by David Bishop
Jane says her father was tortured and crucified in a prison camp during the war. The Japanese scientist responsible never stood trial. Yukio Li was his son. The Robsons decided to get revenge after Sir Wilfred told Jane about Yukio Li’s family background. Graham Daniel was Michael Robson’s son.
Morse sees a Japanese man in a window. A body is found in the college. It is Friedman – Michael Robson. Morse realises Jane is next in line to be murdered and rushes to her room. Jane is being throttled by a Japanese man, who is himself killed by Mrs Warbut with a croquet mallet.
Morse says the dead man was the real Yukio Li. He swapped places with his substitute and cut off the other man’s tongue to stop him speaking out. Then Yukio Li set about murdering his would-be killers. But he was stopped by Mrs Warbut. She was in Singapore during the war, where she witnessed the torture and crucifixion of Reverend Robson. He bit his own tongue out because of the pain.
THE MANY CAMEOS OF COLIN DEXTER: Dexter can be spotted in the final moments of the story, as a doctor in the hospital ward where Jane is a patient.
DRINK UP, LEWIS: Morse has wine at the summer school dinner, but it’s halfway through the story before he enters a pub. He and Lewis have a pint while avoiding Chief Superintendent Dewar. The inspector can’t understand why people take drugs. Lewis likens their urge to Morse’s thirst for beer. ‘But beer is food,’ the inspector protests.
Morse has beer at home after he’s been sidelined from the case by Dewar.
CRYPTIC CROSSWORDS: There’s a succession of crosswords in this story. Morse helps Jane with a Japanese clue in the Times crossword during the opening sequence. He sets a crossword for Jane, designed to test the foreign students’ English. He admits borrowing some of the clues from the Times. Morse tells the summer school dinner guests that crosswords are more exotic and exciting than most police work. Friedman’s prowess at the crossword competition helps reveal his true identity.
UNLUCKY IN LOVE: Morse is fond of Jane. They used to date. During the case he takes her to his home for a cup of tea. Morse burbles nervously until Jane says she never had any feelings for him. He says it mattered at the time, but doesn’t now.
LEWIS’ KITH AND KIN: The sergeant says the ritual murder will not give him nightmares, he’s seen too many corpses pulled out of Isis Lock.
SOPHOCLES DID DO IT: For once Morse is unable to leap to his usual wild conclusions because he is providing an alibi for all the obvious suspects. But he does accuse Sir Wilfred of organising a conspiracy to murder Yukio Li and wonders if Michael Robson killed his own son, Graham.
ONE FOR THE MORGUE: Now pay attention because this gets confusing. The Japanese substitute is murdered by the real Yukio Li with a blow to the head. Reverend Robson dies of natural causes. Graham Daniel is strangled by Yukio Li. The Japanese drug dealer also murders Michael Robson. Last but not least, Yukio Li is killed by Mrs Warbut with a croquet mallet, while he is trying to strangle Jane Robson.
MURDERS: four. BODY COUNT: five.
MORSE DECODED: The inspector was stationed in Cologne during his National Service.
QUOTE-UNQUOTE: Morse shares his wisdom with students at the summer school reception dinner: ‘Insults more often lead to murder than anything else, in my experience.’
The inspector is surprised at Max being so forthcoming about time of death and supplying a positive identification. ‘Perhaps it’s because I haven’t eaten,’ Max replies tartly. ‘A clear brain, sharpened by hunger.’
Morse is appalled when heroin is found, as it will involve the drugs squad. ‘Now they’ll all swing into it, won’t they? All be down on us. Flash lads from London with flowers in their buttonholes.’
The inspector refutes charges that he is avoiding a senior officer: ‘I’m not running away from Superintendent Dewar, Lewis – I’m respecting his space.’
SOUNDTRACK: Elgar’s ‘The Dream of Gerontius’ is heard throughout the episode, a most apposite choice to accompany images of crucifixion. Travelling to the burial of Reverend Robson, Morse listens to Bach’s St John Passion in his car. Morse plays a tape of Chopin’s Opus 10, Piano Etude No 5 while driving Jane to his house. The inspector changes the tape to Elgar’s ‘Enigma Variations’, but Jane switches it off. Morse says he thought Jane liked the English composer’s music. While sidelined from the case he plays a record of Beethoven’s String Quartet No 15 at home. Alain’s ‘St De Jules Lemaitre’ is heard while Morse talks with Mrs Warbut as the story draws to a close. The inspector says he often cries at concerts.
