Your Sudden Death Question

Add a couple corpses to the famous campus. In this one a group of bright people, mostly associated in some way with the College, have entered a competition, a quiz contest. A curly haired moderator has promised a 5000 pound prize to the winner. I am quite good at trivia and quizzes, but the questions are about as obtuse as any I've ever encountered. The odd mixture of people seem to know the answers. One in particular knows everything. He doesn't even seem to be trying. Well, it isn't long before he is found dead, but the show goes on. We have a classic whodunnit, with a bevy of suspects confined to a relatively small space. It isn't long before a second one of theirs is strangled. This is a decent episode because we get to knew each participant pretty well. The first victim seemed to have a serious connection to the remaining cast and it is Lewis and Hathaway's jobs to unravel their duplicity. There is also a subplot that relates to Hathaway's classic guitar being stolen from his car. And, the Inspector starts a little romantic encounter with the medical examiner.

Ive just watched this right through for about the 4th time and I still don't can't remember who did or why. That's the epitome of the perfect murder mystery to me. Also included in this episode which helps the story along is an amazing cast of actors and great characters, a favourite being Alan Davies. Love the quiz background as well along with other things afoot. One of the classics.

PS just watched for about the 10th time know and remember who and why now yet I still love watching it, that's how great it is. And so is Alan Davies.

Not a full review, just a correction to an earlier review.

Ava Taylor and Ethan Croft's team is called Nuts, from the National Union of Teachers (NUT), and the town they work in is Reading, not Redding (but it is pronounced redding!)

Also, it's Old Contemptibles, not contemptables.

This is probably one of my favorite episodes. It's Full of very familiar actors, Inspector Sullivan, Alastair MacKenzie of Father Brown and Alan Davies of Jonathan Creek for example. Superintendent Innocent is a bit playful while serious funny. It's great to have an episode that's not centered on some crazy religious fanatical bunch of priests or professors. Sargent Hathaway is keen on so called helping with Inspector Lewis's advancing relationship with Dr Hobson. At least they killed off a man before killing off the pretty girls. It's usually pretty girls eighty percent of the time I believe. Enjoy rewatching it.

When regularly bland Lewis and Hathaway are the most charismatic characters in an episode thats not good. A rare British detective mystery without one standout in and out character. The episode got off to a rocky start and slightly rebounded. The early scene of quiz competitors introducing themselves was reminiscent of a much mocked 90s Levi's jean commercial with the annoying forced fakeness of the personalities.

Alan Plater Lewis scripts so far have one gem and the rest only mediocre to dreadful. The stories rarely produce any stellar suspense or classic characters. Here the red herring out of the blue reveal that a suspect's wife was the assault victim of Croft's was awkward and drew little outrage from Lewis that this was withheld.

Probably the most memorable part of the weak episode was Rebecca Front (Ch. Supt. Innocent) filling out her cute purple dress in multiple scenes. The final scene of Lewis and stunning Clare Holman (Dr. Laura Hobson) was quite awkward and poorly written.