The Cozy Mystery List Blog

Cozy Mystery (and Other Favorite) Books, Movies, and TV

Television Mystery Series… What to Start With?… (Part 3)

Back in May I wrote part 2 of this series where I am giving some advice concerning where to begin when looking for Cozy Mystery tv and movies. As I said then, I started out with a pretty long list with just looking for the best television and movies to begin with, so I have ended up with this being a three part series.

As before, the  TV and Movies page on my site is the place where I have listed all the tv and movies that are related to Cozy Mysteries (and some not related) that I have enjoyed. However, as you can see on that page, the list is a bit long and not really organized except by alphabet, so I am trying to whittle it down to those I particularly enjoyed and that are really great examples of the Cozy genre.

This time, the first show I want to talk about is Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple with Joan Hickson. Wow, what a great portrayal of an absolutely classic Cozy character! I wrote about Joan Hickson’s Miss Marple way back in 2008 when this site was still pretty new.

I know a lot of us began reading mysteries with Agatha Christie. She was one of my earliest reads (only coming after a few other youthful favorites such as the Bobbsey Twins). Miss Marple is my favorite Agatha Christie character – I think her clever solving of crimes by using the way she can compare people to various characters she has known in St Mary Mead is sensational. Her unassuming personality combined with her super sharp wit, makes her a great adversary for criminals!

I know there have been other great actresses who have portrayed Miss Marple >>> and I have seen them all >>> but Joan Hickson just does it best for me. The series with her is a bit old and is lacking today’s production standards (no HD here) but I love the shows anyway. This is one of the few Cozy series that I have re-watched more than twice.

The next series that I am recommending if you haven’t seen them is the Inspector Alleyn Mysteries. This is another series that I wrote about way-back-when. This series stars the delightful Patrick Malahide. Although it may be a bit hard to acquire some of the episodes of this series, it is very much worth seeking them out. Ngaio Marsh, one of the classic authors in the golden age of mysteries who is known as one of the Golden Age’s Queens of Crime, created a classic character with police Inspector Roderick Alleyn. The tv series is a bit old as well, but I think it holds up pretty well. This is a good example of British detective series with a very sharp upper-crust main sleuth.

The last series that I am going to mention this time as a good series to see if you haven’t already is The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency . Based on Alexander McCall Smith’s book series with the same title, I found this tv series to be a delightful adaptation of the wonderful stories set in Botswana featuring the sage Mma Ramotswe (Precious) and her slightly kooky sidekick Mma Makutsi (Grace). I wrote an entry about this series back in 2011. Just as with the books, these stories have a very light mystery plot, but are instead focused on the characters of the sleuths and their interactions with many other interesting  people. Again, these shows are worth looking for.

If you’ve got any other suggestions for great Cozy Mystery TV or movie series to start with, please be sure to leave them in the comments below!

Comments

  2. I love the Murdoch Mysteries, set in Toronto at the turn of the century and the Miss Fisher series about a 1920’s free spirited detective who works with the police. Both are available from Netflix. If you love all British mysteries, you can stream Acorn which carries these and more.

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  3. I just bought the Joan Hickson Miss Marple series. I love watching these shows. I recently binged on the other series of Miss Marple with Geraldine McEwan and Julia MacKenzie. Not as fond of Ms. McEwan–seemed meaner that the Miss Marple I pictured, but still was fun to indulge in all these episodes (they were available on Acorn).

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  4. I love Miss Marple, and am completely unashamed to say that my favorite shopping coup this summer was an entire collection of all seasons of Murder She Wrote and Gilmore Girls on DVD for $20! Gilmore Girls doesn’t have the mystery element, but I love the characters and the witty writing 🙂

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  5. Danna, in case no one has mentioned this already, I recently re-bought the entire Joan Hickson/Miss Marple set, this time on BluRay and I don’t even have a BluRay player yet! I do believe from the description that they’ve been remastered in HD for BluRay. I had the VHS tapes, then replaced those with the DVDs but, you’re right, the quality of the old films even on DVD felt ancient. I can’t attest to the BluRay quality (maybe someone else can) but I look forward to viewing them once I enter the technological 21st century. LOL 🙂

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  7. Philip Marlowe Private Eye starring Powers Boothe is faithful & accurate description of the short stories. HBO video.

    Nero Wolfe Private eye Timothy Hutton & Maury Chaykin excellent adaptions of the novels & short stories.

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  9. Midsomer Murders, based on the characters from the books of Caroline Graham. These are very well done contemporary English village mysteries. Fun and excentric characters.

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  10. Agatha Raisin is available to watch on Amazon TV right now – lots of fun and the people playing the characters are very appealing.

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  11. It’s amazing that Midsommer Murders has so many series when there were only seven books. They definitely capture the writing of Caroline Graham. I love Murdoch Mysteries, and No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. Jill Scott was perfectly cast. Others I can think of are Inspector Lewis and George Gently.
    Ann

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  12. I also began with Agatha Christie and out of the 30 to 40 books I read only once did I guess the killer.

    I also recommend the Doyle and Houdini mysteries that were shown on Fox this spring and early summer. The mysteries were great and you got to meet The Great Houdini and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
    They were well done.

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  13. The ones mentioned are indeed marvelous. For a 21st century delight, go to MHZ channel, 372 on Comcast. Running at 8 or9 pm CDT & then repeated, all mysteries are subtitled in English. Montalbano series are based on mysteries by Camilleri. The Brunetti series based on Donna Leon’s mysteries is numerous unofficial with us. Add “Fruit of the Vine,” “Don Matteo, & Inspector Rex, which features a Vienna see German Shepherd!

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