IDENTITY PARADE: Derek Fowlds appeared in the sitcoms Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister. More recently he has featured in the drama Heartbeat. Amanda Burton later starred in the medical drama Peak Practice with Kevin Whately and subsequently in the forensic thriller series Silent Witness. Philip Middlemiss is best known for playing the long-running character of Des Barnes in the soap Coronation Street.
RATINGS: 11.22 million. Another lacklustre rating, up against the BBC’s popular quiz show A Question of Sport.
THE VERDICT: ‘The Settling of the Sun’ is one of the least effective of Morse’s televised tales. The story hinges on a massive coincidence: the Robson family decides to frame Yukio Li as a drug dealer, but he already is one, and highly dangerous as well. This enables him to kill with impunity, which seems far too convenient in retrospect. Charles Wood’s remarkably humourless script is loaded with unsympathetic characters, something the director and guest actors seem unable to overcome. Ultimately their efforts get swamped by bathos, leaving the viewer uninvolved and unsatisfied.
LAST BUS TO WOODSTOCK
‘You’re going to like this one. Quite a puzzle.’ The very first Morse novel is adapted as the final story of the second television series, in somewhat sanitised form.
UK TX: 22 March 1988
SCREENPLAY: Michael Wilcox, based on the novel by Colin Dexter
DIRECTOR: Peter Duffell
CAST: Anthony Bate (Bernard Crowther), Terrence Hardiman (Clive Palmer), Fabia Drake (Miss Jarman), Jill Baker (Jennifer Coleby), Holly Aird (Angie Hartman), Paul Geoffrey (Peter Newlove), Ingrid Lacey (Mary Widdowson), Shirley Dixon (Margaret Crowther), Ian Sears (John Sanders), Perry Fenwick (Jimmy), Shirley Stelfox (Mrs Kane), Jenny Jay (Sylvia Kane), Diana Payan (Vikki Phillips), Anne Havard (Sally), Vass Anderson (Mr Bentley), Jo Unwin (receptionist), Steph Branwell (Senior Sister), Ian Bleasdale (Time and Motion expert), Amanda Wenban (typist), Kate Percival (lab assistant), P J Davidson (gamekeeper), Dave Roberts (police officer), Steven Law (shop assistant), Paul Lawrence Davis (doctor)
STORYLINE: Sylvia Kane and another person run through the rain to a bus shelter at night. Sylvia asks a woman at the shelter, Miss Jarman, when the next bus to Woodstock is due. Sylvia wants to hitch and waves down a red car. The other person decides not to get into the vehicle, which has a broken tail-light. Sylvia says she will see the other person in the morning. A bus for Woodstock arrives soon after.
A young man called John Sanders goes into the Fox and Castle pub at Woodstock to have a pint. Before he can order, a middle-aged man, Peter Newlove, steps in front of him and orders first. Outside, the red car that picked up Sylvia pulls into the car park. Sanders orders another pint. Newlove goes outside. Sanders tells the barmaid he’s waiting for someone, then goes outside. In the carpark, someone watches Sylvia get out of the red car. She is angry with the driver and walks away. Sylvia is attacked and falls to the ground behind the car. Newlove re-enters the pub and orders a pint. Sanders staggers inside and vomits on the carpet.
Max examines Sylvia’s corpse. She has a broken neck, scratches to her face and bruising – a puzzling mix of injuries. Morse finds an envelope in Sylvia’s bag addressed for hand delivery to Miss Jennifer Coleby of St Aldgates Assurance Co. Sanders identifies the body as Sylvia. He tells the detectives she had come into the ironmonger’s shop where he works. It was her idea to meet at Woodstock. He describes finding the body and says he heard a car driving away fast.
Morse finds a coded me
ssage in the letter: TAKE IT PLEASE. Sylvia worked with Jennifer as a typist. The detectives go to Sylvia’s workplace, where they interview the manager, Clive Palmer. Morse talks to the office post-boy, Jimmy, who spends his lunch hour playing snooker for money. Jimmy says the envelope was filled with cash. Sylvia told the post-boy she would give the envelope to Jennifer.
Morse makes a television appeal for information. It is watched by Miss Jarman, and also a middle-aged couple, Bernard and Margaret Crowther. Max arrives at the Crowthers’ house for dinner – Margaret is his niece. Crowther is up for a prestigious professorship, but the contest is putting him under strain. He expresses interest in Max’s autopsy of Sylvia.
