There was a time when a lock-in at the local pub was something of a treat. But things change.
All-day drinking has taken away the nefarious excitement; and when the lock-in is not with other likeminded extracurricular drinkers, but with the murderous landlord now revealed as your long-since adopted son, that’s also likely to take the shine off it.
That’s the situation lady of the manor Serena Wyham (Helen Schlesinger, who was recently the murderer in the opener to the last season of Lewis so not really in a position to complain now) and wideboy fairground owner Butch Nevin (Michael Higgs) find themselves in at the climax to ‘Harvest of Souls’, the final episode in the current run of Midsomer Murders. As is so often the case, the past (in this case a brief but fertile fling in 1979) has come back to haunt them.
Much of the action takes place in and around Butch’s fairground camped out on the village green, the star attraction of which is the Wall of Death. Not the glass noticeboard that adorns the wall of Barnaby’s office each week, onto which Charlie diligently attaches photos of the deceased and suspected, and where I constantly expect to find he has started writing odds against each character (“Kam, I’ll give you 10 to 1 on it being the rejected ex-lover”).
No, this is the legendary fairground Wall of Death, motorcycles running almost horizontally around the inner wall of a pit. It’s an extraordinary sight, although it doesn’t quite live up to its reputation – victim number three is found there, but it’s a fairly pedestrian stabbing rather than a horrendous ‘accident’ during the show. I can’t help but wonder whether the original script was rather more dramatic in that respect, perhaps before Health & Safety stepped in.
It’s a strong finale to this run of episodes, and boasts a larger than usual cast – what with the Wyham family up at the manor, their estate staff, the vet and her daughter, the couple at the pub, plus the horde of fairground folk, to be honest it’s something of a relief when the killing starts as it thins down the number of people we’re expected to keep track of.
There are a couple of occasions when the script seems so eager to get on to the next bit that something of the detail is lost – the revelation of just who was behind the horse-rustling, for example, is passed over in a momentary snatch of conversation between Barnaby and Nelson (for anybody still wondering, it was Jessica).
But on the plus side, anybody already indulging in the Midsomer Murders drinking game that I proposed last week will have been thrilled when not even ten minutes into the episode the Wyham’s stableman complains about “disgruntled villagers.”
The killer is of course considerably more than disgruntled, and killing spree aside it’s hard not to feel sympathy for him as we learn of the loss of his daughter in the absence of a compatible kidney donor. His frustration at not having been able to do anything to save her has turned into anger towards his biological parents, and his goal in targeting their own grown-up children is a misguided sense of justice rather than simple revenge. It’s a very touching moment when his real mother comforts and forgives him.
“It’s quite something isn’t it, the power of the love between parent and child” observes Nelson sagely, summing up what we’ve learned tonight in a manner normally reserved for Barnaby (or Jerry Springer). It echoes Barnaby’s comment earlier in the episode about owners and their animals – and he should certainly know all about that.
If there’s an unsung star to Midsomer Murders it’s Sykes the dog, who this week gets rather more screen time than usual. The end, improbable as it sounds, sees the Barnabys (including Sykes) out on the open road in a Volkswagen camper van. “Torquay 2007” says Mr to Mrs Barnaby by way of explanation, and with something of a glint in his eye – a pleasing indication that the past can sometimes come back to delight rather than to haunt us.
Just how far the fictional Midsomer is from the factual Torquay I don’t know, but one thing I think we can agree on – after a couple of months of non-stop crime fighting, if anybody deserves a holiday it’s Barnaby. Although let’s hope he doesn’t stay away too long.
Aired at 8pm on Wednesday 17 February 2016 on ITV.
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