stuntman who did that flailed well. Looks like hail. Yeah.
Mark:Does a great job.
Sarah:I actually think they did some CGI there. So really rudimentary CGI.
Mark:Little bit right at
Sarah:the beginning. They sort of superimposed the actor's face on top of the stuntman's face for just fragments of a second.
Mark:Fragment of a second.
Sarah:So they must have looked pretty differently from one another. Yeah. And they thought they needed to do something to make it look more like him.
Mark:No. And it is the best stuntman effect we've seen on the on any episode so far.
Sarah:There's some good ones coming.
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:What about after the credits?
Mark:After the credits, no one's running that church, and no one's going in it. The first thing I have is this is the end of this church. Yes.
Sarah:Do you think Alan
Mark:Oh, really? I got a job. It's in Oxfordshire. It's a little country parish. Oh, this will be what what happened to your old
Sarah:priest? What's about the curate? What's this black body outline on the floor?
Mark:What's this big rug out here for? Do
Sarah:you think after the episode that Alan seeks actual treatment? Now that Joe has said I don't want you to die and he's heard that and he realizes he didn't want to die?
Mark:In my vision, because I'm a warped person, I have Alan dies and Joe inherits and marries Matthew. Oh,
Sarah:She does feel bad for
Mark:She does feel bad for Matthew.
Sarah:Making him catatonic and everything.
Mark:There are two crazy ladies in this episode, but there are two guys near the edge. Matthew and and Hale are like one tiny thing sent well, okay. It is a murder of somebody love. Okay. I understand that this might set you up, but they both go full crazy right away.
Sarah:Yeah. And, what do you think happens to Margaret? Do you think she realizes the error in her ways?
Mark:Probably. Hopefully she finds somebody, because even though I don't like her, she deserves happiness. You know who's not getting good is Doctor. Cole, because Doctor. Cole is either, at best, disfigured for life.
Mark:Mhmm. At best.
Sarah:Maybe he comes back and lives in the vicarage and Margaret takes care of him.
Mark:Maybe, but she knows what's going on with him now. That's true. So Doctor. Cole is in disgrace. Yeah.
Mark:Absolutely. He does not he fares the worst of anybody because he does no wrong in terms of actually doing an illegal act. If he had went away with Joe, she's 19, it would have been perfectly legal.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:But he comes out disfigured or worse and ruined.
Sarah:Yeah. Because Matthew's not crazy about him now, and Margaret's not crazy about him now. Nope. And his practice is pretty much screwed because he probably can't practice anymore.
Mark:And I have Kate Malpass has lots of business now.
Sarah:There's one person who should come out of this in a pretty interesting state. Mhmm. And that's Jed Fox.
Mark:Jed. Okay. So Jed Fox and his wife are the two predominant villagers who are, like, they're right hitting that witch button right away.
Sarah:Well, you know, I I think that he's the dominant rabble rouser because he's just taller than everybody else. Yes.
Mark:He
Sarah:is. So it's easy to film his face over the crowd. Yes. But after all is said and done, I hope he walks around going, sorry. Yeah.
Sarah:I got out of I it was out of hand. Sorry.
Mark:I I got a little him and his wife both get way out of hand.
Sarah:I was wrong. Sorry.
Mark:Let's go play BINGO.
Sarah:You know? Oh, no. That that witch fooled all of us into thinking that she wasn't a witch. She burned herself, really, and, you know, just to throw us off.
Mark:Yeah. I'd sometimes want like, we need after the show Midsomer where there's, like, years of trauma trauma that these people have to see. Like, Matthew is not going to get over this very easily.
Sarah:No. It's gonna stay with him forever.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:I don't think he can get with Joe because she put that hog head in his lap and took a picture of him and drugged him and
Mark:Just a funny thing I did.
Sarah:Really, I just did it to make your dad mad anyway. Yeah. He's like, yeah, but you ruined my shirt.
Mark:Oh, and plus and plus, it's pretty implied that her and her dad her and his dad had already done some stuff.
Sarah:Something to make him think that there was potential.
Mark:Oh, okay. There's another thing. Doctor Cole gets the naked pictures of Joe. Right? It says the glories of Christendom on them.
Mark:So Right. Clearly, he knows they're for him. He sets them out on his desk. He tells Judy, who never appears in the episode Right. That he's gonna cancel his first home visit client.
Mark:Okay? And he pushes his desk back. What is he going to do?
Sarah:I don't know, but Margaret walks in just in time.
Mark:Because it's certainly implied that he's gonna have a bit of a wank.
Sarah:Yes. I think so.
Mark:And, like, what kind of person are you that, like, you get naked pictures and you're immediately like, screw work. I need to wank right
Sarah:in this house. I know there's somebody home and so sick they can't even come to the office. I'll cancel it. Yeah. This is gonna be a while.
Sarah:What? And then fobs Margaret off on, oh, well, I was I was taking these to the church to burn them because that's where you burn pornography is at church.
Mark:Never mind. He knows.
Sarah:Why would you burn those photos at church after the reverend had just been burned at the church?
Mark:Oh, the other thing. Okay. So
Sarah:Oh, you're excited now. Okay. Okay.
Mark:So they go in the forest. She gets naked, k, and has a tattoo on her back that appears and disappears
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And well placed fur from her coat that covers her ass crack. And he she drugs him, and he stays out all night. Okay?
Sarah:Right.
Mark:Okay? She delivers the pictures the next morning. Who developed these pictures?
Sarah:Clearly, she did. Joe did. She developed her own photos.
Mark:There is no implication that Joe knows anything about photography. Some guy, the chemist is like, woah. Oh, you want these back light? Hold on. I need to go in the back room for a
Sarah:moment. Cancel my first appointment of the day. I
Mark:just well, I have a note that says, develop those pictures. And those giant, they are eight and a half by 11.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. If not, a little bit bigger. Glassy, black
Mark:and white. They're arty.
Sarah:Yeah. They're well developed too, so she must know what she's doing.
Mark:I I I guess.
Sarah:Maybe she learned it at art college or something.
Mark:Maybe one of the security guys that are never talked about but are all over this episode are there.
Sarah:Alan's tough guys with the black leather jackets and the headsets.
Mark:Yeah. Who are just not even acknowledged in this. Why does he need so much security?
Sarah:I don't know. As long as he doesn't go in the church, he'll be fine.
Mark:It's also not acknowledged who drives by in the limbo. It's not him who drives by in limbo.
Sarah:It's people coming to his party.
Mark:People coming to it could be a hen party out going between Midsomer Parva and somewhere else.
Sarah:Well, and they're horrible bodyguards because the person who wants to kill him is the person that they're not doing
Mark:anything about. Worst bodyguards ever. Yes.
Sarah:So that's the straw woman. What do we have for next time?
Mark:Okay. So first of all, you can find Midsommar Maniacs on Twitter, Instagram, and email. We post on the Facebook groups, Midsomer and Acorn in the subreddit, or anywhere else we can find maniacs at Midsomer Maniacs. So just find us wherever you want, send us all sorts of things, you certainly have time to do it now. I I got a note from somebody the other day that said, I finally caught up.
Mark:I was like, excellent. The next episode is episode 34 or episode seven season seven, episode seven, one of my favorite episodes, Ghosts of Christmas Past. Yeah. The first holiday special.
Sarah:We're gonna have a little Christmas in April.
Mark:Yes. It will be Christmas in April, and oh, it has magic tricks. It has suicide. It has the weird uncle, it has Sad dog. Sad dog.
Sarah:Yep. But it also has Christmas trees and big meals and Yep. Crackers and crowns.
Mark:And a kid hopefully, I don't know, we should have seen that kid do more acting. Mhmm. And hopefully you'll look him up and see where he's at now.
Sarah:Until then, stay sane. Stay happy. Yep. Stay safe.
Mark:Bye, Maniacs.
Sarah:Bye, Maniacs.
Mark:And written by Jeff Duff.
Sarah:You wanna try that again one more time?
Mark:What?
Sarah:Because you went Just cough. Get it over with.
Mark:Okay. I got the rodent.
Sarah:We're gonna It's
Mark:a me, Jennifer.
Sarah:I ruined a Christmas by being an overbearing bitch. Hey, Maniacs.
Mark:Hey, Maniacs.
Sarah:It's Midsomer Maniacs.
Mark:At home quarantine edition number two.
Sarah:Wait a minute. It's always the at home edition.
Mark:Well, that's true. Because we record at home.
Sarah:It just hasn't been self social isolation edition.
Mark:In our lovely yellow recording studio. I
Sarah:have officially been in the house, except for walks, since March 15.
Mark:Yep. I am the designated goer outer. Yes. So I, I get bundled up in shorts and a t shirt and go outside and go buy the things and get the things.
Sarah:Get the stiffs. Yes. Pharmacy, grocery store, all that good stuff.
Mark:Yes. If you're listening for the first time, this is Midsomer Maniacs, a podcast dedicated to the ITV series, Midsomer Murders. Each week, we dig into an episode of the show, including the murders, the mayhem, the loonies, and everything else we love. Just to let you know off the top, if your children are okay with top people talking about bonking, they're probably gonna be okay with this episode.
Sarah:I don't know about you, I'm feeling a little bit slap happy.
Mark:Yeah. Merry Christmas. Yeah. Because this week, we're looking at ghosts of Christmas past episode seven, series seven.
Sarah:It's bad enough being in isolation and trying to figure out what day it is because a Monday through Friday job just isn't a thing for me anymore. It's kind of just every day doing stuff So at the day of the week is so inconsequential right now. And then you add on top of that talking about Christmas.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And April, March is just double strange. Yes. But it's also kind of a nice break. It is. It is.
Sarah:If only this was a more actually festive episode. Well, so It's like how not to do Christmas.
Mark:There's a tradition in British television of doing Christmas episodes. They're shown either on Christmas day or right around Christmas day. Doctor Who does this, and there's been several Christmas specials for different shows. This is the first Midsomer Christmas episode.
Sarah:They went seven seasons before they thought, maybe we should do a Christmas episode.
Mark:Let's make it the most depressing Christmas episode ever.
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:I gotcha. Let's
Sarah:show a really, really dysfunctional family doing it completely wrong. Exactly. Awesome. Oh. It's Midsomer.
Sarah:Never mind that some people die.
Mark:We too many people die.
Sarah:We get that contrasted with the Barnaby's Christmas traditions.
Mark:Which are strange in themselves. At least to us. Yes. This episode is filmed January and February 2004 and then broadcast on Christmas Day two thousand and four, so they it sat in the can for a whole year. Now I think the reason why this is the very first Christmas episode is it's only got 6,900,000 viewers.
