Night of the Headless Horseman

Socially inept Thom Bray a poetry teacher at a boy's country day school invites fellow writer Jessica Fletcher to the school as a guest lecturer. What he tells when she arrives is that he has told everyone including stuffy schoolmaster Fritz Weaver that Angela Lansbury is his mother. A bit mortified Lansbury goes along with the lie.

That turns out to be a bad move when the school's womanizing riding instructor Barry Williams is killed, in fact decapitated. When Bray and Lansbury fess up to that lie, the sheriff Doug McClure isn't inclined to believe Bray is innocent of murder. In fact there was a public humiliation of Bray by Williams earlier.

But someone like Williams is going to have a host of people wanting to do him in. A little investigating and you know Jessica Fletcher will solve it.

Personally one look at Bray and you know he's not capable of murder.

I think I've seen virtually every episode of Murder She Wrote multiple times because it's charming, I love Angela Lansbury and it's an easy watch in the background when you're doing something else lol. But the one thing that always cracks me up about this episode is when Dorian introduces Jessica as his mother and the professor says, "Aren't you a little young to be Dorian's mother?" And I'm like, what is he talking about? She's clearly like decades older than him. So I checked Angela's birth year and the actor playing Dorian's birth year - and yep she was 30 years older than him! 🤣 Not too young to be his mother at all. Idk why they put that line in there, maybe because Angela thought she looked too young to be his mom -- which only makes me love her more. Lol.

Wenton, Vermont, maintains its rural Colonial charm from its railroad depot to its old-fashioned inn, from its stables to its covered bridge, from its proclivity to costuming to its conforming school for boys, Wenton Academy.

It is into this nostalgic community which poet Dorian Beecher (Thom Bray) accepts a teaching position. to succeed the late Gretchen Van Stotter, who perished from a mysterious accident one year prior to the action of this episode.

Gretchen's father, Dorn Van Stotter (Guy Stockwell), serves as Stablemaster at Wenton Academy, under the supervision of proprietor Edwin Dupont (Fritz Weaver) and Administrator Charlotte Newcastle (Hope Lange), who soon begin to encounter an investigation over swindled funds.

Gretchen's fiancé at the time of her passing, Dentist Penn 'Doc' Walker (Charles Siebert), welcomes Mrs. Beecher, Dorian's "mother" upon her arrival to Wenton. It seems that Dorian has become serious with Sarah Dupont (Karlene Crockett), daughter of the stern Edwin Dupont, and needs someone kindly to present. And so, when he invites his former teacher Jessica Fletcher (Angela Lansbury), he doesn't relate the entire story.

Waitress Bobbie (Judy Landers) tends to serving Jessica and Dorian, as they gather at the Inn with Doctor Penn Walker, but festivities are interrupted by town bully Nate Findley (Barry Williams), who picks a fight with Dorian, who grabs a sword from the wall, but is interrupted by the entrance of Sheriff Sam Rankin (Doug McClure) and his assistants Deputy (Gary Pagett) and Uniformed Policeman (Tom Ohmer) when a brawl breaks out.

Those credited as 1st Man (Sanford Clark), 2nd Man (Forry Smith), 3rd Man (John England) and 4th Man (Brad Zerbst) appear at the mêlée and afterward, as they toss the sword from their truck upon finding Dorian by the creek. However, three of the combination are seen in either scene.

Because it happens to be a three-day autumn holiday at Wenton Academy, most of its pupils have left campus, with the exception of Todd Carrier (Donald Thompson), Robert (Brandon Douglas) and Brendan (Adam Ferris), who seem to enjoy the stable to the degree of founding a clubhouse upon its loft. They also seem to enjoy sleuthing around corners, and through the window of the loft.

So, on the "Night of the Headless Horseman," when a murder thickens the plot of romance from a distance, Dorian enlists Jessica to achieve "Poetic Justice."

"Night of the Headless Horseman" is a very odd episode...and very atypical for this show. It's obviously HEAVILY inspired by Washington Irving's story, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and at first I thought is was more tongue in cheek...a funny parody. But as I watched, I saw there were tons of parallels but it wasn't as funny as it should have been. Additionally, it is extremely odd that the episode did not air around Halloween but in the winter!

A goofy Ichabod Crane-like guy, Dorian, is in pretty much the same situation as the character from the Irving tale. Jessica Fletcher has been invited to see him at the Wenton Academy...and for no reason that made sense, Dorian has told everyone that Ms. Fletcher is his mother...not a famous novelist. What follows is a beheading and folks assuming Dorian did it because he was tormented just like Crane was in the original story.

I think this episode really missed the mark. Making it SO similar to the story only would have worked well had they made it more comedic. Instead, it's neither fish nor fowl...not really funny but not really serious either. I personally did not love the episode.

Dorian Beecher is a very talented poet, an amiable chap, who is haunted the headless horseman, who terrorises him late at night, a cloaked figure, who clutches a pumpkin, but appears to have no head. Dorian believes he knows the identity of the horseman, a local bully boy who. Jessica is on hand to help.

I can forgive this episode its minor faults, so Dorian isn't exactly overly appealing, not particularly a passionate individual, but this is actually a rather good episode, the story is excellent, I love the Gothic overtones, a cloaked figure terrorising our protagonist, it is really smart. The visuals are excellent, they made full use of the storyline. Nice touches of humour, Jessica's disbelief at Dorian's lie, plus a really interesting conclusion make this one of my favourite episodes in the third series. 9/10