Moonflower Murders is BBC One’s latest offering in the cosy crime genre. A sequel to Magpie Murders (which is itself based on the books by Anthony Horowitz), this fabulously multi-layered story takes all the conventions of the genre and twists them in ways that makes every cliché feel fresh again. Leading the charge is Lesley Manville as the gently acerbic Susan Ryeland.
Susan lost all her possessions in the devastating fire at the end of Magpie Murders and has now moved to Crete to open a hotel with her longterm boyfriend Andreas (Alexandros Logothetis). But of course, the past doesn’t stay buried and soon enough a desperate couple are knocking on the front door asking for help finding their daughter. She’s gone missing, and the only clue as to her whereabouts is the detective novel Atticus Pünd Takes The Case, by Susan’s old client Alan Conway (a sour-faced Conleth Hill).
With Conway dead, it’s left to Susan to crack the case. Soon, a multi-stranded mystery is unfolding, both in the present-day and in the 1950s-flavoured world of Susan’s imagination, where Atticus Pund goes about solving the case in the novel – and pops up occasionally in the real world to offer her advice. Manville is, of course, marvelous as Susan.
She is witty, self-contained and utterly believable in her weariness as somebody’s whose fresh start isn’t as fresh (or as exciting) as she thought it was going to be. Her relationship with Pund (who exists entirely in her head) is also on.