Mark:Their viewership went way down.
Sarah:It's just not as much as they would usually get.
Mark:I just don't think people want to sit around on Christmas day and watch an hour and a half of murder. Murder. Unless you live in this house because
Sarah:That's all we do.
Mark:Well, no, not this house. The house the in the episode because the the movie that Howard wants to watch and that Scott is watching, it's a Halloween movie. Yeah.
Sarah:And there's also a little controversy about what season this episode is actually in. Right? So it's it's either the seventh episode of Season seven, or the first episode of Season eight.
Mark:Or some analogous weird episode in the middle, which is kind of what it is.
Sarah:Which is fine, but every website I look at seems to have a different label for it.
Mark:Because it has Scott, it's really the middle of Scott, it doesn't really matter what season it is. It's either seven or eight, because those are the Scott seasons.
Sarah:It's just mid Scott.
Mark:Mid Scott.
Sarah:Okay, that's what we'll call it. The mid Scott episode.
Mark:The mid Scott Christmas episode. And it's got all the Scott things in it. Drunkenness, girls who are completely in love with him, off putting comments, being taken by a child, all the normal Scott things.
Sarah:I didn't know those were all Scott
Mark:things. Yeah. It's just the way Scott is. I'm learning to really like Scott. I am.
Sarah:I appreciate him more than the first time I saw his episodes.
Mark:Yeah. And he doesn't get a he gets a short shift. Yeah. And I think the actor does much better here than he did in the recent Agatha rage that he was in.
Sarah:I agree. So can we just agree off the top that Jennifer is annoying?
Mark:The most annoying. She may be the most unlikable person in this entire series. Wow. And there are unlikable people.
Sarah:That's saying something.
Mark:Well, and I keep okay. So
Sarah:The most unlikable person in Midsomer?
Mark:In this season at the very least.
Sarah:Is that seven or eight? Seven. Okay. Remember, it's She's the most unlikable character in a Scott episode. Is that what you're saying?
Mark:Oh, definitely, I think.
Sarah:Okay. I
Mark:mean, for sure there.
Sarah:Wow. That's putting
Mark:Though the stake in her fatalities professor might give her a run for her money.
Sarah:I don't know. See, I have I also dislike Jennifer. She's incredibly annoying. She would be that relative who I really dreaded going to see, but at the same time, I think she has good motives. She just doesn't know how to deal with those motives.
Mark:No. I just The way
Sarah:the way she expresses her concern and care for people is poorly done.
Mark:No. I think she's insane. I think she is in love with her brother and can't admit it, and wants to run his life.
Sarah:She wants to run everybody's life.
Mark:I don't even believe that she got a private eye to look into the background of Claire. I believe fully that she made all of that up.
Sarah:Wow. Okay.
Mark:I really don't
Sarah:like her. Put me in the odd position of defending Jeff, the most dislikable person in a Scott episode, but I I guess I'm gonna have to do that. That's okay.
Mark:I'm sorry. I don't like her one bit. And she doesn't have her fantastic Italian accent that she has in lovejoy.
Sarah:Oh, I got something to tell you about that. I got some interesting oids about her Italian accent.
Mark:Oh, good lord. That episode, it's it comes at the end of season two or three.
Sarah:She's in two episodes. It's a two parter.
Mark:Yeah. She's at the Where Love
Sarah:Joy Goes to Venice.
Mark:Season finale, I think it is Yeah. Of either two or three. And whoo.
Sarah:Okay. Before we get too deep into that
Mark:It's like Mario.
Sarah:Let's let's do I know. Let's just do an overview. Okay?
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:So we've got we've got the family. Right? We've got Jennifer and her siblings who are Ferti and Ross and Kate.
Mark:Yes. And it's the Deville Devilleier family.
Sarah:No. Just Villier.
Mark:Villier family. That's right. Just the Villier family.
Sarah:Ferti has committed suicide
Mark:Nine years ago.
Sarah:Aunt Lydia
Mark:Christmas day.
Sarah:Aunt Lydia raised the kids because their parents died young.
Mark:She must be the sister of the dad.
Sarah:Right. She's their paternal aunt. Yeah. Right? So she moved in when they were younger and was a parent to them, so she stays in the house.
Sarah:Ferti shoots himself on Christmas Eve nine years ago.
Mark:We're not sure why other than to make the dad the dog the most sad dog. Oh, Alfie. I spend the first whole part of my notes are all poor Alfie, poor Alfie, oh Alfie.
Sarah:He's a beautiful black lab with a big gold bow. Yes. He's a good puppy.
Mark:He's a very good puppy and played by at least three different dogs.
Sarah:Well, he'd have to be. Yes.
Mark:Right? Yeah.
Sarah:Then after the cold opening, we get the the full episode. We start it's Christmas Eve, nine years later.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Right? And we start out at the cop shop, and the most repulsive thing happens in the whole episode.
Mark:I wanna know who Pam is. You see her I've watched this scene, like, six times. So so you see Pam walk towards the camera from a hallway. Yes. And then she finds Tom who's been imbibing in Christmas
Sarah:She's on a beeline for Tom, so he doesn't get out the door before she gets her lip lock.
Mark:Barnaby's like completely fine with
Sarah:it. Disgusting.
Mark:Scott's like, I thought I was the woman, crazy one.
Sarah:Who does that? Who first of all, who walks around with mistletoe in their hand just so they can get as many kisses as possible? Right? Second of all, who kisses people on the lips Pam. For mistletoe?
Sarah:Pam. And this is inappropriate workplace behavior. Pam.
Mark:Pam doesn't even make the credits. No. She's got lines, but she makes the credit. She is some person in the production of the episode.
Sarah:All I know is that it's it's not like it's a a throat kiss or anything, but it's more than just a
Mark:No. It's it's a whoo. Like, Scott makes notice of it.
Sarah:Yeah. Boy, you couldn't do that nowadays.
Mark:Meanwhile, I'm like, wait a minute. There's a sign in the background. A sign about terrorists. The sign says terrorist suspicion. Have you let accommodations or cashed or sold a vehicle for cash?
Mark:Seen anyone suspicious? Seen anything suspicious? Don't hesitate, please ring the anti terrorist branch hotline 800789321. And underneath in very small letters, your call will be strictly confidential. Maybe we should call the terrorist hotline on Pam.
Mark:She's a lip terrorist.
Sarah:She is. She's a mistletoe terrorist.
Mark:Mistletoe missile. The the word missile is in the name.
Sarah:It's spelled different, but okay.
Mark:Just saying.
Sarah:Then Tom goes home. He gets a taxi home. Yes. He's clearly drunk.
Mark:And he clearly gives the nod and the wink to Scott that if anything happens, be sure to call me right away.
Sarah:Yeah. He's he's not so drunk as to not beg for an escape route from his family Christmas. Right? Because Joyce's parents are coming.
Mark:Joyce's parents are coming. Douglas and
Sarah:Maureen. He's brought the monopoly.
Mark:That's that is a trivia question right there. What are Joyce's parents' names?
Sarah:Yes.
Mark:Yes. He's brought the monopoly and nothing else. She has a suitcase, and he has the world's oldest monopoly.
Sarah:The nearest I can tell is it's from the sixties or seventies.
Mark:At the at the very early
Sarah:got black dice.
Mark:It has black dice, and it's also pure cardboard. There's no shiny cardboard on it.
Sarah:Right? It's that flat cardboard.
Mark:It's a flat cardboard cardboard, so I would assume it's sixties.
Sarah:It's it's probably the monopoly board that Joyce grew up playing with. Meanwhile, at Drager Hall, the villagers are arriving. Right? So we get Emily and Aiden. Aiden is Jennifer's son.
Sarah:Yes. Otherwise known as the largest toddler.
Mark:And they drive through town, which has so many people in it.
Sarah:Everything's going
Mark:on. It is the busiest out. This is Costin. It's never said in the entire episode. We had to look it up in the Midsomer Magazine murder map to realize that this happens on the Northwestern outskirts of Costin.
Sarah:Oh. Yes. Well, there's a choir. There's some kind of parade that's just breaking up.
Mark:Big Santa Claus, the thing that looks like Banham.
Sarah:People who look like they're out on a
Mark:Some school feature of a party
Sarah:or something. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's the loony
Mark:They have tons of extras again in these episodes.
Sarah:Mhmm. They show up at the house. I can't get over what a bad host Aiden is. He pisses me off the whole episode.
Mark:He is
Sarah:If I was Emily, I would be absolutely miserable. I don't know these people. The only person I do know is being a shit. I'm not with my own family. I'm here with this crazy family, and they're all mean to me.
Mark:I'm kinda glad he doesn't get the 100 k. He shouldn't. He can't. It's on tape. Cops have seen it.
Sarah:Somebody's gotta give it to the
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:To the lawyer. So Emily and Aiden show up at the house, and then the next to arrive is Ross Yes. On his motorcycle.
Mark:I have a problem
Sarah:with Ross. He's the the lost brother who's been abroad for years.
Mark:He's a jerk at the breakfast flashback. He's reading his paper
Sarah:with his side.
Mark:City stockbroker. And suddenly, because of do you think he knows what Jennifer did? Because remember, Jennifer's the bad person. Do you think he knows what Jennifer did?
Sarah:No. I don't think he cares enough to even be part of that.
Mark:But I think he feels bad, and that's why he goes crazy.
Sarah:What's he doing staying there?
Mark:I don't know.
Sarah:Like, does he live there at that time?
Mark:At that time, yeah. He's living there.
Sarah:So before Furdy's suicide?
Mark:Yes. Well, he's the youngest.
Sarah:So Ross is the youngest?
Mark:Ross or Kate and her crazy clothing thing. We'll get to that.
Sarah:So we've got Jennifer, Ferdy, Kate, and Ross. Yes. They are the siblings. Ferdy was the oldest. That's why he would have inherited.
Sarah:Yes. Ross winds up inheriting because he's a male. Right? So I think it goes Ferti, Jennifer, Kate, Ross.
Mark:So you think he's the youngest?
Sarah:I don't know. Kate, Ross, you could exchange. Jennifer definitely acts like the oldest sibling.
Mark:Well, okay.
Sarah:Like, she has to be responsible for everybody, I e, bossy on everybody.
Mark:And Ross arrives with his his leathers on and his crazy hat, and he's, you know,
Sarah:got a He's goddess, and he's a Buddhist.
Mark:He's a Buddhist and all this stuff. Right? But behind them is Kate and her husband, whose name is
Sarah:Digby.
Mark:Digby.
Sarah:The most impatient driver in the universe.
