June 3, 2007

"Midsomer Murders" is a British detective series which has been on television since 1997, and is ongoing. One nice thing, besides the stage sets of quaintesque villages and suspicious acting aristocrats is the plotting, which, straining for originality in a genre which has exhausted all the cliches, likes to jolly things up by having the villain turn out to be, really, the last person you would suspect, like the elderly church librarian.

And our focus now is the episode titled "Picture of Innocence" which first aired June 3, 2007.

Eddie Carfax is name of a character in this episode of "Midsomer Murders". He is a photographer who specializes in cats. In this story there is a fierce competition between the traditional photographers and those using digital equipment to create photographs. Eddie Carfax is on the side of the darkroom users. He is played by Adrian Scarborough (May 10, 1968). You have seen Scarborough before, you just did not know his name.

In the American crime drama, you will remember, there must be a murder but the pressure is on, and usually successfully, to rescue a second victim. Midsomer Murders murders go on and on (each show, not the seasons) and lots of folks may die before the detectives find the culprit. Us old lady librarians seem to have a flair for evading detection.

Besides playing into American anglophilia, "Midsomer Murders" presents the village pub in a light we hope is realistic.