Sanders, it transpires, has a big wad of cash, while Palmer is having an affair with Jennifer. Miss Jarman tells the detectives about seeing Sylvia. She thinks the other person at the bus stop was a woman.
Morse visits Jennifer’s home at night. He meets her flatmates – a student called Angie Hartman and Mary Widdowson, a nurse. Angie invites him to a public lecture by Crowther about the Earl of Rochester. Jennifer says she was changing a library book at the time Sylvia was killed.
Sanders gets the sack from his job. He attacks the boss and is arrested. Next day the detectives interview Jennifer in front of Palmer. She admits to lying about the library book. She was with someone but will not name them. Jennifer professes ignorance of the coded letter. When she has left, Palmer admits to being with Jennifer on the night of the murder.
Max’s assistant notices that Sylvia’s arm had been operated on recently.
The detectives interview Sanders. He admits stealing £500 from the envelope in Sylvia’s bag. He’s already spent £100 of it.
Margaret Crowther panics when a policeman examines her car. He says they are checking all red cars in the area. Miss Jarman tells Morse and Lewis she has seen the red car again and noticed the brake light was broken. She gives them the registration number. The car is registered to Margaret Crowther. Morse deduces Crowther was the man who picked up Sylvia. The detectives visit the Crowthers’ house, but they’re not home.
Margaret confronts her husband, who admits giving Sylvia a lift. They drove to Woodstock. Crowther says Sylvia came on to him, then got angry when he didn’t respond. She left the car, and he reversed over something before driving away. Crowther thought he had hit the kerb. Margaret decides to scrub the car clean and dump the tyre that hit Sylvia. They do this in a park but are chased by a gamekeeper. Crowther has a heart attack. Margaret takes him to hospital.
The detectives return to the Crowthers’ house. They encounter Max. He says Sylvia was getting treatment for her elbow problems. Her next appointment was for the day after she died.
Morse realises Mary Widdowson was the person with Sylvia at the bus stop. Mary says she and Crowther were having an affair. He used coded letters to send messages. He wanted her to go on holiday while the professorial chair was being decided. Sylvia’s death was accidental. Mary followed Crowther and Sylvia to Woodstock. Mary hit Sylvia, and then Crowther reversed over Sylvia, not realising she was lying on the ground behind his car.
THE MORE THINGS CHANGE: The plot of Colin Dexter’s novel is simplified and tweaked, with character names shuffled. In the novel, Crowther’s wife commits suicide and he dies of a heart attack, but both survive in the TV version. The novel’s more sordid elements are quietly airbrushed out, replacing Sanders’ addiction to porn with a rather more prosaic passion for snooker.
THE MANY CAMEOS OF COLIN DEXTER: The author can be seen sitting behind Morse in the audience during Crowther’s lecture.
DRINK UP, LEWIS: Morse has a whisky without ice at the Fox and Castle. Lewis opts for a soft drink. Morse is perturbed when he has to pay. The total is £1.60.
Sylvia’s distraught mother cajoles Morse into having a glass of whisky while they sit in the dead girl’s bed-sit flat. He doesn’t drink it.
Next day Lewis buys Morse a pint of beer and himself an orange juice, before Morse goes to the lecture about the Earl of Rochester.
The inspector buys himself and Lewis a pint of bitter each. He moans about yuppies filling up pubs. As the story ends, Lewis offers to buy Morse a drink. ‘Long overdue, Lewis,’ the inspector replies.
UNLUCKY IN LOVE: Angie flirts with Morse. She announces to her flatmates that the inspector is lonely and needs company.
LEWIS’ KITH AND KIN: The sergeant has two children. He wouldn’t be without them, even though they keep him busy. Lewis feels like the public executioner in his house. Mrs Lewis tells the children he’ll give them a smack if they don’t behave.
SOPHOCLES DID DO IT: Morse idly wonders if they’re looking for a serial killer, possibly a religious freak, but nothing could be further from the truth. He spends much of the episode convinced Jennifer must be involved with Sylvia’s death.
ONE FOR THE MORGUE: Sylvia Kane dies when she’s accidentally run over by Bernard Crowther.
MURDERS: none. BODY COUNT: one.
MORSE DECODED: The inspector reads a lot of poetry. He quotes Edmund Spenser. The inspector hates the smell of hospitals.
YOU’VE DONE IT AGAIN, LEWIS: Lewis says he will see Max in the morning, triggering Morse’s realisation that nurse Mary was due to see Sylvia the morning after the killing. The sergeant is praised as ‘brilliant’.
