Hammer House of Horror: The Mark of Satan

 "Gentlemen- the brain!"

And so we come to the final episode of Hammer House of Horror- and it may very well be one of the finest, a fascinating (and timely, in 2021 with all these anti-vaxxer nutters), study of an individual who falls way down into the pit of conspiracy theories and magical thinking by way of his obsession with the number nine.

And yet this works so very well as serious drama. It's certainly superbly directed, with the unsettling visual grammar of a horror film, and the cast is equally superb- Peter McEnery is reminiscent of a young John Hurt here, Emrys James steals his scenes as an eccentric surgeon superbly, and Georgina Hale shows all the naturalistic subtlety that made Ken Russell cast her so very often. 

Yet it's the writing that makes this such a triumph. From the plot, to the subject matter- arguably there's nothing supernatural here; the only evil is the fatal temptation of conspiratorial thinking. Even the priest here sees fit to quote from Iron Maiden's favourite bit of the Book of Revelation, a part of the Bible that a large proportion even of Christians seem to think is, well, on drugs. There's a mood of paranoia and claustrophobia throughout, evokes by a perfect marriage of character, direction and dialogue. There's humour, too: Edwyn's mum's last words when stabbed are "Oh dear", while Stella- a surprisingly nuanced and realistic character- responds to his expounding of conspiracy theory nonsense with "Do you take sugar?". 

The series really is ending on a high.

Inspector Morse: Last Seen Wearing

 "You were so keen to have a murder. You should be happy."

One ought to bear in mind that Colin Dexter's novel was written fifteen or so years earlier, but it's striking to see that, in 1988, missing persons cases were dealt with via paper files, and in the case of Valerie Craven the number of files means that Morse, "the three file man", has to be called in. It dates the programme quite as much as the appearance of the London Docklands.

The characterisation of Morse here, while fascinating, may be a bit of a time capsule too, and I shall focus on this rather than commenting on the whodunit: I remember the novel too well, He's presented as a devilishly clever chap who is allowed to behave in shockingly unprofessional ways- extensively drinking on the job, not bothering to look at the files, perving at the private schoolgirls doing PE who he denigrates as "rich and thick", being terribly cynical about the whole thing, even forging a letter to the parents of the missing girl- and getting bollocked by Strange for good measure.

Yet, after the bollocking, he gets results. And continues to be a beer snob, a definite point in his favour. The dialogue, and characterisation, is subtly brilliant here, from Morse to Lewis to Strange to the arrogant gaslighting Phillipson to the cultured, Irish, Yeats-quoting Mrs Craven. This is the subtlest, finest, adaptation yet.

But I fear we are, mostly, to be veering off Colin Dexter's path most of the time from here. Let's hope the quality remains.