Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Neil Dudgeon, Nick Hendrix, Fiona Dolman, Annette Badland, Louise Jameson, Maimie McCoy, Mark Williams, Siobhan Redmond, Poppy Gilbert, Mollie Harris, Ferdinand Kingsley, Kojo Attah, Brian Bovell, Lee Byford, Kadell Herida, Ruth Horrocks, Sinead Matthews, Mat McCooey.
Every village has its myth, its local legend, and if doesn’t then it should take a leaf out of the playbook of the long running and popular series, Midsomer Murders.
Some might say that if the quaint British village has nothing to offer the visitors that may pass by on the road, then in today’s celebrity and personality driven world they may as well close shop and be doomed to the annals of history, even if they have to invent and contrive a legend, then surely people will travel there just to say they have experienced the ghoulish delight on offer.
Tradition though persists, and so it is to the ritual and institution of Inspector Barnaby and the officers of Midsomer Constabulary that The Wolf Hunter of Little Worthy gains its notoriety, and once more it is to the secrets of the past that hunt down the villagers in such a way that leaves its mark on the viewer.
Originality in the pursuit of murder has always been the selling point of Midsomer Murders, the mark of death always finding a new way to be delivered, and whilst the reasons for the killing may overlap, depending on the rage and anger felt by the one who feels it is their mission to restore balance around them by exacting revenge, it is the subject of delivery which has created its own mythos surrounding the much-loved British detective drama.
The Wolf Hunter of Little Worthy is no different, the cause of the offence may be shrouded in the coldness of human experience, but it is the mode in which the murders are exacted which gives this instalment of habitual murder its gruesome and appealing presentation.
The legend of the wolf hunter owes in part to the phenomenon of the abandoned child that has engrained itself into literature and historical folk lore for generations, and it is one that the episode hangs itself upon for inspection with ease. After all there is something that still gets underneath the bare skin of any human when they hear the mournful cry of the wolf, the beast that is no longer native to this land, somehow still able to strike fear into the heart of anyone wanting to walk the woods at midnight.
Whilst it may be bad form to describe any episode of the programme as entertaining, The Wolf Hunter of Little Worthy errs splendidly to that end, one of high mischief in the cautionary tale, and even in the reveal there is much to sympathise with the plight of the families affected by the price of progress and the damage of outdated belief.
An episode that highlights just how good Midsomer Murders can be when it allows itself to veer slightly off the beaten track, The Wolf Hunter of Little Worthy taps into the psychology of many an issue of human relationships with nature and the effect of loss.
Ian D. Hall