Jonathan Creek s2 ep1: Danse Macabre

[cloudsinvenice]

"Don't you dare go back to sleep, you lazy sow, now come on! You've got three seconds before the saucepan lid!"

Maddy, Maddy, Maddy. You make so much sense to me. You're the kind of person who can't find the motivation to drag herself out of bed... but can and will build an elaborate Ferris Bueller-esque multilayered alarm system in order to counteract that tendency. One involving crashing saucepan lid sounds. I understand this intimately. I am lucky enough that the phone I have now comes with an alarm that inexplicably includes a very loud sound effect of horses' hooves, but before that... well, if I'd only had the wit to do the saucepan lid thing...

In the middle of Maddy's attempt at a morning routine, the doorbell rings.

ENTER: PETER DAVISON, FOR GREAT JUSTICE. 

R: "It's the Doctor!" 

Me: "It's Campion!" 

I love this man. He just radiates sincere concern. He's one of TV's natural vicars, and indeed he is playing a vicar here. The problem he's brought to Maddy ("I hear you're a collector of mysteries...") centres on his rather trying mother-in-law, a bestselling US horror author and "a lady of rather florid style and ghoulish imagination," who turns out to be not Anne Rice, but Emma Lazarus. She has goth stalkers and writes books about people getting chewed up by lawnmowers in small Arizona towns (sample titles: "Umbilicant"; "Ouija World").

Anyway, last night was Hallowe'en and the good vicar was away being pep-talked by the bishop while his wife and parents-in-law went to a fancy dress party. On their return home, the family and their bodyguard, Richard Branson (or at least it really looks like him), were menaced by a guy in a skeleton costume who killed Emma, then knocked out her daughter Lorna and carried her off at gunpoint. His attempt to make off in the car was foiled when Richard Branson shot the tyres, so he backed into the garage carrying the unconscious Lorna, shutting the door behind him. By the time Vicar Who came home, all was chaos, the police having spent fifteen minutes surrounding the garage, only to discover on opening the door that Lorna was alone, despite there being No Way In Or Out As Is Usual On Jonathan Creek. 

Maddy makes the usual call to Jonathan, and has to fudge things a bit in a doomed attempt to distract Vicar Who from Jonathan's snide remarks on the other end of the phone. She's hoping to play down his necessity to the solution of the mystery, presumably for reasons of both tact and ego. "Bit of a sad character, actually. Ideas man to a conjurer." is her summing-up of Jonathan, which is almost unbearably sad to those of us acquainted with the recent Easter special. :S

We are cheered up by Mrs. Vicar Who, who turns out to be played by PIPPA HAYWOOD FROM THE BRITTAS EMPIRE! So few people remember that show, let alone love it. But it was a triumph of slightly dodgy British 90s sitcoms, a triumph, I say! And the glory of Jonathan Creek is that almost everyone in it has a fine British sitcom/drama/both pedigree. Spotting the actors is one of the little pleasures of the series. 

Anyway, once Jonathan does become involved, he brings his usual mix of competence, eyebrow-raising and mild nervousness at the rest of humanity. Just don't get him in conversation about anything woo: 

"It's prime girly territory isn't it, reincarnation?" And then he goes on about persuasive bollocks and astrology, and the whole patronising spiel just demonstrates how Jonathan has managed to remain free from the encumberances of a girlfriend to date. 

In fairness, he's having a rather hard time in the Adam Klaus part of his life. Adam is dating an opera singer, who it's safe to assume is only bonking Adam because she wants a spot on his stage. Adam is married. Adam's wife is on a business trip. Adam's wife returns from her business trip the morning after a pretty dramatic night before, while Adam and the singer are sharing a bath. Jonathan has unwisely slept over, and as such it is his fate to be forced into the bath with the unruffled opera singer in order to present a squeaky-clean domestic facade. 

JONATHAN, YOU ARE ADAM'S MALE BEARD. LOOK AT YOUR LIFE. LOOK AT YOUR CHOICES. 
 

Given the progression of this series, it is fair to say that Jonathan will look at neither his life nor his choices, but it makes me feel good to shout at him in caps now and then. 

As ever, I won't give away the reveal, but it is glorious and well summed up by the dialogue: "She'd lived her life in Technicolor. How could her death be anything else than gloriously, tastelessly gothic?"

As ever, you can have more shippiness and screencaps over at teylaminh's post: http://teylaminh.livejournal.com/829695.html
 

Comments

[birke]

Peter Davison! I love Peter Davison! To me he's Tristan the feckless veterinary student in All Creatures Great and Small, but I'm sure he's good at everything else, too.

[cloudsinvenice]

How ever did I forget about Tristan?! I used to love that programme when I was a kid. :)