Mark:And she is chastising her daughter who has to be 21 in the back of the car,
Sarah:Phoebe. Mhmm.
Mark:Phoebe should not have come on this. She Phoebe should have went to the pub with Scott.
Sarah:Yeah. She would have been better off.
Mark:She would have been better off. And then beside Phoebe in the back seat, behind the passenger, is the gold mine that is Howard.
Sarah:Yes. My favorite character.
Mark:Does nothing but tell the truth in this episode, and no one believes him.
Sarah:Nope. He's the wisest person in the family. That's for sure.
Mark:He is absolutely the most observant, intelligent, wise, caring person in the family.
Sarah:Let's talk about these actors. You mentioned Jennifer
Mark:Being on Her
Sarah:the name the actress's name is Hayden Gwen.
Mark:Yes. You see her all the time.
Sarah:She's in a lot, a lot, a lot of things.
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:She's in another episode of Midsomer. It's, dark secrets, which is a twenty eleven episode.
Mark:I forget what
Sarah:that plays Maggie Viviani.
Mark:I forget what that's about. Is she Italian in that episode? It's me, Vivian.
Sarah:She is in two episodes of Lovejoy, playing an Italian tour guide Yes. Who has an Italian accent that Mark's not exaggerating. She sounds like Mario.
Mark:It's me, your tour guide.
Sarah:Welcome to Welcome to Aventis. But here's what you need to know that makes it even worse. Hayden Gwen taught English in Italy for two years, and speaks Italian fluently.
Mark:No. She doesn't.
Sarah:She was an Italian tutor.
Mark:Oh my gosh. She is an insult to the Italian people.
Sarah:She is. And I confirmed, I looked at the years, she did that before the Lovejoy episode. So it's not like, oh, she went to Venice when she fell in Lovejoy and fell in love with the language and stayed there to teach Italian. No, no, no, no. They probably hired her for that part because she could speak Italian.
Mark:I know she speaks Italian in the episode, and I think her Italian's okay. It's her pretend Italian English. And I remember when the first time we watched that episode, we said by the way, spoilers, she gets shot and killed. We were like, oh, darn.
Sarah:Yeah. But it brings up an interesting thing that I had never really thought about.
Mark:It's the most James Bond y episode of Lovejoy ever.
Sarah:Oh, yeah. But if you are fluent in a second language, it probably is really difficult to do that accent in English. Yeah. I can understand that. It's probably very hard.
Mark:Like, it's very different when I speak French than when I pretend to be a person from Quebec speaking English.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. And I I mean, I took German, Russian, Japanese. I couldn't speak English with those accents. No.
Sarah:Without I can pronounce words in those languages.
Mark:Yeah. Without saying they can't do any.
Sarah:But when I saw that she was fluent Italian, I'm like, wait a minute.
Mark:It's a good Midsomer.
Sarah:I love joy. It's a good love joy
Mark:if you can get
Sarah:past her cringey accent.
Mark:It's okay. She buys it pretty early on.
Sarah:It's me, Luigi. I'm on the boat.
Mark:Oh, I got shot.
Sarah:Now, Aunt Lydia Yep. Is played by Mystery Maniacs. Yep. Who has a long history of Long history. But by far, her favorite credit of mine anyway, is she is what they referred to as the ancient booer Yes.
Sarah:In princess bride.
Mark:Yes. Boo.
Sarah:Boo. She's like a crone. Yep. You had true love and you threw it away. Yep.
Sarah:Excellent. She does such a good job.
Mark:If you haven't seen princess bride in the last few years, you should give yourself a treat and rewatch it.
Sarah:Well, we'll link to a scene Yep. Of her turn. It's hard to imagine aunt Lydia being baaaah.
Mark:Yep. You know?
Sarah:Kate.
Mark:13 down is a stinker. Yeah. Kate,
Sarah:the other sister
Mark:is Yeah. Okay. What does she have on when she gets out of the car? A coat. That goes around her head like a super spaceship outfit.
Sarah:It does have a rather thorough hood.
Mark:It's actually the picture for this week's episode because I am literally, I'm like, I really like that, but I hate it at the same time. Chugs warm. She does. She does.
Sarah:She's played by Mel Martin.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Who again has been on a lot of things. But what I found about her that I thought was most interesting because, you know, Midsomer, it's it just goes to show how few actors there are in England, you know, like everybody's been in a Midsomer. She's the first actor in a Midsomer who has been married to two actors who were also in Midsommers. Excellent.
Mark:Who was she married to?
Sarah:She was married to John Dutton, who plays Will Saxby in Blood Will Out.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:And Paul Ridley, who played Neville Blackshaw in the Black Book.
Mark:We haven't got to Black Book yet, but we did Blood Well Out.
Sarah:Yeah. Now Ross is played by Philip Quast Quast. Who is an incredible singer.
Mark:Oh, I didn't know that.
Sarah:The majority of his credits are for musicals. Oh. He's been in Les Mis, and he's been in if you Google him, that's what you find.
Mark:Him singing?
Sarah:Is that he yeah. That he is a muse an actor in musicals
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:And has an incredibly beautiful voice.
Mark:Luckily, he's really only in this episode for, like, four scenes and doesn't do much in them.
Sarah:No. He just has a beard. And beads. Carries his beard around.
Mark:I'm a broom
Sarah:just no. So so that's the siblings anyway. Yes. I don't have anything on on Ferti.
Mark:You don't have anything on Howard?
Sarah:Well, he's not a sibling. Do you wanna talk about them?
Mark:Well, yeah. We'll talk about Howard and and Phoebe.
Sarah:Well, let's talk about Emily and Aiden then. Okay. Aiden
Mark:Wait a minute. I have to go smoke.
Sarah:Aiden Carter is played by Dominic Colenso.
Mark:Wait a minute. I have to go pout.
Sarah:He was 25 when this was made.
Mark:No. He was eight. He acted eight. Howard is more mature than him.
Sarah:The character acts like an eight year old, but he's played by a 25 year old man
Mark:Mhmm.
Sarah:Who maybe did two more acting gigs after this
Mark:And that's it?
Sarah:And then he quit and then became a professional speaker. Oh. He's a speaker, communications expert, and former professional actor.
Mark:Has he sent you a LinkedIn invite to a talk?
Sarah:No. But we're only two degrees separated on LinkedIn.
Mark:Oh my.
Sarah:Now Howard is played by Rory Kopas. He's 13 when he plays this role. Yes. He also only does a couple more acting gigs after this.
Mark:He does another one of my favorite ones though.
Sarah:Yeah. He's in Hellboy.
Mark:He's in Hellboy. Yeah. That's the kid on the on the roof that throws rocks at the other guy with Hellboy. Yeah. He's great.
Mark:Shares cookies with Hellboy. Yep. His hair is super long.
Sarah:He, went on to get a BA in mechanical engineering and, became a professional rower, and now he's a rowing coach at a private school in The UK and has a a very active YouTube channel where he posts, he posts, I think it's the rowing coach is what he calls himself.
Mark:Oh, he must be like 40 now.
Sarah:Yeah. If he was 13 when this was filmed. Yeah. Yeah. But you look at him, it's like, that's Howard.
Mark:Oh, that's good.
Sarah:He's still got the same face, just older. Dominic, who we haven't even mentioned yet.
Mark:Okay. So Dominic shows up in a cab. And at first, when you first watch this episode, you're like, who are you, and why are you involved with the family?
Sarah:Yeah. And that's what everybody wants to know.
Mark:Well, clearly, it's because he's the killer.
Sarah:He's played by Bruce Alexander. Bruce Alexander was in every episode of Touch of Frost.
Mark:Every episode?
Sarah:Yes. He was the sergeant or whatever to Frost.
Mark:Oh, okay.
Sarah:Okay? But there's something else interesting here.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Because when I looked into that and and Touch of Frost is like EastEnders and and so many other shows that I see in every author's bio. They're in a Midsomer, they've been in, you know, a
Mark:couple of What
Sarah:did I say?
Mark:Authors.
Sarah:Oh, I'm sorry. Touch of Frost is one of those things that I see pretty common.
Mark:Touch of Frost was way ahead of its time.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:When Touch of Frost and I would say Morse are kind of can they're the same time frame I think that they were out, and they're they have kind of the same feeling to them.
Sarah:The thing about Touch of Frost is it only ever had 42 episodes.
Mark:It's not much.
Sarah:I mean, it's it's several seasons. Yeah. Right? And Bruce Alexander was in every episode.
Mark:The Touch of Frost podcast is almost over, by there is no Touch of Frost podcast.
Sarah:But if they started when we did, they'd almost be Yes. So I thought, I wonder how many other actors have been in both Touch of Frost and Midsomer. Yes. And I do that all the time, and it's always a high number. But I'd never done it with a show that had so few episodes.
Sarah:Yes. A 130 actors Actors. Were in Touch of Frost and Midsomer. Yes. Just actors.
Sarah:I ruled out stuntmen, directors, craft services, producers, everybody else. Just
Mark:actors. I wonder it's same network. I wonder
Sarah:That's an average of three Midsomer actors per episode of Touch of Frost. Wow.
Mark:That's crazy.
Sarah:I know. I mean
Mark:You did Touch of Frost. Well, you're all well, you're in.
Sarah:You have to do a Midsomer.
Mark:You
Sarah:have to do a Midsomer. That's in your contract. If you do one, you have to do the other. I couldn't I couldn't believe there were that many.
Mark:That's a lot.
Sarah:But there are so many episodes of Midsomer. Right? Yes. You could have those same 130 actors and have only, you know, two of them in each Midsomer.
Mark:It's like the crossover between Midsomer and the Bill.
Sarah:Right. And and that kind of show that was on for so long, you expect to see those overlaps. But with Touch of Frost, it was such a short running show. Speaking of short running shows, Hayden Gwen, who plays Jennifer, was also in this awesome show for kids, they only had one season in 1991 called Time Riders.
Mark:Time Riders? Mhmm. They rode the time?
Sarah:She's a motorcycle riding time traveling scientist.
Mark:Oh, will be in the show notes for sure.
Sarah:It's fantastic.
Mark:I can only imagine. But there's no puppet who lives in the basement, is
Sarah:there No, there's no creepy puppet or living scarecrow. Though she does have a strange sidekick. I don't you know?
Mark:Okay. So they get to they all get to the house, and they all snipe at each other. Especially, Jennifer is sniping at her own son for bonking.
Sarah:What is up with her? Why okay. She puts them in separate rooms. Fine. It's her house.
Sarah:They're not married. She says they should sleep in separate rooms. Fine. But then she won't let it go.
Mark:It's not her house. It's Ross's house. Just saying.
