Growing up, few things were more cherished by me and my sister than Sunday nights at our grandparents. We had ice cream and sat in the living room and watched Murder, She Wrote with almost religious fervor. There are a few shows that bring that kind of instant nostalgia related to my grandparents - All in the Family, Magnum P.I., Father Dowling Mysteries, Diagnosis Murder, Matlock, The Three Stooges, Golden Girls - but Murder, She Wrote is the one we all watched as a family.
Murder, She Wrote is the ongoing tale of Jessica Beatrice ("J.B.") Fletcher, a retired widow who takes up writing mystery novels as a hobby and is surprised to see them become huge bestsellers. She lives in Cabot Cove, Maine, and a running joke among fans is that over the run of the show it becomes the deadliest city in America - 274 murders! Although many episodes are centered in Cabot Cove, she also travels all over the country and possibly the world (my memory on that is hazy).
Due to her natural keen instinct for murders and mysteries, Jessica commonly finds herself drawn into murder investigations everywhere she goes - sometimes as a suspect! And, of course, despite being an amateur (more or less), she inevitably solves the murders or strongly guides the police to the right suspect.
The show ran for 12 seasons, and featured a cornucopia of guest cameos. In this age of binge watching TV, I've decided to watch the entire run of 264 episodes and review them here. I did this once with I Love Lucy, and someday I want to do it with M*A*S*H. But for this blog: MURDER, SHE WROTE!
Episode 1+2: The Murder of Sherlock Holmes
The first episode is a two-parter, and introduces the plot - Jessica Fletcher is a retired English teacher who lives in a very charming little house right on the Maine coast, and has a deep and abiding interest in solving mysteries. She gets a call from her nephew Grady in New York, who has submitted one of her manuscripts to a publisher without her knowledge - and it's been accepted!
When her newly published book takes off and becomes a best-seller, she is flown to New York to meet with her publisher, a charming but preoccupied man. He invites Jessica to a costume party - she is the fairy godmother from Cinderella, and her publisher host dresses as Sherlock Holmes. But the next morning all hell breaks loose when someone dressed as Sherlock Holmes is found drowned in the pool out back. Who is it? Who killed them - and why?
The very first episode showcases both the virtues and vices of the show: the murders are juicy and surprisingly gritty, there is a surprising amount of sex tension and simmering hatreds among the various suspects, and it's fun to watch Jessica go into full Agatha Christie mode and dissect everyone's motives and opportunities with ruthless accuracy.
But there are downsides... the show really throws a lot of suspects at you in a short time, and it's often hard to keep track of who is who, and keep tabs on the ever-shifting array of clues. You really have to pay full attention, which leads to another issue: the show is really quite long at a full hour. This first episode doubles the problem, since it's a two-parter.
The length allows Murder, She Wrote to build atmosphere and throw in a lot of color and character building scenes, but also makes it all too easy to mentally check out for a minute or two when things slow down. But beware - the moment you stop focusing on things, the show is guaranteed to throw several curveballs and a knuckleball right at you, and you'll find yourself wondering "When did HE die?" or "Wait, she wasn't stabbed but was poisoned?!" etc.
The first episode is a very solid introduction to the show, the way it operates and the general atmosphere - which is entirely, thoroughly soaked in the 1980s.
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