The Murder Room - Part 1

The book was set in 2003 so why push it back to the 70s ? These are lavish adoptions but in my humble a grave error not to do the books in order as the lead characters change so much over the decades which the writers have utterly failed to acknowledge...and while I like Bertie Cavill in this part he brings out that Adam is very stylish and elegant both physically and mentally he suffers from not being able to move him along including his later and slowly drawn out love interests ...yup na Martin Shaw in comparison utterly nailed bringing to life the written word ..also the writers totally managed the plot !

When the Murder Room was televised by the BBC almost 20 years ago starring Martin Shaw. I noted that the adaptation was disappointing. My biggest issue was Shaw's Dalgliesh was just a generic detective.

This one was more like it. The Dupayne Museum is a small private museum with its own murder room with exhibits from real life criminal cases.

Neville Dupayne is one of the trustees and a NHS psychiatrist. He is at odds with his brother Marcus and sister Caroline about renewing the lease for the museum to keep it open.

Later that night his body is found inside a burning car by the housekeeper Tally Clutton who was knocked off her bike earlier on.

DS Daniel Tarrant thinks the gardener, Ryan is the killer. Maybe egged on by the housekeeper to save their jobs and prevent the museum from shutting.

Dalgliesh suddenly finds himself under pressure from the top. Leading him to think that someone has something to hide. He also needs to consider his own future after being nominated for a literary prize.

Interestingly The Murder Room was published in 2003, so the Shaw version was set in the present day. It works just as well in the period mid 1970s setting. It actually gives it more atmosphere.

Aided with two deaths that mimic those in the murder room. Once again Tarrant draws the short straw as the clothead. It is Dalgliesh and Miskin who are more nuanced.

This episode is okish as a TV show, but it doesn't feel true to the time setting plus an important ongoing character in not present. I was expecting such an omission though as this TV series is not following the order of the books (The Murder Room is one of the later stories, but only the 6th in this run). Obviously that makes any recurring characters is problematic, especially when the novel they are introduced hasn't been part of this run (so far?)! Despite being out of sequence with the books, it does follow on slightly from the previous TV two-parter, so you do need to watch it in the broadcast order.

Doctor Neville Dupayne is killed in quite brutal fashion, soon after his brother Marcus and sister Caroline failed to convince him to renew the lease on the family's museum. DS Miskin is still coming to terms with the shooting.

Interesting choice, to have this much later book at this stage in the run, but when you consider the quality of source material, these great books can easily be changed to fit a different time.

Lots of changes to the original story, I feel they the focus was quite deliberately changed, but on the whole it works quite well.

Very atmospheric, it definitely has that Endeavour vibe to it, it looks marvellous, it's a gorgeous production, maybe not as good as the first two from this series, but still a very fine watch.

Father Brown fans learned why Mrs McCarthy had vanished from Kembleford, a fine cast here including Cusack, Anastasia Hille and Sylvester Le Touzel were both very good.

Despite the book being quite heavily changed, I really rather enjoyed it.

8/10.