Sarah:No. They share it.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:It's equally owned, but her son and his girlfriend under her shared roof with her siblings, fine. You make the rules.
Mark:I don't care what you're using to your grubby rooms.
Sarah:Yeah. I don't care about that. But she won't let it go. If I was Emily, I would be mortified.
Mark:She mentions it to Dominic as loud as possible. Like, when they recorded that to be in the production, she would have had to yell it.
Sarah:Yeah. And that's Emily. She's sex crazed. All she wants to do is screw my son all the time. I don't know what I'm gonna do about all their sex craziness, and she just isn't happy unless she's having sex.
Sarah:Why do you think that? It wasn't even and she didn't say a word. Ugh. She was fine with separate rooms. Yep.
Sarah:Just wanna hit her. Yeah. Like, Emily is a guest.
Mark:Yes. No one treats her like a guest, especially Aiden. The worst. Just the worst. It's not how you treat people when you bring them to your house, even if you do want to bonk them.
Sarah:Well, Jennifer has a no bonking rule.
Mark:Well, I don't think Jennifer's been bonked a long time.
Sarah:Her and poor old Lydia just rattling around that house. Yes. So I want I so I it made me wonder, like, where does bonking come from as a term? Because, I mean, you and I both knew what it meant. I think most people would.
Mark:I remember it being big in high school for us, bonking. So there might have been a cultural reference then to it, like on TV or something.
Sarah:I I had all kinds of trouble finding it. Okay? Oh, really? So I found some some options. There's no definitive, but here are the options.
Sarah:So bonk originally was a blow to the head.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Right?
Mark:Bonk bonk on the head.
Sarah:You got bonked on the head.
Mark:It's a Star Trek episode.
Sarah:And if you get bonked on the head enough, you go bonkers.
Mark:Okay. That makes So
Sarah:you get you it's insanity. You're bonkers. Yeah. Okay. That's fine.
Sarah:That makes sense. Then it was proposed that bonk had become slang for sex because it was knob backwards. No. I I don't get that at all.
Mark:No. No. Don't agree with that one.
Sarah:It's not backslang. No. I don't understand that. You get hit on the head, you go crazy. I can't connect that meaning of bonk to sex at all.
Sarah:Then there was the knob thing. Yeah. Then there's this idea that it might be an onomatopoeia.
Mark:If you're making that noise, you're doing it wrong.
Sarah:Like, who has sex that
Mark:goes bonk bonk bonk bonk bonk? And if your partner is saying bonk bonk bonk Bonk bonk bonk bonk bonk. You may wanna check.
Sarah:They might be a goose. Bonk bonk bonk bonk. Like, I don't get it.
Mark:I don't support bonking geese.
Sarah:I don't understand how anybody ever even thought about that long enough to write it down. No. And I'm talking about reputable sources of the etymology of words said it may be an imitative or onomatopoeic term
Mark:I for say, if you're making that noise or the act itself is making that noise, you are doing it wrong.
Sarah:It just leads me to believe that people who write dictionaries don't have sex either. Oh, that's what sex sounds like, isn't it? Bonk, bonk, bonk, bonk, bonk. Like
Mark:or maybe it's just one big bonk.
Sarah:Oh, that was fast. So I I could never find any kind of definitive connection.
Mark:So then everybody goes to church. And by
Sarah:everybody Christmas Eve, everybody but Digby and Ross. Everybody in the
Mark:entire episode goes to church air within two views of each other.
Sarah:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the bar Barnaby doesn't even know. Well, no. Wait a minute.
Sarah:Scott doesn't go to church.
Mark:No. Scott doesn't go to church. So He's with the young people who are out bonking.
Sarah:Scott? No. They're not. Scott, Digby, and Ross, and Alfie are the only people who don't go to church on Christmas Eve for example. Now?
Sarah:And Alfie is excused because he's a dog.
Mark:Yes. Before that, I wanna talk a little bit about songs before that. Yeah. In the beginning, when they get to the house and everything, it's all three ships. Now three ships is a traditional British Christmas song.
Sarah:You mean it's like played in the background of the episode?
Mark:Saw three ships come sailing in.
Sarah:On Christmas day.
Mark:On Christmas Okay. Yeah. No one understands this song. It it says the ships are sailing into Bethlehem. Okay?
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:There's no body of water near Bethlehem.
Sarah:No. The closest It's not a port city.
Mark:The closest body of water is 60 miles away.
Sarah:On Bethlehem in the morning. Yeah. No. How can you sail a ship into a desert?
Mark:So the again, this goes along with the bonking thing in the sense that
Sarah:It does?
Mark:That it has weird connotations. People have said, okay, that it's actually three ships that are coming in to Spain that have relics from the Magi on them.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:So the Magi are the three wise men who supposedly it's never talked about in the Bible.
Sarah:So then it's like why is a crusade story.
Mark:Yeah, it's like a crusade story. But then there's the people who are like, no, no, no, no, no. Camels are the ships of the desert, and because they are the ships of the desert, the magi ride in on the camels, and that's the three ships.
Sarah:Well, kinda makes sense. Kinda. And camels has too many syllables. I saw three camels come sailing, and come bonking in, come bonking in.
Mark:But on a weird aside again, when I first saw I I remember I see saw a cartoon with this in it. I forget what British Christmas show has it in it. It's three ships that come sailing, and I don't know what it is. It may have been in like in a little aside. I was really young.
Mark:And my mother said that they were the ships from Columbus.
Sarah:It's the Nina, Pinta, and the Santa Maria.
Mark:And so I was way confused when I was looking this up, and I kept wondering why this is a Christmas song. Anyway
Sarah:It does say on Christmas day in the morning.
Mark:Yeah. Know. But but Christopher Columbus is not really a Christmassy thing.
Sarah:No. No.
Mark:No. At the church, they are singing hymns. They sing a hymn that is entitled, While Shepherds Watch Their Flocks. Okay? It's remember singing this hymn in the Anglican church when I was a boy on midnight mass on Christmas.
Mark:I remembered this, definitely doing this.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:It is hymn number two eleven in the Anglican hymn book, which is not on the hymnal number displays.
Sarah:And those are standard?
Mark:Yes. Right? So like when I found this online it shows you what it tells you what hymn number it is.
Sarah:Okay.
Mark:And they're standard. Like you hear people talking about, oh I love 54, or things like that, right? But the thing at the front of the church that lists the numbers for the hymns doesn't have two eleven on it.
Sarah:Oh, So the vicar's doing a bad job?
Mark:But it should have two eleven on it. It's it's it's not even listed on the sign. What are they doing singing that song? And then Dominic, playing my mother, is singing like a crazy man.
Sarah:I saw three sheeps gone daily.
Mark:No. No.
Sarah:I gotta have a lot of vibrato. Right?
Mark:Yes. So everybody goes to church and everybody goes home and it's weird because we're there's some weird stuff about this episode and we'll get to another couple of things about it, but this is weird because they're like, oh, you know the Barnabas, wink wink, and you know all these people are involved in this bad thing that's gonna happen, wink wink. So you know what's going on, but none of the characters do and never make reference to it ever again.
Sarah:Yeah. It's kind of an inside thing. Yeah. It's a a wink and a nod. The Dead Sea is only 20 miles away from Bethlehem, by the way.
Mark:Still.
Sarah:It you you could not see ships
Mark:Sailing in.
Sarah:From Bethlehem. No. Unless they were really big.
Mark:With Columbus on them. Yes. What are we doing here?
Sarah:Where is he from, Transylvania? You you say that that what's her name? That Hayden Gwen has a bad accent.
Mark:That's That was the worst Christopher Columbus ever. Wasn't he Portuguese? See, what happened is I was going through the in my brain that he was Italian because most people think he's Italian, but he's not. And then I said, no, he's Portuguese, and that monstrosity came out of
Sarah:me Or is he Italian, but he was sponsored by the Portuguese?
Mark:No. No. It's the other way around. Okay.
Sarah:So he would say, oh, braggado.
Mark:He was yep. I don't know. That's the only Portuguese word I know. I'm cutting this whole section out.
Sarah:No. You can. It's so awesome. Horrible. My sheep, they are so big you can see them from 20 miles away.
Mark:Okay. So they get they get to
Sarah:the house. We've been in the house a long time.
Mark:No. No. No. They get back to the house after church. And Digby doesn't go to church because he's too busy smoking on the couch.
Sarah:Yeah. Falling asleep with a cigar in his hand.
Mark:In the house that's ready to go up anyway. Yeah.
Sarah:Ross is in his room. Yes. We don't know where Alfie is.
Mark:Yeah. We don't know where Alfie is.
Sarah:And Scott has gone home. Yes. Because he's on call. He tells that five headed red haired girl, he's on call, and he's gotta go home.
Mark:Who is referred to in the credits as girl. She gets more time than Pam. Than
Sarah:Pam. Pam's got a name. Oh, my note says is Scott in the bar with five head red haired girl. No. Because she's got a gigantic forehead.
Mark:Just girl.
Sarah:Just girl.
Mark:He's good though. He does the right thing. He goes home, he eats his dinner, he watches the movie, he's ready. Mhmm. Yeah.
Mark:The seemingly important thing that we should be paying attention to is Lydia parking the car in the garage. We'll get to that. Okay? That's what we should be paying attention to. No.
Mark:No. No. No. Mark is not paying attention to that. Mark spends twenty five minutes piecing together what black and white movie that Howard turns the channel to.
Sarah:Yeah. And Scott's watching.
Mark:Yes. So originally
Sarah:It's got a crazy dummy in it. Oh, boy. That's all I noticed. Originally,
Mark:what is on the TV is a choir show. Right. Now these are common, at least they were in Canada, to have these choir shows that where you could turn them on and listen to these people sing church music.
Sarah:Yeah, and it's probably at a cathedral or the national church or whatever. Yes. Where is it that the royal No,
Mark:it's in a studio, this one.
Sarah:Oh, okay.
Mark:And they're singing In the Bleak Midwinter by A happy song. Christina Rossetti. Well, you know, what's her name? Jennifer loves it.
Sarah:Of course. Why didn't we get this one at the hymn service?
Mark:No. No. This is she knows the song, she's singing along, but because Howard does the adult thing of turning the channel and watching what he wants and keeping himself busy, she gets upset with him. So he turns the channel
Sarah:You're gonna ruin Christmas.
Mark:Yep. He turns the channel to a Halloween movie, and this Halloween movie is bonkers. The reason why I know what movie it is is because it's directed by Charles Creighton and two other guys, and you see that on this on the the image, like, tiny, like a tenth of a second.
Sarah:And that's all it takes for Mark to find everything.
