by David Bishop
Johnson will soon be a superintendent and offers Lewis the chance to become inspector. The sergeant discovers Hardinge was stopped in a spot-check the day after Karen disappeared. The bursar admits going with Karen and Myton to Wytham. He took photos of Karen, then left. Hardinge went back the next day to recover a camera lens. Claire says she went with him. But the detectives know this is false. Hardinge admits he is having an affair with Claire.
The new police pathologist, Dr Laura Hobson, says the body in the woods was a man. His skull was crushed. A watch nearby bore the initials JM. Strange reassigns the Daley murder investigation, and Lewis, to Johnson, on the chief constable’s orders. Johnson arrests Philip Daley for murdering his father, George.
Morse and Lewis have a shouting match about the case. The sergeant says he has accepted a place with Johnson’s regional crime squad. Morse congratulates him but warns him that there’ll be a price to pay. He suggests Lewis think about how Myton could have paid off his bills the month after being murdered.
Johnson assaults Philip during his interrogation. Lewis objects and leaves to investigate Morse’s tip-off. Myton’s bills, it transpires, were paid by someone else. Morse visits the garage Daley frequented and borrows the security camera videos. The inspector deduces Hardinge was being blackmailed by Daley. Lewis has traced the cheque that settled Myton’s bills to Dave Michaels.
Morse watches the video again. He sees Cathy visit the garage while Daley is there. A fingerprint inside Karen’s camera is matched to Kate Burns, who served seven years for shooting her father when she was 15. The mugshot of Kate looks like Cathy. Lewis has already left for Wytham – Morse races after him.
Lewis questions the forester about the cheque. Cathy aims a shotgun at Lewis, thinking he’s discovered her true identity. Michaels says Myton tried to rape Cathy – she is Karen Anderson. Myton’s death was self-defence. Michaels found her and took her in. He buried Myton and dumped the bag. Cathy says Daley visited her at the cottage. She killed him, then drove the body to Blenheim. Michaels refuses to help her, so Cathy murders him. She forces Lewis to drive the body into the woods and makes him dig a grave.
Morse arrives at the cottage, sees the blood and fears the worst. He drives into the woods. The inspector finds Cathy and Lewis. She says her father sexually abused her from the age of ten. Cathy refuses to go back to prison. Morse knocks the shotgun from her hands. It goes off, killing her.
THE MORE THINGS CHANGE: Substantial changes have been made to the plot of Dexter’s novel, with perhaps only half the television story relating to the source material. The entire Parnell subplot is new and neatly sets up the conflict between Morse and Lewis. More extreme is the transformation of Swedish tourist Karin Eriksson into gun-toting maniac Karen Anderson from Swindon. Does the adaptation succeed? See The Verdict, below.
THE MANY CAMEOS OF COLIN DEXTER: The author can be seen during a tracking shot that pans down to Morse’s Jaguar in the opening sequence. Dexter is wearing a dinner jacket and black bow-tie.
DRINK UP, LEWIS: The inspector drinks beer in a pub while Lewis has orange juice.
Morse drinks red wine at a dinner with Claire.
The sergeant buys Morse a pint and himself an orange juice at a pub in Woodstock. The inspector complains about the beer being cloudy. Lewis decides to go back to work but Morse says it’s the sergeant’s turn to buy the next round. Lewis points out he bought the first one.
UNLUCKY IN LOVE: Morse meets Claire but thinks she is involved with Hardinge. When the inspector discovers they’re only related by marriage, he is still put off by Claire’s wedding band. She says it’s designed to dissuade unwanted admirers. They meet for dinner and she kisses him on the cheek. But the putative romance goes awry when Claire lies for Hardinge. Morse discovers she’s having an affair with her brother-in-law.
SOPHOCLES DID DO IT: Morse believes the man in Karen’s photos is her murderer. He gets the people right but the roles reversed. The inspector later speculates that Daley saw Myton dump Karen’s bag and blackmailed him. Morse then decides Hardinge murdered Daley to stop blackmail threats.
ONE FOR THE MORGUE: James Myton has his skull bashed in by Karen Anderson when he tries to rape her. Steven Parnell is stabbed to death in prison by unidentified assailants. George Daley is shot by Karen, who had changed her name to Cathy Michaels. David Michaels is also shot dead by Cathy. Finally, Cathy dies when Morse knocks a shotgun from her hands and it goes off.
MURDERS: four. BODY COUNT: five.
MORSE DECODED: The inspector has been a policeman for 30 years. Morse is a decidedly amateur two-fingered typist. He’s never contemplated what he will do after retiring.
