Amazing detective series placed in Melbourne, Australia, in the Roaring Twenties. A few decades after Sherlock Holmes and not long before elderly spinster Miss Marple, young Miss Fisher seems to be roughly the same age as Dorothy Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey. In addition to plots that often seem custom made for the location and time period, the producers went to great expense to conjure up those years in which the horse-drawn carriages have almost completely been replaced by motorcars and the fashion ideal for women was to look almost like cross-dressing men. If you can overlook the occasional anachronism (such as an electric torch that is clearly too small and too bright for the time), the atmosphere contributes significantly to the enjoyment of this series. Here we have a female detective for modern tastes, placed a century ago in a period in the past when such a character briefly was plausible.
Like Sherlock Holmes, Miss Phryne Fisher is a capable private detective, able to effortlessly navigate all strata of society. Like Miss Marple, her method of solving cases involves proper work rather than jumping to unlikely conclusions based on bizarre clues. I am not sure why she reminds me of her (even more recommended!) modern African colleague Mma Ramotswe of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency (2008), as she is far less conservative and has a far richer private life that keeps getting entangled with her cases. Unlike all her colleagues, she is a flapper, a scandalous young 1920s woman. In many ways she reminds me of John Steed from The Avengers (1961).
To make things even more interesting, Miss Fisher quickly acquires a Catholic sidekick as well as a complex relationship with Detective Inspector Jack Robinson.
This series can easily hold its own compared to the classical Sherlock Holmes adaptations, including those with Basil Rathbone and those with Jeremy Brett. The same is true in relation to the classical Miss Marple adaptions including those with Margaret Rutherford and those with Joan Hickson. And also in relation to the various miniseries starring Lord Peter Wimsey. By being so Australian, it is almost as English as all of these.
While every episode is about an independent case, the Season 1 episodes are loosely tied together by a story arc that comes to the foreground in the last two episodes: an unsolved crime case in her personal history. In Season 2, the main protagonists of the series slowly and gradually work on their relationships. In Season 3, we get to know Miss Fisher's father, and we finally get a wedding. Perhaps as a substitute for the fourth season that never came, the tale of Miss Fisher ends with Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears (2020), a film that you may want to skip if you don't like action films with ridiculous plots of the Indiana Jones / Lara Croft type. If you don't expect too much, it can be fun, though.
There is also Ms Fisher's Modern Murder Mysteries (2019), a spin-off series that promises to take the concept into the 1960s by following the exploits of Miss Fisher's niece Ms Fisher. Instead of her aunt's emotional independence, the niece inherits a team of exceptional women to support her. The spin-off's IMDB rating currently suffers from downvotes by viewers who are disappointed that the original series was terminated and that Ms Fisher is not exactly like Miss Fisher. But if you take the spin-off series on its own terms, you will find that it is about equally good, if not better.
Like Sherlock Holmes, Miss Phryne Fisher is a capable private detective, able to effortlessly navigate all strata of society. Like Miss Marple, her method of solving cases involves proper work rather than jumping to unlikely conclusions based on bizarre clues. I am not sure why she reminds me of her (even more recommended!) modern African colleague Mma Ramotswe of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency (2008), as she is far less conservative and has a far richer private life that keeps getting entangled with her cases. Unlike all her colleagues, she is a flapper, a scandalous young 1920s woman. In many ways she reminds me of John Steed from The Avengers (1961).
To make things even more interesting, Miss Fisher quickly acquires a Catholic sidekick as well as a complex relationship with Detective Inspector Jack Robinson.
This series can easily hold its own compared to the classical Sherlock Holmes adaptations, including those with Basil Rathbone and those with Jeremy Brett. The same is true in relation to the classical Miss Marple adaptions including those with Margaret Rutherford and those with Joan Hickson. And also in relation to the various miniseries starring Lord Peter Wimsey. By being so Australian, it is almost as English as all of these.
While every episode is about an independent case, the Season 1 episodes are loosely tied together by a story arc that comes to the foreground in the last two episodes: an unsolved crime case in her personal history. In Season 2, the main protagonists of the series slowly and gradually work on their relationships. In Season 3, we get to know Miss Fisher's father, and we finally get a wedding. Perhaps as a substitute for the fourth season that never came, the tale of Miss Fisher ends with Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears (2020), a film that you may want to skip if you don't like action films with ridiculous plots of the Indiana Jones / Lara Croft type. If you don't expect too much, it can be fun, though.
There is also Ms Fisher's Modern Murder Mysteries (2019), a spin-off series that promises to take the concept into the 1960s by following the exploits of Miss Fisher's niece Ms Fisher. Instead of her aunt's emotional independence, the niece inherits a team of exceptional women to support her. The spin-off's IMDB rating currently suffers from downvotes by viewers who are disappointed that the original series was terminated and that Ms Fisher is not exactly like Miss Fisher. But if you take the spin-off series on its own terms, you will find that it is about equally good, if not better.
