Atticus Finch, Donald Trump, and Dragons

“It’s like being a caterpillar in a cocoon, that’s what it is,” [Jem] said. “Like somethin’ asleep wrapped up in a warm place.”
~Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

There have been times in my life that I thought a fire-breathing dragon would be the best thing that could happen to my hometown. At a young age, I was more ambitious, desiring outright invasion, nuclear war, or perhaps a nice plague, just to shake things up. Of course, my conception of these disasters remained mostly in the abstract, literary plane. Once North Korean nukes had eradicated all the cities (not much of a loss), we Appalachians would be left to survive by our wits and discover adventure apart from the conveniences of civilization (think Red Dawn, but with Southern accents). What I really wanted was for someone to take our sleepy, complacent town by the scruff of the neck and shove its face in reality.

Vera Series 4 - Death of a Family Man - Episode Review

My review of the previous episode: The Deer Hunters.

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.
My review of the third season of Vera.

Despite the frightening title, Joe’s final episode doesn’t really focus on him. The most interesting change in dynamic comes from Robert Glenister’s Owen Preece, who is guesting as a rival and possible love interest for Vera. The latter half of that sentence doesn’t quite work. It’s certainly interesting to see the sparks fly when Vera encounters another authority figure (unlike Morse or comparable detective heroes, Vera has never embraced the underdog, anti-authoritarian hero storyline), but any romantic chemistry is firmly in Joe’s (and Celine’s) imagination.

Vera Series 6 - The Sea Glass - Episode Review

My review of the previous episode: The Moth Catcher

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.
My review of the third season of Vera.
My reviews of the fourth season of Vera.
My reviews of the fifth season of Vera.

Vera has spent plenty of time around the ocean, so I suppose it was inevitable that an episode finally move the investigation off-shore. Vera even gets to strap on a life-jacket and head to sea - surely, one for the memoirs.

The body is that of Tom Stonnell, and it's dredged up with a load of fish by a group of very alarmed trawlermen. It's uncertain whether the bloody wound to his head was an accident or a deliberate attack, but it's certainly suspicious enough that Vera can cackle delightedly - she has a murdah, pet.

Vera Series 4 - The Deer Hunters - Episode Review

My review of the previous episode: Protected.

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.
My review of the third season of Vera.

British detectives - as a class - tend to be aristocratic and city-based (from Wimsey to Holmes). True, there’s the occasional working class plodder - Lewis and Frost, for example - but Vera’s the first detective I’ve encountered with her feet firmly in the country earth (photographed incredibly, in what, I think, is the first use of drones filming Vera). Poor citified Joe looks pained as she scoops up a handful of animal droppings and smells them deeply. They’ve just discovered a body - and the droppings tell Vera they should be looking for poachers.

Vera Series 6 - The Moth Catcher - Episode Review

My review of the previous episode: Tuesday's Child.

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.
My review of the third season of Vera.
My reviews of the fourth season of Vera.
My reviews of the fifth season of Vera.

This is the second time this season Vera has employed the imagery of a girl running in the darkness - this time inter-cut with images of a glowing pyramid full of moths. Investigating the hit-and-run death of the girl, Alex Gartside, Vera and Aiden stumble onto a setting a bit out of their usual oeuvre of rugged plains and modern architecture: a stately home. As Vera's commented before, if it's a stately homes, there's always been a murder - and sure enough, Vera and Aiden stumble across another body - this one male.

Valentines for Nerds

Valentine's Day has arrived - the central day of the romantic year. It's the day we commemorate the death of St. Valentine, a Roman priest who (probably) got in trouble for marrying Christian couples in the reign of Claudius Gothicus in the 200s. Failing to convert the Emperor, he was then beaten to death and beheaded (still a better love story than Twilight).

Vera Series 4 - Protected - Episode Review

My review of the previous episode: On Harbour Street.

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.
My review of the third season of Vera.