QUOTE-UNQUOTE: Strange confuses Morse’s summer holiday at a celebrated classical music festival with a Middle East city: ‘You were off sunning yourself in Beirut.’
Dr Hobson makes a comical first impression: ‘Do you know where I might find a Detective Chief Inspector... [consults her instructions] looks like Mouse?’
Morse berates Lewis: ‘Coffee may be instant, death may not.’
The inspector describes how modern police would react to Holmes and Moriarty grappling at the Reichenbach Falls: ‘Today the area would be sealed off and surrounded by firearms officers while a hostage negotiator was sent for.’
SOUNDTRACK: Debussy’s String Quartet Opus 10 is played during the opening scenes. The music recurs several times during the episode. When Morse and Claire have dinner, Debussy’s ‘La Fille aux cheveux de lin’ from the Preludes for Piano Book 1 can be heard in the restaurant.
BEHIND THE CRIME SCENES: This special introduces new typography for the opening title sequence – the first change to the titles since the show began in 1987.
IDENTITY PARADE: Soap opera fans will be startled to see Shaun Williamson appear as a lowly cashier towards the end of this episode. The actor would spend the next ten years appearing on EastEnders as the luckless Barry Evans. Christopher Fairbank previously starred alongside Kevin Whately as Moxey in the 1980s comedy drama Auf Wiedersehen, Pet. The pair were reunited when Auf Wiedersehen, Pet was successfully revived in 2002. Neil Dudgeon is now a far more familiar face on British TV, thanks to shows like Midsomer Murders and Life of Riley.
RATINGS: 16.55 million. After an absence of almost three years, the first Morse special proves the chief inspector can still draw a massive crowd.
THE VERDICT: ‘The Way Through the Woods’ brought the much-loved series back to television after nearly three years. The story is full of drama and conflict, giving Kevin Whately the chance to deliver one of his best-ever performances as Sergeant Lewis. The scene where he clashes with Morse over the case and their relationship is electrifying. Yet the story leaves the viewer unsatisfied. John Madden’s direction is crisp and efficient, but the problem lies with Russell Lewis’ adaptation. Much of the new material works well, but the denouement goes right over the top. Turning Karen into a psychopathic killer haunted by sexual abuse and incest is crass, and the final bloodbath feels utterly gratuitous. A shame, because this episode has much to recommend it.
THE DAUGHTERS OF CAIN
‘I think Mrs Stevens was a very clever woman. Cleverer than we are. And cleverest of all by being dead.’ The detectives solve two murders but are left with all of the credit and none of the satisfaction.
UK TX: 27 November 1996
SCREENPLAY: Julian Mitchell, based on the novel by Colin Dexter
DIRECTOR: Herbert Wise
CAST: Phyllis Logan (Julia Stevens), Gabrielle Lloyd (Brenda Brooks), Anthony Haygarth (Ted Brooks), Benjamin Whitrow (Brownlee), Amanda Ryan (Kay Brooks), Bernard Brown (Dr Felix McClure), Jasper Jacob (Michael Mansell), Shane Hickmott (Kevin Costyn), Angela Catherall (Mrs Barnett), Dominic Brunt (detective), Lynn Farleigh (Jane Cotterell), Josephine Clarke (nurse), Nadim Sawalha (Dr Hassan), Jason Riddington (Ashley Davies), Jeremy Peters (trainer), Andrew Blair (constable), Luke Pursey (student), Richard Claxton (student), Kate Anne (student), Chloe Tucker (student), Judi Armstrong (re
ceptionist), Steve Edwin (Waterman), Christopher Ashley (policeman), Virginia Grainger (hospital sister), Stephen Tindall (lab detective), Andrew James Spooner (lab detective), Susie Fairfax (nurse), Nicky Goldie (policewoman), Richard Wellings-Thomas (policeman)
STORYLINE: Julia Stevens is dying. The schoolteacher gives the bad news to her cleaner, Brenda Brooks, who seems more upset than Mrs Stevens. Julia believes she can still make her mark. Brenda gets home to an angry husband, Ted. He hits Brenda because she is late making his tea.
One of Julia’s teenage students, Kevin Costyn, flirts with her after class. Julia says she will ask for Kevin’s help when she needs it. Dr Felix McClure, meanwhile, is found murdered at his home, stabbed to death. A trail of bloody footprints leads out of the house. Among McClure’s effects is a London phone number for a woman called Kay.
Strange tells Morse all promotions are frozen, so Lewis must remain a detective sergeant. Brooks is admitted to hospital after a heart attack. Brenda decides to tell Julia a secret.