Mark:Yep. And we find that this is a 1950 movie called Dead of Night. Now, Charles Critton also directed A Fish Called Wanda.
Sarah:Those are two very different movies.
Mark:It's very, very different movie.
Sarah:This is called Dead of Night? Yes. Who plays that on Christmas Eve?
Mark:I don't know.
Sarah:My kind of power. My kind of people. So
Mark:the synopsis for this movie is architect Walter Craig senses impending doom as he is half as his half remembered dreaming, reoccurring dream turns into reality. He shows up at this house and he knows everybody, but he doesn't know how he got there. And they all tell him different stories, so it's an anthology Mhmm. Which is one of my very favorite kind of horror movies.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:Like, I'm watching this movie very shortly.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:I I it is my kind of movie for sure. And Scott is also watching the same movie, and it has the weird puppet in it.
Sarah:Yes. And puppet that looks like he's from a Goosebumps book.
Mark:One of the stories is Looks like Jimmy Carr. Is about a is about a puppet that comes alive. Right? Mhmm. I have no idea why this movie is in this episode so prominently.
Mark:Like, no one from this episode worked on that movie. It just must be somebody's it's like scars of Dracula. It's
Sarah:like Yeah. It's somebody's favorite. Or I don't know. Maybe they to show that much of it, they must have had permission. Right?
Sarah:So was it old enough that it wasn't copyrighted anymore?
Mark:Or something like that? It's over fifty years old.
Sarah:Whatever it is, it has to be the opposite of anything that Jennifer would be willing to have on TV. Yes. So picking a horror movie is perfect. Yes. Because there's no way she's gonna start.
Mark:Why is it not Scars of Dracula, which is the go to movie in in summer?
Sarah:Because there's no creepy dummy in
Mark:it? I I don't know. I just suggest that Howard has not only good taste in cards, not only good taste in card tricks, but good taste in movies. In the garage, something is happening.
Sarah:Well, okay. So the dinner happens before church?
Mark:Yes. The dinner works. Where Digby lights his cigar.
Sarah:Yes. So that's where Howard gets the weird message in his popper. How can you tell a heartless liar with blood on their hands?
Mark:Yes. They'll be dead by boxing day.
Sarah:Do you know how poppers work?
Mark:Yeah. You were gonna look this up.
Sarah:Yeah. But do do you know, like, what it is in it that makes it go pop?
Mark:It's like a
Sarah:cap. It's not.
Mark:Oh, what is it?
Sarah:So you and I talked about this, and we both thought that the popper in in a Christmas cracker was probably similar to a cap in a cap gun, right? Had a tiny, tiny bit of gunpowder and something hits it.
Mark:Which you should have around tissue paper. And bang.
Sarah:Right? But that's not the case because there's nothing to strike it. Gunpowder has to be hit.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Right? Has to be pressured. And that doesn't happen in a cracker. What it is is silver fulminate.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:So you take a strip of cardboard. I I watched a how to video. I can make my own now. If I can just find some silver fulminate, which I'm sure you can pick up anywhere.
Mark:I got a big box of it.
Sarah:It's highly explosive. Like, it can explode under its own weight. Okay. Okay.
Mark:Must be addressing the ship. Yeah. So
Sarah:you take a strip of cardboard that, that you cut in two and then you overlap it. Right? So that so that the, so it's overlapped by like an inch. Yeah. And at the end of each piece, you put a tiny piece of like sandpaper.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Okay. And then there's a stripe of silver silver fulminate between
Mark:them. Okay.
Sarah:So that when you pull them apart, the sandpaper rubs friction on the silver fulminate and it goes bang. Okay. That's how you do
Mark:it. Okay.
Sarah:And I actually watched a video of a guy making these.
Mark:I was denied crackers as a child, so I'm fascinated by them.
Sarah:Oh, well, if you go to oldenglishcrackers.com
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Not only can you watch a video about how they're made, but you can buy your own supplies including the snaps. Oh. So you can make your very own. My own very own crackers. You will be denied no more.
Mark:Oh, nice.
Sarah:I also watched a video of people who made a giant one, and they put way too much silver fulminate in it.
Mark:Tissue paper?
Sarah:It caught on fire.
Mark:Yeah. Tissue paper.
Sarah:The little plastic penguin that was in it was melted.
Mark:No. No crown for you.
Sarah:No. No. Christmas crown up in flames.
Mark:So Lydia drives back from church because she's an independent woman.
Sarah:Yeah.
Mark:And she drives back with Dominic who has his plan, his nefarious plan is in place. He gets out of the car because he can't get out of the car on that side in the garage because
Sarah:It's teeny tiny. It's one of those garages that was built for a carriage. Yes. And now you put a car in it? Yes.
Sarah:So it barely fits.
Mark:And then we think he goes in through the front door.
Sarah:And that's what he convinces everybody.
Mark:But he
Sarah:doesn't. But in reality, he slips in through the garage while she's putting the car away.
Mark:So what it looks like to people at this time is that Lydia left the car, came inside.
Sarah:No. What supposedly happened was when she got out of the car, she accidentally pulled a wardrobe down on the car and also forgot to turn the car off and locked herself in. Yes. That's what And the
Mark:garage door opener. Jennifer totally gaslights her. You're crazy. How do
Sarah:you do all of that not knowing it?
Mark:Yeah. Which is what the point like, Lydia goes, that's the point.
Sarah:Yeah. Like so I pulled a wardrobe over on myself and didn't notice. Cars start themselves. Forgot forgot to turn the car off and didn't notice. Jennifer, the gas lighter is like think we've tolerated you you long enough.
Sarah:You're not going to ruin Christmas.
Mark:I think we tolerated you long enough. Get to me, Jennifer.
Sarah:I ruined the Christmas by being an overbearing
Mark:ruined the Christmas.
Sarah:He should apologize for everything. Yeah. She's trapped in, and she's, like, banging on the door.
Mark:Help me. Help me. With a cricket bat.
Sarah:Yeah. With a cricket bat. She's got
Mark:that. But there's more in that garage
Sarah:than meets the eye. Oh, you saw a sign.
Mark:So there's a sign there that says roll the pig for 60 p. Don't know what this means. There's a roll the pig game at Feds. I couldn't get video of what it was.
Sarah:It's probably like bowling, isn't it?
Mark:Well, I I don't know because I thought I had a handle on it. I thought maybe it was like a Tombola that looked like a pig. Mhmm. But no, because one blog I read said I remember going to FETs as a child with my parents and my dad playing role the pig and then there's this clause which is at that point in time, the pig was real. What?
Sarah:That poor little pig.
Mark:No. At that point in time, the pig was live.
Sarah:So then And later you play with a dead pig?
Mark:There's a rolling of the dead pig later. I don't know.
Sarah:That's not a kid's game.
Mark:Please, please, people in England, explain roll the pig to us.
Sarah:That's not a game you play out of fate.
Mark:Anyway, they have a sign.
Sarah:Probably because they get roped into running it every year at the local fair.
Mark:Well, I'm sure Jennifer has lots to say about that. It's me. I rolled the pig.
Sarah:I I think if Lydia had come in the house after being trapped in the garage and had a bullet in her shoulder, Jennifer would have said, you shot yourself. You're not gonna ruin Christmas.
Mark:No. Nope. It's Howard.
Sarah:Stop shooting yourself. Howard, stop shooting at Lydia. You're not gonna ruin Christmas.
Mark:And Ross would have been like, because that's all he does. Yeah. I'm a Buddhist, so I can't be involved in conflict now.
Sarah:Later that night, Emily's trying to sleep in her room, and her room is invaded by some creepy person. And so she screams, and it's Jennifer. And Aiden just happens to be climbing a ladder to get into her room because, you know, he's sex crazed.
Mark:And Jennifer looks at her like
Sarah:Like, it's her fault.
Mark:What? Are stupid that I creeped into your room?
Sarah:I first of all, I can't believe that you're shocked that I'm creeping into your room in the middle of the night. And second, you're sex crazed. That's why Aiden's climbing the side of the house. Wait a minute. Emily's in her room minding her own business.
Sarah:It's Aiden who's sex crazed.
Mark:Aiden is a sex crazed man.
Sarah:But if I'm defending Jennifer here, she made up a stocking for somebody she didn't know She did. To make sure that she would have one. She did. And that's nice.
Mark:I'm gonna introduce Jennifer to this new thing. It's called knocking.
Sarah:Or leave it on the doorknob.
Mark:Leave it on the doorknob.
Sarah:Because she's she's trying to be Santa. Yeah. Right? So you leave it on the doorknob.
Mark:I I have never seen a person in Santa hat be more idiotic.
Sarah:Be less festive.
Mark:Yes. And and I was just waiting for her to blame Howard first. Howard
Sarah:was supposed to tell you that I'm gonna come in with the stocking tonight.
Mark:It's me, Santa. Oh.
Sarah:You sex crazed idiot. But she is being nice.
Mark:We need to put a disclaimer in front of this episode.
Sarah:We're not saying those are good Italian accents. That's the whole point.
Mark:We in no way
Sarah:are actually imitating Italian people. No. No. No. No.
Sarah:Scott's neighbor across the street has the most obnoxious Christmas lights, sets off his own car alarm.
Mark:What is that part about? I don't know. It has no bearing in the entire episode. It is somebody in the production who's pissed off about a neighbor who sets his car alarm off all the time and has obnoxious Christmas lights.
Sarah:Meanwhile, in Scott's moldy bed set
Mark:Oh, god. Scott, clean up.
Sarah:And we get to see Lydia also woken in the night. Half of the screaming, I suppose. Everybody goes back to bed. Yes. And Lydia decides it's time for her to put in her diary entry, the diary that she keeps behind the the secret door in her room Yeah.
Sarah:That I would think any any kid who grew up in that house would know about that room. You would think. It's just a closet. Yeah. But, you know, if it's been her room, as long as they can remember, maybe they wouldn't go
Mark:in there. Tell people Lydia's room has a secret room. Like, you tell people that.
Sarah:They obviously don't appreciate that they live in this incredible house. They all think it's junk.
Mark:Yep. Anyway, oh, down the stairs she goes. Yeah. And Alfie gets blamed.
Sarah:Alfie scratches on Lydia's door and then stops. Why wouldn't Lydia just go and go back to bed?
Mark:No. No.
Sarah:Like, oh, well, he left. That's the whole point of going to the door was to get him to go away. Yeah. So why wouldn't she just go back to bed? No.
Sarah:She goes to the stairs.
Mark:To wander, and Howard runs out and pushes up. Sorry. I was pretending to be Jennifer.
