"You'll never get on if you can't master your subjunctives, Lewis."
TV Review: 'Lewis' - ITV1 - 9.00pm - 11.00pm Sunday 29 January 2006
It is not often that I tune into the light channel nowadays, unless it be for the purposes of UEFA Champions League football, but the McQuillan TV was enthusiastically put on to '3' last night for this Inspector Morse spin-off. Here indeed was 'Morse without Morse'. Kevin Whately (apparently a 'favourite' of 'housewives') revisited his role as Lewis, now promoted to the rank of Detective Inspector. He spent the first 45 minutes or so dressed like the man from Del Monte, and his assistant looked rather like Peter Crouch to me, but I digress.
All the usual Morse ingredients were there: Scenic Oxford, bells, an inconsiderate and intellectually inferior boss (called 'Innocent', which I thought was a name for Popes, not policewomen) and multiple deaths. Colin Dexter's books, and the TV films inspired by them, seemingly give Oxford a higher murder rate than New York and Baghdad combined. The writers even made Lewis a widower, allowing him to qualify for a minor sub-plot where he was pursued by a frisky scientist. I counted five corpses in total in last night's episode - and the culprit was, almost inevitably, a devilish don, as the murderers in Morse invariably are. The programme missed the Morse character, of course, and John Thaw's masterful portrayal of him. No real ale, no Wagner, no allusions to Greek mythology, no attracting women half his age with his super brain, and yet still failing to 'pull' them. And yet this was a pleasant enough reminder of those halcyon days, when British TV was still the best in the world, and not full of 'reality' shows, and programmes showing people decorating their houses. Message ends.
The murdering don inspired me to make a list of famous 'Dons'.
Don McLean
Don Howe
Don Juan
4 comments:
Brilliant commentary, my dear fellow. (Never mind that I am ignorant of more than several of your references!)
Congratulations on your utilization of a favorite word of mine, "halcyon." I am almost certain I injected it into one of my poetic works of yesteryear, many of which you are familiar with!
Don't forget Don Quixote, Don Mattingly (an American baseball player) and Don Keys.
Overseas readers may be interested to learn that an annotated version of my Blog is soon to be published by Whiggamore and Periwinkle Press (London) and will be available from all good book stores priced 12 Guineas and online at Andes.com
A publishing house that includes in its title one of my favorite hues certainly deserves my business.
I await the annotated version of your blog with frenetic anticipation. Of course, this now means I must acquire Paypal in order to convert my American dollars. I ran out of Guineas approximately three years when I purchased a bust of Prince Charles at a London flea market.
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