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*** This review may contain spoilers ***
Midomer Murders: Faithful unto Death is set in the Midsomer village of Morton Fendle where DCI Tom Barnaby (John Nettles) is attending a local fête, there he witnesses a local man named Gray Patterson (Mark Bazeley) threaten businessman Alan Hollingsworth (Roger Allam) about a project to turn an old mill into a tourist attraction that has gone belly up leaving a lot of investors including himself out of pocket. Barnaby is asked to investigate the collapse of the deal & see if anything illegal has taken place, however the situation becomes much more serious when Alan's gorgeous young wife Simone (Leslie Vickerage) is kidnapped & held to ransom. Barnaby has a long list of suspects with strong motives & it not long before the first murder occurs, that of a local girl named Brenda Buckley (Sophie Stanton) who may have seen too much for her own good...Episode 4 from season 1 & originally broadcast here in the UK during April 1998 this was directed by Baz Taylor & is yet another excellent murder mystery which is one of my all time favourite stories from this generally excellent series. The script by Douglas Watkinson adapted from the novel by Caroline Graham has all the necessary ingredients for a top Midsomer Murders, it has a complex multi layered plot where things may or may not be connected to keep you guessing, it has lots of rich character's many of whom have strong motives for the crimes committed, there are plenty of red herrings & a well thought out plot that in my opinion is far from predictable & to round it off there's a deliciously dark ending which although typically far fetched & unlikely it's very memorable, it ties everything together perfectly & has a nice sinister edge to it that rivals the equally dark climax of The Killings at Badgers Drift. There is also a really nice humorous streak running through Faithful Unto Death with Barnaby unknowingly taking cannabis amongst various other light hearted moments. It's not all good news though, again at almost 2 hours you need a fair amount of patience as these show's are exposition heavy, despite centering the whole story around them we never find out what happened to the villagers who invested in the mill projects, I mean did they get their money back & there's a character called Harry Vellacott who gets a big introduction but then is totally forgotten about. Still, these are small quibbles & Faithful Unto Death is a classy murder mystery with a dark edge that seems to be missing from more recent Midsomer Murders stories.Again this makes good use of the beautiful English countryside & is nice to look at for that aspect alone, the real life village of Little Marlow in Buckinghamshire was used for the fictional Morton Fendle if your interested. As usual this episode has high production values mainly because a fair amount of cash went into making it, apparently the average cost of an episode is £1.25 million which is a lot by British TV standards. The murders aren't graphic in this one although there is a cool car crash even if the angle at which the logging trailer is parked is utterly ridiculous, I mean why would someone leave it in that position across the road & uncoupled from a truck? How did they even get it into that position in the first place & uncouple the truck that was hauling it? It makes no logical or physical sense whatsoever when you think about it. The acting as usual is also superb.Faithful Unto Death is a personal favourite of mine, I love it's mix of humour, the strong character's, the complex multi layered mystery which I doubt anyone will second guess & everything else that makes this series a winner like John Nettles & the location's, what's not to like? An absolute must for fans of the series & armchair sleuths everywhere.
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