"There's always a fifty-fifty chance that the man who found the body did the deed..."
This second episode is better than the first: a complex yet logical series of events that furnishes us with the clues quite fairly, with well-rounded characters portrayed by an extraordinary cast of some of this country's finest character actors. Even better, there are a couple of fiendishly clever twists at the end- and the traditional Morse conceit of having our Wagnerian detective make a couple of wrong turns only makes the whole thing more effective.
It's been decades, plural, since I last read the novel, but this seemed like a fairly straight adaptation to me, although with a few extra visual clues slotted in at the start, as would sometimes happen in Granada's Sherlock Holmes. No doubt it's an '80s thing for the ITV franchises which were, of course, still largely in their pre-1991 heyday.
It's also notable how much of Morse's character is by now shaping up- the crosswords are prominent here- and, of course, relevant- as is the Wagner. Morse's attitude to real ale is, of course, eminently civilised. It's good too, and surprising, to see pathologist Max fleshed out a bit. Peter Woodthorpe maks him quite the memorable character.
There's more Oxford architectural porn here, of course, no doubt for the last time. But there's some interestingly dated attitudes here, in a 1987 adaptation of a 1977 novel. Personally, I've never seen Last Tango in Paris, but certainly not out of any prudery; I haven't got around to it, plus I understand the actual making of the film was a bit #MeToo. It's a proper film by a reputable director and I would not, personally, think of it as porn, just a serious film with sex in it.
On the other hand, I hate butter...
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