McClure was a retired academic running a fundraising campaign for Wolsey College. He still had rooms on a staircase in college but lived at a private address. Mr Brooks used to be the scout for the staircase. He went to a job at the Pitt Rivers Museum, leaving the college when McClure retired. This happened soon after a student on the same staircase committed suicide. Matthew Rodway had been taking drugs before walking out of a window. When Kay Brooks visits her mother in Oxford, Julia is waiting for her.
The detectives learn Brooks was probably supplying drugs to Rodway. The college could not prove this so McClure got Brooks a job at the museum, on the condition the former scout had no further contact with students. Brenda tells the police her husband started getting chest pains at 3.00 am on the day McClure was murdered. Brooks was admitted to hospital at 2.00 pm. She tells Lewis about her daughter Kay, who lives in London. The sergeant notes the Brooks have an expensive new kitchen – well outside the financial reach of a security guard and a cleaner. Brooks says his bicycle was stolen the night before McClure died. He hasn’t had a chance to report the theft.
Morse believes Brooks killed McClure. If the police can find Brooks’ bike, it will probably be covered in the murdered man’s blood. The detectives decide to let Brooks stew while they collect more evidence against him.
Julia, meanwhile, offers Kevin sexual favours in return for certain tasks. McClure’s possessions, it emerges, include photos of Kay with Rodway and a South African student called Ashley Davies. McClure had Davies suspended from college for fighting. Rodway spent four days in hospital after being beaten by Davies. Morse sends Lewis to question the former student. Davies says Rodway was his best friend. He was in South Africa when Rodway died. Davies is going to marry Kay.
Kay says Brooks is her stepfather. Brooks hits her mother. His bicycle is found with McClure’s blood on it. Morse wants to bring Brooks in for questioning, but the former scout is missing.
Brenda and Julia take a school trip to Stratford, while Kevin breaks into a cabinet of knives at the Pitt Rivers Museum. Brenda says she last saw her husband before going to Stratford. The school trip got back late so Brenda stayed at Julia’s house.
The theft of a knife from the cabinet Kevin broke into is discovered. The director says a staff member could have taken the knife, but they wouldn’t need to break the cabinet lock – that would draw attention to the theft. The stolen knife matches the sort of weapon used to kill McClure – but it was stolen several days after he was murdered.
Brooks’ body is discovered in the river, carefully wrapped. The murder weapon is still impaled in his back. It’s the knife stolen from the museum.
Morse realises Brooks used his staff key to open the cabinet and take the knife, planning to kill McClure with it. He rearranged the other knives in the cabinet to hide the theft. But Brooks had a heart attack and couldn’t return the knife. Someone else used it to murder Brooks and had the cabinet broken into to draw attention to the theft, thus hoping to establish an alibi for themselves. Morse believes Julia is the mastermind.
Brenda admits her husband murdered McClure, because the retired academic discovered Brooks was still dealing drugs. She burned Brooks’ bloodstained clothes after he had his heart attack. Brenda denies knowing anything about a knife or who killed her husband.
Julia collapses while being questioned at home by Lewis. She asks to speak to Morse. He interviews her in hospital but she is delirious because of her tumour. Brenda is arrested. She has a letter from Julia for Morse. In the letter Julia confesses to murdering Brooks. She claims to have acted alone, without help from Brenda or Kay. Morse believes most of the details in the letter are true, but all three women participated in the plot.
The detectives are unable to prove Brenda or Kay were involved with Brooks’ murder. Julia dies in hospital.
THE MORE THINGS CHANGE: Julian Mitchell crafts a remarkably faithful adaptation of Dexter’s novel. Kay is upgraded from a cheap whore to a high-class escort, while Morse’s love affair with Kay is reduced to a mild flirtation and some hand-holding. Otherwise, the screenplay wisely adopts the philosophy that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
THE MANY CAMEOS OF COLIN DEXTER: The author sits clutching a pair of crutches at an out-patients’ clinic halfway through the story, when a receptionist calls out Brooks’ name. Dexter responds when she calls out the name Humphreys. Julian Mitchell also makes a cameo appearance, standing directly behind Brenda at the crematorium service for Julia.
DRINK UP, LEWIS: Morse drinks Glenfiddich at home during the title sequence.
The detectives go to a pub where, unusually, they both have a pint of beer. Lewis needs it after hearing his promotion chances are frozen.
They visit another pub later and, again, both have a pint of beer. That’s more alcohol than Lewis has had in years!
Morse has beer while Kay drinks orange juice at a pub in Marsden.
