Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * *
Cast: Samantha Bond, Jo Martin, Cara Horgan, Natalie Dew, Hollie Dempsey, Phil Langhorne, Tijan Sarr, Niall Costigan, Ella Kenion, Rita Tushingham, Sophia Ally, Ian Barritt, Amelia Valentina Pankhania, Ethan Quinn, Tegan Imani, Lizzie Roper, Emily Bevan, Raphael Akuwudike, Sam Janus, Abigail Cruttenden, Caroline Langrishe, Nina Sosanya, William Willoughby, Hugh Quarshie, Dominic Mafham.
A second season of The Marlow Murder Club was always on the cards, but sometimes popular doesn’t always reach into the depths of the crime that begs to be solved by the armchair detective; sometimes the presented piece is too warm, too cosy to be anything other than a distraction offered with the best intentions of drama.
It is though to the best intentions that the drama itself does thrive and as the three tales of Middle England and home counties murder weaves its way through the picturesque setting that captures the eye of the public subscribing to the belief from abroad that crime in Britain is a state of gentility, so the understanding that we must have a varying degree of insight in how the worst examples of human offences are solved.
The three tales involving the investigative trio of Judith Potts, Suzie Harris, and Becks Starling, local women to whom have keenly ingratiated themselves into the process of justice, are almost entirely what the viewer would expect, almost typically British, almost stereotypical allusions of what certain parts of the world demand from the genre, the beautiful setting, the sense of refinement, of headlines over crumpets and pots of tea…and whilst modern day Britain, especially its crime, is a far cry from the world initially inhabited by the great female amateur detective Ms. Marple, the sense of murder as a construct still exists.
From the country house/locked room mystery, the impossible murder location, and the vagueness of the enigmatic themes of the British obsession of sailing, The Marlow Murder Club circles the edge of the acceptable face of homicide, indeed it gives it an air of tranquil comfort, not so much restoring justice, but giving it a face that is unperturbed by the experience.
The three main leads of Samatha Bond, Jo Martin, and Cara Horgan keep the narrative flowing, however, and due to its premise of being an ensemble, the need for sharing the limelight of solving the mystery often detracts from the mystique of the crime; and this itself adds another issue, another dilemma for the viewer to conquer, that the peril is almost non-existent, there is no problem that as a group that cannot be overcome; and for that it lacks intensity and true drama.
A series that maintains its level but is far from complex or demanding; a gentle stroll through the sedateness of the most heinous of acts, The Marlow Murder Club is the crime drama of the pragmatic and polite countryside.
Ian D. Hall