Sarah:Well, he does later admit that he did
Mark:it or something. Oh, but he admits it like, oh, yeah. I did it. I did. I apologize.
Sarah:It was me. Yeah. I'm homicidal. But he does admit it. Yes.
Sarah:Because he just wants to get everybody off his back.
Mark:Well, he and he totally, like, rats on the cops about it. Like, it's like, you know, if a suspect's not guilty, he just wants to tell the cop or something, just shut them up.
Sarah:Yeah. Like, I'm telling you right now. So Lydia goes to the hospital, and nobody stays with her. No. Because she's not gonna ruin Christmas.
Sarah:And this is
Mark:like okay.
Sarah:This poor old woman is in the hospital alone.
Mark:Let's say let's say they went to bed early. First of all, church is late on Christmas Eve, like 11:00 late. Yeah. Okay. So they came in.
Mark:They had the whole garage thing. Let's give them forty minutes for that.
Sarah:Okay? So now it's almost midnight.
Mark:Then they have the whole stocking thing. Yes. So it's enough. We'll give it twenty minutes.
Sarah:So let's say it's 12:30 now.
Mark:It's 12:30 now. Now Lydia's up writing her book
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And goes down the stairs.
Sarah:So now it's one?
Mark:Yeah. They call the cops. Right? Because Scott calls
Sarah:Barnaby Right.
Mark:The next morning. But Scott has been there.
Sarah:And the ambulance has been and taken her away.
Mark:Yeah. So it's like four in the morning. Yeah. And Jennifer comes home and is like, she wouldn't want us to ruin Christmas. Go to to bed.
Sarah:Well, and Scott's nice enough not to call Tom right away, right? He lets him have his presence in bed first.
Mark:Yeah, about that.
Sarah:So I don't understand.
Mark:The Barnabas exchange gifts and then take those gifts back to their bedrooms and open them and yell at each other around the house about the gifts. That's what they do. That's not me making fun
Sarah:of them. Or does does Tom or Joyce distribute the presents I would then get back in
Mark:in her new purple sweater.
Sarah:She does have a new outfit. Yep. Or at least a new top.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:I think it's just stockings. I think they just open small things in bed.
Mark:Including a carving knife?
Sarah:It's not large. It would fit in a stocking.
Mark:You've never put a carving knife in my stock. And that's not a euphemism for the balking.
Sarah:The only carving knife we have is out in the garage where I use it to cut styrofoam. For Halloween. And it's great for that. You mentioned Cully's top. Can we talk about Emily's sweaters?
Sarah:Okay. Because the cardigan that she puts on is is more grown than made. Yes. It's disgusting. It looks like it's made out of fungus.
Sarah:It's it's bulbous y and it looks 80 years old and haven't been buried in the ground for a week first and then dug up and then worn. Like, who? It's just gross.
Mark:One of the things they talk about in the magazine is how incredibly cold it was during filming inside. Okay.
Sarah:So Kate's got a nice coat. Why can't Emily have a nice coat?
Mark:No. She's too busy thinking about bonking when
Sarah:it's closed. Hideous belted fungus y cardigan.
Mark:What is that belt? The whole thing is just
Sarah:But then later, when she's washing dishes on Christmas day or boxing day, she's got another sweater on that's even worse.
Mark:And there's I forget who is it? Emily wears the patchwork thing. Like, what's her Joe from the last episode?
Sarah:She's got, well, she's got a patchwork denim shirt. Yeah. Plaid denim shirt. It's kind of madras, plaid sort of that was popular maybe ten or fifteen years before this episode was filmed. Yes.
Sarah:So I think we're supposed to get the impression that Emily doesn't have a lot of money.
Mark:Maybe, but the wedding she goes to sure is nice.
Sarah:Yeah. Well, friends can have nice weddings. She didn't pay for it. Right? But the sweater that she's wearing when she washes dishes has like it's made out of this novelty yarn that looks like hair, but then it has patches of, like, native American patterns on it.
Sarah:Yeah. You have to go to an effort to have something that ugly.
Mark:It is the ugly sweaters of Emily. It's just oh.
Sarah:That cardigan bothers me so much.
Mark:Yes. You know who goes to visit and Lydia in the hospital?
Sarah:Tom.
Mark:Topham and Scott.
Sarah:Oh, and they do such a good job with her bruises. She legitimately looks like an old lady who's been beaten up. Yep. She does. So sad.
Mark:She does. It's so sad.
Sarah:Never mind that when Scott calls Tom to say we need there's been an accident or a shove or Howard did something else bad, that Tom is sitting at the table wearing earrings. Yes. She looks so awesome in those earrings. No. No.
Sarah:They must have been in his Christmas cracker.
Mark:No. He calls him up he calls him up to go to see Lydia when he's in bed. The earrings are later when they go back out because, they oh, because Lydia dies.
Sarah:Yeah. No, because Lydia is awake.
Mark:Oh, that's And
Sarah:so they go to talk
Mark:to her. That's right. They go to talk to her.
Sarah:Yeah. He's got those earrings on at the dinner table.
Mark:He looks so pretty with those earrings on.
Sarah:He looks so happy.
Mark:He does.
Sarah:Yeah. She said she was pushed. And then Tom and Scott go back to the house because now they wanna see her room, and they need to investigate a bit more closely. Right?
Mark:And, of course, Jennifer doesn't believe the cops.
Sarah:She's just horrible. When they go back is when we get to really see the upstairs hallway. Yep. And it has this beautiful wallpaper.
Mark:Yes. It's gorgeous.
Sarah:And this beautiful stained glass window. Yes. And I knew that the house where the episode was filmed was a well known house. It's called Harpsen Court. Yes.
Sarah:And we talked about this at the beginning of the episode because Jennifer is like, you would get a room and you get a room and you a room and you two can't share a room because of the bonking. And you get
Mark:a room.
Sarah:I thought, big is this house? Well, Harpston Court has 13 bedrooms. 13. So it's plenty big enough.
Mark:More than us.
Sarah:For all those people. But you can tell from the interior shots, they've they've made the house look shoddy. Right? So there's wallpaper peeling in places, the floor is rough looking.
Mark:This light switch doesn't work. All that stuff Don't plug anything into a wall like a
Sarah:Well, you don't see that.
Mark:Carving knife. Yeah.
Sarah:You don't see that. They make reference to it, but the the impression is that the house is shoddy. And so I wanted to know whether the interior shots are actually shot in that house or whether it was a different house.
Mark:Because the magazine implies it.
Sarah:Yeah. That it was different?
Mark:No. That it was the same.
Sarah:It was the same? It is the same.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Because Harps in Court has been on the market a few times since this was filmed.
Mark:Maybe we should buy it.
Sarah:It's 13,000,000 last time I looked.
Mark:Maybe we shouldn't buy it.
Sarah:And it's listed as a oh, I'm sorry. 10,000,000. A $10,000,000 doer upper. A doer upper? Yes.
Sarah:Queen Mary once stayed in one of the rooms. Wow. It was originally the oldest part of the house was built in the thirteenth century.
Mark:So this is Nothing in this town was alive or manufactured or created in the thirteenth century.
Sarah:No. There's some rocks that were probably here then. Yeah. But the if you remember when they're in the, in the family room, the library, whatever you would call that formal room with the fireplace where they have the tree. Yeah.
Sarah:The fireplace has this really weird shape. It's almost, it's not quite an arch. It's like a peaked arch.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Right? And it has no mantle. Oh. There's no ledge.
Mark:No. If it's peaked like that, no.
Sarah:And that peak is repeated in the windows on the front of the house. Remember,
Mark:it's it's got
Sarah:that peak. Yeah. That that is all part of Harpston Court.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:That window on the landing, that beautiful round sanglass window, that's actually in Harpston Court. Okay. 13 bedrooms, five kitchens.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Which I assume they're also including like a summer kitchen that might be in a barn or something.
Mark:I guess. Yeah.
Sarah:So the kitchen in the photos from the architectural digest and other places I looked, they never show that kitchen. No, but I'm not. I wouldn't be surprised if that kitchen actually is in that house. If all of those rooms are in that house. Yeah.
Sarah:That same house was also used in woman in black with Daniel Radcliffe. Did you ever see that? No. I think I watched it without you. Yeah.
Sarah:And they made it look super creeped up for that. They put a whole bunch of weeds and all kinds of stuff around it. But, yeah, interiors and exterior shots all the same house. Oh. It's beautiful.
Sarah:I'm sure the $100,000 that Aiden is gonna inherit wouldn't touch it. No. It wouldn't even be enough to do the heating No. Or the electrics.
Mark:From uncle Bob or whatever. Bart. Bart. Bart.
Sarah:Jennifer is just convinced that when Aiden gets that money, that's what he's gonna do with it. No. Is fix up that house.
Mark:He's gonna go
Sarah:Why would he do that?
Mark:To my orca debunk. Bonk. Bonk. Bonk.
Sarah:Bonk. What? Because, you know, it's not backwards.
Mark:Yes. Barnaby's like, interviews everybody, including the best interview ever, which is the one with Howard. Yes. So they interview all the other people, but then they take Howard alone, which they would never do.
Sarah:I don't know. I mean, if they were gonna take him into the police station, they would need a responsible adult. But if they just ask Kate and Digby, hey, is it okay if we talk to him? They're like, yeah, go ahead.
Mark:Well, Kate shows the one moment of parental concern for a child when he comes out. Yeah. That is the single moment of care that she has for her own child.
Sarah:The only other kind of parental behavior I see from her is when Jennifer is bossing Howard around that cake sort of gives her a look. Like, how dare you talk to my kid that way? But it's pleading.
Mark:It's my job to talk to my kid like
Sarah:Yeah. If somebody's gonna blame Howard for everything, it's gonna be me. Howard, you did everything.
Mark:Howard does a magic trick.
Sarah:Especially since they think that he admitted to murdering her.
Mark:Yes. Howard does a magic trick on Scott, and they do this really well. Right? He basically explains the magic trick like a magician would explain the magic trick. Mhmm.
Mark:He does very good. Right? He shows how he led Scott into the whole situation, and that becomes the blueprint that Barnaby uses to know that it was Dominic later on.
Sarah:Because the same implanting ideas in your head sleight of hand and misdirection are how Dominic gets away with it. Right?
Mark:And how it pulls out. And we don't know Dominic's a magic guy yet.
Sarah:No. We do know that finally they admit, oh, yeah, Ferti, this thing that nobody's mentioned. Well,
Mark:it's Howard that mentions it, and they all look at him like, how dare you mention it?
Sarah:It's relevant. I would almost think that as soon as you know it's an actual crime that has occurred, that one of the first things a constable would do is to pull any other incidents at that address. Yes. And Tom would have known about Ferti's death before he even went there.