This episode begins with somewhat of a repeat of the season 3 finale’s trick opening - a gaggle of glamorous girls are dancing on the beach, observed by a sleazy looking guy. One of the girls is separated from the others. Walking alone in the darkness, she stumbles. It’s the body of the watcher - he’s been bludgeoned to death. The man, not the woman, was the prey.

What's Up With Me - 2015/2016

I've been so busy that the only time I update this blog is usually for whatever British detective show I'm reviewing at the moment. I'm hoping to change that with a few non-detection-related posts coming down the pipe. These last four or five months have been absolutely crazy. Among the things that have happened:

• I had an article on Twin Peaks and The X-Files published in The Weekly Standard. You know, published. Like, in an actual magazine. A magazine I read when I was a kid. I still can't quite believe that it happened.

• Since November, I've been writing on a semi-weekly basis for Summit Ministries. Among the things I've written about: China's two-child policy, Henry V and Agincourt, the terror attacks in Paris, Advent, Pearl Harbor, prayer, civil disobedience, and The X-Files. 

• On the first of the year, I was, through no virtue of my own, in an award-winning photograph, taken by my incredible sister, Sarah.

• I wrote an article on The Lord of the Rings for the good folks over at Torrey Gazette. It's probably the closest thing I have to a spiritual testimony.

• We've been keeping up with the podcast, and have added a new guest star to a vlog series, Mamaw Reviews: June Long. We've covered The Return of the King and Star Wars: A New Hope, so far, and as soon as sickness and snow abate, we'll be moving on to the rest of a galaxy far, far away.

• I've been watching a lot of The X-Files (and contemplating a Best Of list, though this would probably be of interest only to myself) as my various social media timelines will attest, but an even better show (if, like me, you love British TV, Brenda Blethyn, and murder mysteries) that I've kept quiet about: Vera. I've been reviewing it, and you can watch the first three seasons here for free.

• As usual, my reviews of Endeavour are my top-performing posts, shooting this blog's usual three or four thousand pageviews per month up to around sixteen thousand. The season was a bit uneven, but still very entertaining. Read my reviews here, but first, watch Inspector Morse.

• Bonus: we've been discovering the wonderfulness of silent movies. Here's one to watch. And you should. Because it's great, and funny, and there are awesome stunts.

Longish

Vera Series 6 - Tuesday's Child - Episode Review

My review of the previous episode: Dark Road.

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.
My review of the third season of Vera.
My reviews of the fourth season of Vera. 
My reviews of the fifth season of Vera.

When two teenage boys stumble into a cave, they have little idea that they're about to discover a body. Wrapped in plastic, it turns out to be the corpse of Jamie Thorne, a young man estranged from his family. Over Christmas, he'd stayed with Reverend George Haleford and his family, while working at Pevensey's fair, a local carnival, which provides a colorful setting for this episode of Vera.

Vera Series 6 - Dark Road - Episode Review

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.
My review of the third season of Vera.
My reviews of the fourth season of Vera. 
My reviews of the fifth season of Vera.

Bleak but gorgeous moors? Crows? A crowded pub? A girl running alone in the dark? No depressed Swedish detective in evidence? Must be Vera, and so it is. The girl in particular had just discovered the body of a woman, Anne Marie Richards, left in the wilderness for two weeks.

Marcus the Pathologist, who's looking rather older, hesitantly diagnoses a violent death. She'd been scheduled to have supper with her two daughters several weeks ago. A history of drugs and desertion meant they weren't particularly surprised when she was a no-show. But is that the only reason they refused to seek her out? Could they be responsible for her disappearance?

Vera Series 4 - On Harbour Street - Episode Review

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.
My review of the third season of Vera.

So: the first episode of series 4 finds Joe and his suddenly older daughter, (played by a different actress, Olivia Armstrong) Jessie, boarding the train after church. Among the crowd is Margaret Kraszewski, a do-gooder that the camera’s lingering gaze implies is not long for this world. Sure enough, when the crowd vacates the car, Jessie finds the old woman dead - stabbed in her lower back.

Vera - Series 3 - Review

My review of the first season of Vera.
My review of the second season of Vera.

Vera - Series 2 - Review

 My review of the first season of Vera.