QUOTE-UNQUOTE: Morse is pleased with the new case: ‘Coded messages, murder – right up my street. It’s not a bad way to start the day.’
The inspector muses on deathbed conversions: ‘The church loves a repentant sinner. Good for business.’
Morse is in philosophical mood while contemplating the conception of Sylvia Kane: ‘Nothing trivial about fornication. It’s a great pity, but there you are.’
Later in the same conversation he adds: ‘Is sex more trouble than it’s worth? I keep wanting to find the answer.’
SOUNDTRACK: Morse listens to the overture of Mozart’s opera Cosi Fan Tutte as he drives through Oxford. Crowther is listening to Mozart’s Piano Sonata in C (K545) when Max arrives for dinner.
IDENTITY PARADE: Post-boy Jimmy is played by Perry Fenwick, now better known as Billy Mitchell in the soap opera EastEnders. Mary is played by Ingrid Lacey, who later starred as Helen in the sitcom Drop the Dead Donkey. Terrence Hardiman is best known as the title character from the children’s series The Demon Headmaster.
RATINGS: 12.23 million. This was the most-watched episode of 1988, as viewers rediscovered Morse once more. Series two averaged only 11.2 million, never matching its predecessor.
THE VERDICT: ‘Last Bus to Woodstock’ is a workmanlike yarn with some winning moments, such as a delightful scene where elderly eyewitness Miss Jarman scolds Morse for interrupting her. But the story lacks urgency, probably because the only killing is more accident than murder. The script is guilty of trying to link every character in the story, no matter how great a coincidence is required. Newlove just happens to be in the Fox and Castle on the night Sylvia dies. Sanders just happens to be walking past Sylvia’s bed-sit when Morse drives up. There are several more examples of a tendency that spoils an otherwise solid effort.
SERIES THREE (1989)
Producer Kenny McBain left after the first two series to develop a new TV drama called Sharpe, based on the novels by Bernard Cornwell. To replace him, executive producer Ted Child brought in Chris Burt, a colleague from The Sweeney. Burt made an immediate impact, adding a new regular cast member, Dr Grayling Russell.
The attractive young pathologist was a far cry from her crumpled predecessor Max, with her presence designed to compensate for the show’s lack of female characters. Dr Russell is initially an irritant to Morse, but soon becomes an object of desire for the often morose detective with a terrible track record in matters of the heart.
Burt also pushed for more humour in the scripts, and was keen to play up the pairing of Morse and Lewis. The four stories in this series see the sergeant taking a more active role in solving cases, enhancing his partnership with Morse. Lewis also a
cts as a comic foil, pricking his superior’s lapses into pomposity.
Viewers responded positively to the changes, with ratings surging by two million for this series. At the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Awards, John Thaw was acclaimed as best actor for his work on series three, while the show was nominated for best drama series, and its exquisite camerawork.
Dexter limited his role for series three to providing notes and story ideas, rather than complete treatments. Only one of his novels was adapted, and The Riddle of the Third Mile underwent so many changes it was renamed The Last Enemy. This sea change gave the screenwriters more freedom and saw the show blossom creatively...
Produced by Chris Burt
Executive Producer: Ted Childs
REGULAR CAST:
John Thaw (Chief Inspector Morse)
Kevin Whately (Sergeant Lewis)
Amanda Hillwood (Dr Grayling Russell)
GHOST IN THE MACHINE
‘We’ve been led up the garden path here, Lewis. A very pretty garden and a highly picturesque path.’ Morse investigates an elaborate attempt to make a murder look like a suicide that looks like a murder.
UK TX: 4 January 1989
SCREENPLAY: Julian Mitchell, based on an idea by Colin Dexter
DIRECTOR: Herbert Wise
CAST: Patricia Hodge (Lady Hanbury), Clifford Rose (Dr Charles Hudson), Bernard Lloyd (Professor Edward Ullman), Michael Godley (Sir Julius Hanbury), Michael Thomas (John McKendrick), Patsy Byrne (Mrs Maltby), Irina Brook (Michele Réage), Lill Roughley (Betty Parker), Robert Oates (Ted Parker), John Elmes (Roger Meadows), John Cater (the Dean), Rainbow Dench (Georgina Hanbury), Michael Bertenshaw (detective), Jonathan Donne (constable), Alan Barker (plain clothes officer), Eunice Roberts (policewoman), Trevor Martin (porter), Seeta Indrani (laboratory assistant), Claire Skinner (girl pupil)