Mark:Yeah, I would think so.
Sarah:Maybe not when Lydia had just fallen, but once you know she was murdered, they would have had that rap sheet for that address.
Mark:So Ferti kills himself nine years ago with a shotgun.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:And he does it because he finds out that the love of his life, Claire
Sarah:Claire English.
Mark:Who's his new partner is actually a thief, a drug addict, and
Sarah:a gold digger. And he finds that out because Jennifer claims to have hired a private detective, and Lydia backs her up saying that Claire stole an antique statue and was trying to fence it. Yes. And so he's destroyed by this. But Jennifer already didn't like her.
Mark:No. When she first shows up, Jennifer completely lies to her.
Sarah:No. She dislikes her from the first time she sees her.
Mark:And then our second favorite character appears, we, Alfie.
Sarah:Puppy Alfie is so cute.
Mark:He's so cute.
Sarah:I don't know. Anybody could dislike Claire. They picked a perfect actress to play her. She is sunny and bright and happy and smiles. Then
Mark:Alfie the puppy runs over to her and
Sarah:she's She's like so sunshine in a person. How could you dislike her?
Mark:And like later on, Dominic, when he's explaining why he's the worst human ever, says that Furti was hopeless and she was hopeless, but when they found each other they were perfect for each other. And the actors and the story makes that appearance right Yeah.
Sarah:So, Freddie kills himself because he's heartbroken. Yes. And then Claire kills herself after he dies because It's she's so tragic. Yeah. And all because Jennifer.
Mark:I'm telling you, worst person ever. Worst Jennifer ever. That's for sure.
Sarah:She's the worst Jennifer ever. It's me. So Lydia dies in the hospital,
Mark:and She wouldn't wanna ruin Christmas, so let's go shooting.
Sarah:Yes. Because if you don't have blood on your hands, why are you worried? Like, gauntlet dropped. And Jennifer's like, oh, I gotta go shooting out. Then he's like,
Mark:because I really wanna shoot stuff. Something at that point in time.
Sarah:Yeah. I think he does too. I think he knows what she's like. Yeah. And she's awfully determined
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:That nothing's gonna bother, you know, nothing's gonna ruin anything.
Mark:She ruins Christmas.
Sarah:Oh, absolutely. She probably ruins every Christmas. Kate admits that she and Digby are in in debt. Yep. By the way, an overdraft of 30 ks is not insignificant.
Sarah:No. Right? In The UK, to have an overdraft is like having a running loan. Right? So you have to apply for it and you have to have the credit to be approved for it.
Sarah:And on a standard checking account, I looked this up on a standard checking account. The default overdraft is like a $100. Yeah. So if you go over and you run out of money, they don't bounce the check. If you've got good standing with the bank, they give you like thirty days to make it right.
Sarah:Yeah. Or whatever. And if it's not a prearranged overdraft, the interest can be very high.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:So a 30 k overdraft, even prearranged, would be a significant debt. Yeah. They're in trouble.
Mark:Yes. So they have motive.
Sarah:They do because the only reason why they haven't sold the house is that Jennifer won't let them.
Mark:But why kill Lydia?
Sarah:Well, we know.
Mark:Well, yes, we know. But
Sarah:But why would Jennifer kill Lydia? Do you think Ross knows she did it?
Mark:No. Why would Digby and what's her name?
Sarah:Kate?
Mark:Yeah.
Sarah:Kalidia? Because if Lydia is not alive, then Jennifer might be more likely to sell the house.
Mark:Maybe. Yeah.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:But she's pretty attached to it. So let's go shooting.
Sarah:Yeah. Is this
Mark:a Boxing Day thing? I understand that Americans don't understand Boxing Day. I get asked about it every single year by some American. What is this Boxing Day thing? In Canada, everybody goes shopping.
Mark:Mhmm. Okay? In the in Britain, it's the day that you're supposed to give gifts to the people who provide service to you.
Sarah:Right. Like your mailman and your butcher or whatever.
Mark:The the bid man. Bid man.
Sarah:It's a complicated thing. As as a nontypical American who is not a gun toter that everybody thinks we all are, I'm not. I've never touched a gun.
Mark:I've never seen a gun in person. People. Not that there's anything wrong with gun people.
Sarah:But for me, anytime I see a gun, it's just terrifying. Right? Even in a policeman's holster, it's scary to me. Yeah. The fact that there are people in the countryside and in The US and in England who have shotguns around all the time when there's not like animals that might attack you.
Sarah:Yeah. You know, there are no bears at Jennifer's house. No. Right? They don't have to protect themselves.
Sarah:The fact that they're
Mark:Howard, why'd you let the bear in?
Sarah:They're cleaning guns in the kitchen.
Mark:Yeah. It's weird. They're like militants about it. And of course, part of me is like, oh, folks.
Sarah:What the hell are you doing? I wanted to know more about shooting parties because we see them all the time in British dramas. Yeah. These country house parties, shooting parties, and you might remember that when Jennifer and Digby go out to shoot, there are these kind of like posts in the ground with numbers on them.
Mark:Isn't Goshford Park around the shooting
Sarah:party Yes. Oh, there you can't name all the movies that have shooting parties in them. Yeah. I mean, Agatha Christie loved a shooting party because it gave her an opportunity for people to have dangerous weapons around each
Mark:with this little seat.
Sarah:Yeah. He's got a folding seat, his cane, which is a thing. People had those. Yeah. But when they go out to shoot, there are little numbered spots.
Sarah:Those are called pegs. Okay. And you're pre assigned a peg.
Mark:Yes. So you don't shoot other people.
Sarah:Right. So everybody has a spot and is facing the right direction
Mark:and has a like a angle of where they can shoot.
Sarah:Right. There's a wedge of space in front of you that is yours. Yeah. And if a bird flies into that space, it's yours to shoot. But if it's in your neighbor's space, you don't.
Mark:It's so that you don't turn so much you shoot your neighbor.
Sarah:Well, that and everybody wants to get their own brace. Yeah. So they want an equal opportunity. So you don't, you don't shoot a bird that's within your neighbor's range. Right?
Sarah:I looked up shooting party etiquette.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:And the leading website on shooting party etiquette is Purdy. Now you might remember Purdy because that was the brand of rifles we mentioned a few episodes ago, talking about expensive guns. Because they still do make guns and they make shooting attire. Oh. They have this long article.
Sarah:It's so funny. This long article about how the etiquette around a shooting party really isn't complicated. And then it's like three pages of stuff.
Mark:It's not really all that complicated at all.
Sarah:If you get an invitation to a shooting party and you accept it, and then you receive another invitation for the same day, even if it's a better party, you cannot accept it.
Mark:But wait a minute.
Sarah:You can't turn down the other invitation to go to the
Mark:better I'm going to the better one. I want the biggest bag.
Sarah:When you arrive, you should bring your own gun. It should be cleaned, and it should be in a bag or sleeve. Right? Yes. You should bring your own ammunition.
Sarah:More than enough. More than you think you'll need.
Mark:Well, Jennifer brings her own ammunition.
Sarah:Yeah. You get assigned a peg. Yeah. A number of peg. And there's etiquette around that too.
Sarah:Some places they do it by random draw. It depends on the host. Yeah. Or they can be assigned and there are spots that are better than others. If you're really low on the totem pole, you might get assigned to be a walking gun.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:A walking gun goes with the beaters. Okay. Okay. So the beaters are in the woods on the other side of the field.
Mark:I just have images of what's her name from the very first episode. I know. Bella riding along with her shotgun.
Sarah:Exactly. So the beaters are in the woods and their job is to stir up the pheasant so they take flight as soon as they hit the edge of the field. Yeah. So pheasants will run along the ground when they're in the trees, but then when they see clear, clear grass, they'll take flight.
Mark:Right? And this is all pheasant hunting.
Sarah:Yes. So the beaters rouse the birds and drive them in the direction of the shooting party.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:A walking gun, their job is to be with the beaters And when they rouse the birds, any birds that fly the opposite direction, they shoot them.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:Why?
Mark:So that they force the birds towards the shooters.
Sarah:Okay. Shooting a bird is not gonna change the direction it flies except to make it go down.
Mark:No. But it'll shoot it'll it'll take the other ones.
Sarah:The other birds will go, oh, well, if I go that way, I'll get killed. Yeah. Because they're smart like that.
Mark:Birds are pretty smart,
Sarah:man. No. They're not. They're like little robot dinosaurs.
Mark:Yep.
Sarah:They would I I don't I don't know why this role even exists, but there's also all of this stuff around tipping the beaters and the gamekeeper and you have to do it in cash and you have to do it in certain denominations and you have to do it at a certain time. And when you're driven to the shooting area, you're not supposed to speak between when you get out of the car and when you take your peg. So you're supposed to get out of the car and go to your assigned peg and you're not supposed to speak in that time. And you're really not even supposed to speak during the shooting.
Mark:It's like golf.
Sarah:And then there's all this, thank you. Mean, for them to say, it's really not that complicated.
Mark:It's really not that complicated.
Sarah:Except here is how complicated it is. Right? So the guy who's standing behind Jennifer when she's shooting is probably the gamekeeper who's in charge of that thing. So they're not shooting at their own estate. No.
Sarah:They're somewhere else.
Mark:Yeah. But Digby knows what's going on. Yes. And Jennifer, though we've maligned her repeatedly in this episode, dies a horrible death.
Sarah:Oh my gosh. Her gun basically backfires into her face.
Mark:She blew her face off.
Sarah:Yeah. Which they don't have to show because there's, one of George's techs is conveniently kneeling next to her head.
Mark:And the gun is bad enough.
Sarah:Yeah. Because it's it's fragmented. Right? Yeah. We we get to see George doing dishes in his marigolds.
Mark:Yes. George, after Christmas dishes, is a good man, does the dishes.
Sarah:And and in a better outfit than Emily's dishwashing outfit.
Mark:And then basically, after she gets shot, Barbie's like, I have this all figured out now. Yeah. Because he he figures out that Dominic's a magician.
Sarah:Because he sees him sitting in the chair playing with a card.
Mark:But that's not actually Dominic. Of course not. That is a man by the name of John Styles. The picture in the Midsomer magazine of John Styles is horrific because he's with a punch.
Sarah:A punch puppet? Yeah. Yeah. And he
Mark:is a professional magician and he taught he taught everything to Howard, how Howard does everything he teaches him and walked him through it, and he also is the hand that you see
Sarah:Dominic's doing the card tricks. Yeah.
Mark:But it's not Dominic doing the card tricks.