Julia pours Morse some Bell’s whisky. He persuades her to have some.
UNLUCKY IN LOVE: Morse is slightly smitten by Kay, but escapes the heartbreak she brings him in the original novel.
PEOPLE JUST CALL ME MORSE: The inspector is outraged when a Lonsdale College undergraduate phones him for a donation, calling Morse by his Christian name. The inspector tells Kay to just call him Morse.
LEWIS’ KITH AND KIN: The sergeant’s wife has recently acquired an expensive blender. Mrs Lewis doesn’t think dawn is a very social hour, and nor does her husband. The sergeant’s daughter is doing her A-Levels. Lewis says none of his schoolteachers ever talked sense.
SOPHOCLES DID DO IT: Morse wonders if Davies killed McClure and arranged the accidental death of Rodway. The detectives believe Davies may have helped the three women dispose of Brooks, but his alibi is solid.
ONE FOR THE MORGUE: Matthew Rodway dies accidentally after falling from a high window in college. Dr Felix McClure is stabbed to death by Ted Brooks. Brooks is stabbed to death by Julia Stevens. Julia dies of a brain tumour.
MURDERS: two. BODY COUNT: four.
MORSE DECODED: The inspector hates telephone answering machines. He also hates men who hit women.
CRYPTIC CROSSWORDS: Morse works on the Times crossword while waiting for Kay at Oxford railway station.
QUOTE-UNQUOTE: Morse asks Dr Hobson if there is anything he needs to know. ‘Time you had a haircut. And that tie doesn’t go at all with that jacket,’ she quips.
The inspector speculates that Kay is a high-class escort, specialising in foreign clients. He wonders where she is. ‘Off providing services to the European community, I dare say,’ Lewis replies.
Morse believes Lewis is becoming more imaginative: ‘It comes of his long years working with me. Something’s bound to rub off in the end.’
Davies explains why he was too drunk to have helped dispose of Brooks’ body: ‘I wasn’t capable of manhandling a miniature poodle.’
SOUNDTRACK: The prelude to Verdi’s opera La Traviata plays at the beginning of the story, and is repeate
d several times during the episode. At Julia’s funeral, Haydn’s String Quartet No 3 (Opus 74) is heard as her coffin disappears behind the crematorium doors.
BEHIND THE CRIME SCENES: The telephone number to contact Morse or Lewis is Oxford 202-566.
IDENTITY PARADE: Dominic Brunt has spent more than a decade in the soap opera Emmerdale as veterinarian Paddy Kirk. Character actor Benjamin Whitrow featured as Mr Bennet in the BBC’s acclaimed 1995 version of Pride and Prejudice and provided the voice of Fowler for the animated film Chicken Run. Nadim Sawalha makes a brief appearance as Dr Hassan in this story. He’s the father of actress Julia Sawalha, who featured in ‘Last Seen Wearing’.
RATINGS: 14.76 million.
THE VERDICT: ‘The Daughters of Cain’ gets Morse back on track after the excesses of the previous year’s episode. Mitchell adroitly adapts one of Dexter’s cleverer whodunits, with the cast and crew also delivering the goods. This is high-quality Morse, even if the show’s efforts to explain why Lewis is still a detective sergeant are increasingly laboured. Special mention must be made of Clare Holman’s scene-stealing performance as Dr Hobson. It was ever thus with Morse and police pathologists.
DEATH IS NOW MY NEIGHBOUR
‘Talk about death by misadventure...’ Two neighbours are killed within two days as the contest to elect a new Master of Lonsdale College has deadly consequences.
UK TX: 19 November 1997
SCREENPLAY: Julian Mitchell, based on the novel by Colin Dexter
DIRECTOR: Charles Beeson
CAST: Richard Briers (Sir Clixby Bream), Maggie Steed (Angela Storrs), John Shrapnel (Julian Storrs), Roger Allam (Denis Cornford), Mark McGann (Geoffrey Owens), Julia Dalkin (Rachel James), Susan Field (Mrs Adams), Holley Chant (Shelly Cornford), Susan Engel (Dora Hammersby), Lloyd Hutchinson (DC Jackson), Colin MacCormack (Hargreaves), Jacquelyn Yorke (Amber), Ben Caplan (barman), Nicola Jeffries (Diane Cullingham), Ashley Gunstock (porter), Nicholas Lopez (PC Dixon), Margery Bone (maid), David Fennel (Lord Lieutenant), Walter McMonagle (chief constable), Oliver Grig (Lewis’ son), Candida Gubbins (Sarah Hickman)