Let's be honest here, Midsomer Murders is pure television gold. You don't get to 60 plus full length episodes without there being something really special there and Midsomer Murders is really special. For us Brits it represents a slice of English life that rarely gets an airing on British television. Britain today so woefully politically correct and so woefully apologetic about anything that celebrates Britishness that you rarely get to see this side of Britain outside anything other than an Agatha Christie period piece. There is a Britain like this but it's shunted to the side in favour of television that apes our cousins over the Atlantic. Sharp stylish, flashy television is something the yanks do wonderfully but Britain is hopeless at it. Life here in the UK just isn't quite as fast as in the US and the sooner we accept it and play to our television strengths the better. The BBC must be looking at TV like this, Foyles War and other ITV gems and must be green with envy. For the uninitiated Midsomer Murders is Agatha Christie in the 21st century, it's as if she'd been put in stasis and reheated in the 90's. Twitching curtains, lovely rural scenery, beautiful countryside life but with a dark underbelly that belies the quaint exterior. Yes it's over the top sometimes and if you count the bodies it's a more dangerous area to live than New York or Miami or Las Vegas. Watch it and see a part of English life that is perhaps not rapidly dying but is just not PC enough to appeal to the Guardian/Independent readers here in the UK who feel that every British drama must feature a check list of ethnicities and sexualities...
Review of Midsomer Murders
