Midsomer Murders: The Electric Vendetta is set in Midsomer Parva where Sir Harry Chatwyn (John Woodvine) owns a farm, one day while out shooting partridge's he finds the dead body of hardened London criminal Ronald Stokes in a crop circle in one of his wheat fields. DCI Tom Barnaby & Sgt. Gavin Troy (Daniel Casey) are on the case, Stokes was found naked with a tuft of hair shaven off the back of his head & two small puncture wounds at the base of his spine which according to local Ufologist Lloyd Kirby (Kenneth Colley) points to extra terrestrial activity. The autopsy reveals Stokes died from being electrocuted but why place the body in a crop circle & why make it look like alien abduction? Then that night another body turns up in a crop circle bearing all the marks of extra terrestrial activity, that of Eddie Fields a local petty criminal. What's the connection? Is there one? Are these deaths the result of aliens or are the culprits closer to home? Barnaby has to figure it out & get to truth...
Episode 3 from season 4 this Midsomer Murders mystery was directed by Peter Smith & one has to say that for my money The Electric Vendetta is probably the worst Midsomer Murders episode to date that I have seen, from the pure brilliance of the previous episode Destroying Angel (2001) to the mess that is this The Electric Vendetta it's a huge contrast. The script by Terry Hodgkinson goes into The X-Files (1993 - 2002) territory basing a lot of it's plot around crop circles & starts off quite brightly with Barnaby having to solve some deaths that point to alien activity, the two bodies found in the crop circles with identical marks having both been electrocuted is a nice hook & to be fair to it the episode only really falls apart towards the end when the body of Lloyd Kirby is found. For a start why did the killer place Kirby in a crop circle? They were going to fly to Amsterdam the next day so why draw attention to yourself? Just hide the body where no-one will find it for at least a day or two & by the time it is found they would have been in Amsterdam living off some tasty profits from stolen gear. It just didn't sit well with me at all & the body wasn't marked like the previous two anyway so what were they trying to achieve exactly? Then there's the infamous production goof in which the body of Eddie Fields is never explained other than he was electrocuted trying to steal electricity for a run down foundry from power cables which is fine but it's never explained who put the body in the crop circle, who made the marks or even how they knew what marks to make on his body & he is completely forgotten about. John Neetles has said in interviews that the explanation was lost in an editing mistake which is doesn't really cut it for me. You can't have a multiple murder mystery & leave one of the death's unsolved especially in such bizarre circumstances. Did no-one actually not watch The Electric Vendetta before it was aired & pick up on this glaring error? Also the endings a bit rubbish, did Troy catch Sally Boulter? What was she charged with? Did she admit it or not? It's a shame because otherwise it's a pretty good episode for the first 70 odd minutes with the usual absorbing plot & I liked how different people were responsible for each of the death's.
During The Electric Vendetta Barnaby & Troy break into a house to search it but can't leave because it's all wired up with electricity, I'm not being funny but that's an illegal search & constitutes breaking & entering. If the owner of the house had made a fuss Barnaby & Troy would have almost certainly lost their jobs because technically they broke the law & you can't have the police breaking the law can you. As usual this looks the business, the real life village of Stanton St. John in Oxfordshire was used as the location of Midsomer Parva. There are four death's in The Electric Vendetta with none being particularly graphic & only one going unexplained. This episode also sees some horrible CGI computer effects as Steve is electrocuted & there's a nice Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1979) homage with lots of floating bright white lights in the sky which turn out to be a combine harvester! The acting is strong as always & Amanda Mealing who plays Sally Boulter is as nice to look at as the picturesque scenery.
The Electric Vendetta is maybe my least favourite Midsomer Murders episode because of a really poor ending which doesn't offer as much closure as it should & a body which is never adequately explained & considering this is meant to be a murder mystery surely that's unforgivable. Having said that The Electric Vendetta is three & a half seasons into Midsomer Murders & so far it's been the only really bad episode which isn't bad going at all.
Episode 3 from season 4 this Midsomer Murders mystery was directed by Peter Smith & one has to say that for my money The Electric Vendetta is probably the worst Midsomer Murders episode to date that I have seen, from the pure brilliance of the previous episode Destroying Angel (2001) to the mess that is this The Electric Vendetta it's a huge contrast. The script by Terry Hodgkinson goes into The X-Files (1993 - 2002) territory basing a lot of it's plot around crop circles & starts off quite brightly with Barnaby having to solve some deaths that point to alien activity, the two bodies found in the crop circles with identical marks having both been electrocuted is a nice hook & to be fair to it the episode only really falls apart towards the end when the body of Lloyd Kirby is found. For a start why did the killer place Kirby in a crop circle? They were going to fly to Amsterdam the next day so why draw attention to yourself? Just hide the body where no-one will find it for at least a day or two & by the time it is found they would have been in Amsterdam living off some tasty profits from stolen gear. It just didn't sit well with me at all & the body wasn't marked like the previous two anyway so what were they trying to achieve exactly? Then there's the infamous production goof in which the body of Eddie Fields is never explained other than he was electrocuted trying to steal electricity for a run down foundry from power cables which is fine but it's never explained who put the body in the crop circle, who made the marks or even how they knew what marks to make on his body & he is completely forgotten about. John Neetles has said in interviews that the explanation was lost in an editing mistake which is doesn't really cut it for me. You can't have a multiple murder mystery & leave one of the death's unsolved especially in such bizarre circumstances. Did no-one actually not watch The Electric Vendetta before it was aired & pick up on this glaring error? Also the endings a bit rubbish, did Troy catch Sally Boulter? What was she charged with? Did she admit it or not? It's a shame because otherwise it's a pretty good episode for the first 70 odd minutes with the usual absorbing plot & I liked how different people were responsible for each of the death's.
During The Electric Vendetta Barnaby & Troy break into a house to search it but can't leave because it's all wired up with electricity, I'm not being funny but that's an illegal search & constitutes breaking & entering. If the owner of the house had made a fuss Barnaby & Troy would have almost certainly lost their jobs because technically they broke the law & you can't have the police breaking the law can you. As usual this looks the business, the real life village of Stanton St. John in Oxfordshire was used as the location of Midsomer Parva. There are four death's in The Electric Vendetta with none being particularly graphic & only one going unexplained. This episode also sees some horrible CGI computer effects as Steve is electrocuted & there's a nice Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1979) homage with lots of floating bright white lights in the sky which turn out to be a combine harvester! The acting is strong as always & Amanda Mealing who plays Sally Boulter is as nice to look at as the picturesque scenery.
The Electric Vendetta is maybe my least favourite Midsomer Murders episode because of a really poor ending which doesn't offer as much closure as it should & a body which is never adequately explained & considering this is meant to be a murder mystery surely that's unforgivable. Having said that The Electric Vendetta is three & a half seasons into Midsomer Murders & so far it's been the only really bad episode which isn't bad going at all.