Sarah:Yeah. Because Howard definitely knows how to shuffle some cards. Yeah. He knows how to hold them and Yep. Deal with them.
Mark:John Stiles taught him everything he knew.
Sarah:And then we find out that, of course, Dominic is Claire's brother. And the reason why he waited nine years is that he didn't know until, like, the summer that summer what had actually happened because that's when he learned that Lydia had kept a diary. He gets the diary. He reads about Lydia's confession of plan- basically planning with Jennifer to get rid of Lydia
Mark:in the seven years that they knew each other before this, a little bleeding, leading question to get an idea. Why does it have to be so long between this? If they had done it, like, let's separate this the suicide and this Christmas by two years, everything would be the same.
Sarah:Yeah. And I think if Dominic had just confronted Lydia on her own, she would have admitted to everything.
Mark:She was almost ready to admit.
Sarah:She clearly felt horrible about it even when as she was doing it.
Mark:Is Jennifer forced her to do it?
Sarah:And she felt bad. Yeah. Right?
Mark:Absolutely. But
Sarah:he waits all that time because he's gonna get his come up and
Mark:And Scott, I keep wanting to call him Scott, Spock. He's not Spock, he's Scott. Scott figures out where he is and they go and talk to him and he tells everything.
Sarah:Mhmm. And then, of course, we've got Tom in the metal detector. He gets his revenge on his father-in-law. His father-in-law Who's slurping.
Mark:Who eats pudding with coins in it. So this is a tradition that I remember the first time I was introduced to it was a birthday party when I was maybe six. Went to a friend's house and the parents put in wax paper coins and put it in the cake batter.
Sarah:Mhmm.
Mark:The idea is that everybody got a coin in your cake.
Sarah:Yeah. Right? And it's in wax paper so you don't accidentally eat it.
Mark:A kid ate one of them at that birthday card. Of course. I remember he ate a dime. Yep. So we had to tear everybody's cake apart to find out what cord what coin it was.
Mark:And now Canadian dimes are tiny. They're
Sarah:very small. Right. So They're even smaller than American dimes. Yeah. But Tom gets his revenge.
Mark:So the idea is that Douglas swallows the pound coin, which you would know if you swallowed
Sarah:a pound Oh my gosh. Yeah. They're heavy.
Mark:They're heavy and they're thick. And he lets it know that he didn't actually do this, and Tom has gotten him a metal detector. Right. And so Tom, the least handyman ever. Like, the most handy thing we've seen Tom ever do is paint a set.
Mark:Yeah. Rewires.
Sarah:No, he adjusts the sensitivity to it. Something. So that it will go off.
Mark:Yeah, of the metal detector. He's a detectorist now. And then Toby? And he goes in and rubs it over Douglas's tummy and sets it off. And everybody is in on the joke.
Mark:Joyce almost blows it. I'm like, Joyce? At least Cully figures it out right And Joyce almost blows it, but then Joyce's mom gets it, and then Douglas gets it, and he gets the point from Dom. Yeah. Woah.
Sarah:I got you. I got you. Before we talk about best corpses and after the credits, just one more thing that, I think is interesting in this episode is this whole provision in Uncle Bart's will that Aidan is not allowed to smoke.
Mark:Not allowed to smoke.
Sarah:And if he doesn't smoke, then when he turns 21, he gets a 100,000.
Mark:Yes.
Sarah:Which Jennifer thinks he's gonna put towards the house.
Mark:The codicil in the will. Right?
Sarah:It's an inheritance stipulation.
Mark:Okay. Are these allowed?
Sarah:In legal terms, they're called dead hand control. Oh. Which makes me think of a monkey's paw or something. Yes. Right?
Sarah:And they're they are allowed.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:It's called an inheritance incentive in Now some
Mark:I wonder what we should do to the children.
Sarah:But they're usually, like, with the intent of ensuring the person who's going to get the money will be in a good situation to have the money. Like, you get it when you're 21, or you get it, once you get married. Finish college. Finish college, or you have to use it for college. That kind of stipulation.
Sarah:But when they're sort of overly coercive stipulation
Mark:I actually think my parents had one of these in their will. Now my mom's still alive, so this doesn't go into effect. But I remember them talking about it early on that the money that we got, if we got money from their wills, had to be used to buy a house.
Sarah:Right. That's an inheritance stipulation. Yeah. That's different. This dead hand control is much more coercive than that.
Sarah:Yeah. So I wanted to know whether they were common. They're not common because they get overturned in court all the time.
Mark:Super easy.
Sarah:Right? But there have been some famous ones that make this smoking ban look like nothing.
Mark:Okay. Give me some famous ones.
Sarah:So Heinrich Heine, who was a German poet, left all of his money to his wife, but he stipulated that she had to get remarried before she could have the money. Both. Because, quote, then there will at least be one man to regret my death. Wow. Yeah.
Sarah:That's nasty, isn't it?
Mark:That's from beyond the grave, man. Because most of these come out during the real will reading, I would assume.
Sarah:Yes. Yes. Henry Budd, who was an American, wealthy guy back in the eighteen sixties, left his money to his two sons on the condition that neither of them grew a mustache.
Mark:Oh.
Sarah:They were not allowed to have mustaches. Okay. Because he didn't like them.
Mark:Aden's okay there.
Sarah:There's one guy in San Antonio. This is in the nineties, the nineteen nineties. He left his wife the house and money on the condition that she smoked five cigarettes a day for the rest of her life.
Mark:Who's gonna check that?
Sarah:Because he was a smoker, and she hated it and harped on him constantly, so she couldn't have the house and money if she didn't smoke every day. Yeah. She she got it overturned almost immediately.
Mark:Right? Super easy. And plus, it's harmful to her.
Sarah:Yeah. There was a guy, again in the nineties I'll
Mark:leave you all my money if you hit yourself in the face with an axe. Yeah.
Sarah:Every day. There was another guy in the nineteen nineties in Washington, who left a provision for $500 a month to the police officer in town who gave the most traffic tickets for double parking because he hated people who double parked.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:But my favorite, this is my favorite.
Mark:The best one?
Sarah:Hannah Beswick. She was an American millionaire. She died in the seventeen fifties. She had no children. Her husband died before her.
Sarah:She left all of her money to her doctor, but she was terrified of being buried alive.
Mark:Okay.
Sarah:So he could only have the money if he could prove that she was dead on an ongoing basis. Not just once, but all the time.
Mark:Like, many times did he have to prove this?
Sarah:Enough that he wound up mummifying her
Mark:Wow.
Sarah:And keeping her in his house. Ew. And every year, because it was stipulated in her will, every year, a lawyer would come by and they would formally examine the mummy to make sure she was still dead.
Mark:Now I wanna write a different will.
Sarah:And if at any point, if any year passed that he didn't do it, the money could be taken back.
Mark:Oh, I still wanna write a different will. On the April 1, you have to wear a red nose the entire day or you don't get anything from this. And a
Sarah:lawyer is going to come by and watch you wear it all day. Yep. That's the biggest problem with these dead hand control stipulations and wills is that they usually incur such big legal fees to enforce that people get them overturned. And of course there are strange wills that leave money to strange people like, you know, they leave the money to their dog or something like that. But I was looking for this dead hand control kind of provision.
Sarah:We can't really do best corpse of episode because we don't really see Lydia's corpse and Jennifer's corpse. I mean, I I guess Jennifer could get worse corpse because can imagine what's happened to her.
Mark:The best we get is Lydia's prone body. Yeah. Yep. That's the best we get.
Sarah:After the credits, Ross and Kate now share the house.
Mark:Yeah. And Aiden probably gets his money. I'm like, I'm sure he can contest that.
Sarah:Well, and who in the family is gonna try to stop him?
Mark:Yes. And who's well, like, what is
Sarah:I think Lydia had the video because she wanted to suppress it.
Mark:I think so too.
Sarah:Not because she wanted to stop Aiden from inheriting. No. She thought it was stupid.
Mark:Yeah. I agree.
Sarah:Because that would have been her brother.
Mark:And I think they're happy because Jennifer is not in their stupid lives, Eddie. Like,
Sarah:it's sad that Jennifer's dead. I'm sure Aiden is sad. Yeah. I'm sure Ross and Kate are sad. But otherwise, yeah, I think they probably
Mark:get out of their immediately. Yeah. And it gets Kate and her husband out of a hole.
Sarah:Right.
Mark:And Ross probably gives it all to a Buddhist temple.
Sarah:And hopefully, Emily says, wow, Aiden's kind of a dick.
Mark:One would hope. You know what? Dominic goes to jail, but I think he's kinda happy.
Sarah:He did what he wanted to do.
Mark:Did what he wanted to do.
Sarah:It's sad.
Mark:I see, instead of waiting the nine years, I throw I got a diagnosis of cancer in there, So he knows he's gonna die.
Sarah:Yeah, and so there's a there's a stopwatch on his revenge that he's got to do it if he's gonna do it.
Mark:Inciting incident. The show has problems with it.
Sarah:Yeah, yeah. Needs that pressure.
Mark:Oh boy, episode one of season eight, we get into full bonkers mode.
Sarah:What kind of bonkers? Bonking bonkers or bonk bonkers?
Mark:Oh, you know. All I have to tell you, okay, is there's an undertaker and a wife and a wife that goes screaming out into the night. Yes. She is the thing that goes bump in the night with the choirmaster. That's a bum it's a bonkers episode.
Sarah:It's a good one.
Mark:Yep. So
Sarah:Yeah. Aren't they all?
Mark:Season eight, episode one, things that go bump in the night. Our episode number 36.
Sarah:And that's next week.
Mark:Next week.
Sarah:Oh, stay safe and stay healthy and stay sane.
Mark:Please stay safe.
Sarah:Find things that you can laugh about. Yes. Be with the people that you love. Take care of yourself.
Mark:We are healthy and happy.
Sarah:You should be too.
Mark:People have been very nice asking about if we're healthy and all that good stuff.
Sarah:Yes. We hope you guys are too.
Mark:We hope you are too.
Sarah:Until next week. Bye, Maniacs.
Mark:Bye, Maniacs. In high school, this is a total quick aside.
Sarah:Wait. Did make bonk when you were
Mark:in high school? Somebody asked us what bonking was in high school. So I I did adult of some point.
Sarah:Yeah. And was like, hey, kids. What you're saying?
Mark:We said watching TV with your eyes closed. Thanks for joining us on the Mystery Maniacs podcast. If you enjoyed our crazy podcast today, don't miss out on future episodes. Follow us on social media for updates, beyond the scenes content, and exclusive sneak peeks. Subscribe, like, and share to spread the word.
Mark:Bye, Maniacs.