Rating: 4.5 stars out of 5
Starring: Lesley Manville, Tim McMullan Conleth Hill, Michael Maloney, Alexandros Logothetis, Daniel Mays, Claire Rushbrook, Jude Hill, Matthew Beard, Pippa Haywood, Ian Lloyd Anderson, Karen Westwood, Dorothy Atkinson, Lorcan Cranitch, Danielle Ryan, Harry Lawtey, Chu Omambala, Karl Collins, Sutara Gayle, Sanjeev Kohli, Paul Tylak, Nathan Clarke, Kate Gilmore, Nathalie Armin
Where to watch: BBC Player
To watch or not to watch: One of the best book adaptations, infact, better than the book. And what a ride this whodunnit is! It is two timelines woven in one and done so perfectly! Must, must watch.
Susan Ryeland (Lesley Manville) is the editor for the bestselling author Alan Conway (Conleth Hill) who writes about a 1950s detective Atticus Pund (Tim McMullan). He has just handed over the manuscript for Magpie Murders, which is his last book in the series, to Susan to be read and edited, but to Susan’s dismay, she finds that the manuscript is missing the last chapter where the detective gathers everyone involved with the case and solves the murder (a Christie pastiche). Now Susan has the disagreeable task to see Alan Conway about it, but on reaching his mansion, she finds that he is dead – whether suicide of murder, remains to be seen. So now Susan not only has to edit the book, she also has to figure out the ending of the book, because what is a detective story without the big reveal? What she finds is interesting – something Anthony Horowitz has cleverly used to depict in the books too – that all the characters in the book are caricatures of the real people around Conway. And all of them hate him for good reason, he is overall a difficult fellow. Susan then navigates through the large pool of suspects to arrive at the truth, which is very satisfactory, to be honest. What we end up getting is a 2-in-1, where the current time Susan is working towards solving the murder in the book which is depicted in real time with Atticus Pund solving it as is written in the book, and inadvertently solving the murder of Alan Conway too.
Anthony Horowitz, who is the writer of the book, has also created and written the screenplay of the series, which made it easier to the seen the vision of the book be replicated with almost perfect honesty on the screen (too bad he couldn’t the same thing to his writing for the Agatha Christie adaptations, but that’s a rant for another day). It is a complicated concept done exceptionally well visually, which is not apparent for the audience because well, it is done well – kind of like when continuously practicing a skill becomes an effortless talent. A lot of the credit for the visual gratification goes to the exceptional editing by Nigel Bunyan and Jamie Pearson. And of course, all this is topped by the lovely, the magnificent Leslie Manville, who has donned a new avatar in this series of a plucky, driven and resourceful Susan Ryeland in the series, so different from other major roles. She has understood the assignment, and made Susan an effortless female lead, without hammering the gender even once, but still bringing the point home. Just Wow!
If the above two paragraphs have missed expressing it, this series an absolute must watch. With only a 6 episode runtime, it is time effective, doesn’t feel dull even for a moment, and delivers the rush and anticipation, without any regerets. The opportunity cost of watching the series will be very low, since there are few things which can rival it. There is another season with Susan Ryeland working in Crete with her boyfriend on a hotel and an English couple come to her for helping finding their daughter who disappeared after reading another Alan Conway books, which is available to watch. The third and final book in the series in up for adaptation as of writing this post, and should be released in a few months. In fact, Leslie Manville personified Susan Ryeland so well that Anthony Horowitz based the third book’s Susan more around Manville’s personality. Horowitz should keep doing the good work. Maybe we see Hawthorne and Horowitz adaptation in coming years.
Nonetheless, this one is not to be missed. Do binge watch over the weekend.