Midsomer Murders

Summary

Midsomer Murders is a detective drama set in England. The stories revolve around the efforts of Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby, and later his successor, cousin John Barnaby, to solve numerous murders that take place in the picturesque but deadly villages of the fictional county of Midsomer. The Barnabys have worked with several different sergeants throughout the run of the show: Detective Sergeant (DS) Gavin Troy (Daniel Casey), DS Dan Scott (John Hopkins), DS Ben Jones (Jason Hughes), DS Charlie Nelson (Gwilym Lee) and DS Jamie Winter (Nick Hendrix).

Production

Filming of Midsomer Murders began in the autumn of 1996, and the first episode, "The Killings at Badger's Drift", was broadcast in the United Kingdom on 23 March 1997. This inaugural episode was the highest-rated single drama programme of 1997, watched by 13.5 million viewers. Throughout its run, the feature-length drama has attracted many well-known accomplished actors from the stage and screen in guest-starring roles.

Anthony Horowitz and the original producers, Betty Willingale and Brian True-May, created the series. Horowitz adapted the majority of the early episodes from the original works by Caroline Graham. Current writers include Helen Jenkins, Jeff Povey, Nicholas Hicks-Beach, Julia Gilbert and Maria Ward.

Initially John Nettles acted in the role of Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby. Nettles' character retired at the end of 2010, after the 13th series of eight episodes; his last episode was "Fit for Murder". Neil Dudgeon replaced him in the 14th series, playing Tom Barnaby's cousin, DCI John Barnaby, who was seen in a series 13 episode, "The Sword of Guillaume". Dudgeon made his first appearance in Midsomer Murders in the series 4 episode "Garden of Death", in which he played the role of a tongue-in-cheek gardener, Daniel Bolt, rather interested in sex.

Series 20 began in the UK on ITV on 10 March 2019, with episode 1, "The Ghosts of Causton Abbey". In the US, the entire six-episode series was immediately released on the streaming services Acorn TV and BritBox, and became available on Netflix after the UK broadcast schedule had finished. The show was removed from Netflix in October 2019; only the first 19 series had been shown on the service. Series 20 onward have never been shown on Netflix in US or Canada. As of January, 2021, series 1–20 can be seen in the US on IMDb TV and Tubi TV.

The show's official social media confirmed that production of series 21 began in March 2019. As with series 20, series 21 was initially released in the USA. It premiered on Acorn TV and BritBox on 1 December 2019, before airing in the UK in January 2020.

Published in "The Cinemaholic" in Aug 2024, they have "learned that the network has joined Acorn TV to renew Midsomer Murders for its twenty-fifth season. The instalment’s filming began in the United Kingdom in the spring of 2025."

In October 2025, ITV announced that a 26th series had been commissioned.

Setting

Midsomer is a fictional English county. The county town is Causton, a medium-sized town where Detective Chief Inspector Barnaby lives with his wife and where the Criminal Investigation Department is located. Much of the popularity of the series arises from the incongruity of sudden violence in a picturesque and peaceful rural setting. Various clues in several episodes hint that Midsomer might actually cover the areas of Berkshire and part of northern Hampshire. This may be supported by the episode "Dead in the Water" where a body is found in the River Thames.

Many of the villages and small towns of the county have the word "Midsomer" in their name; this is inspired in part by the real county of Somerset, and specifically, its actual town of Midsomer Norton, and became a naming convention within the show. Midsomer Wellow and Causton are derived from the names of real Somerset villages Wellow and Corston.

Each episode usually contains several murders, the high body count being a well-known feature of the show. Despite this, the culprit is almost never a serial killer—very frequently the murderer is driven by circumstance to compound his or her crimes, and keeps killing to cover up the original murder.

Humour is a main feature of the series. There is often dark comedy, such as a woman being murdered with a wheel of cheese, and many scenes are examples of "dramedy" (comic drama or dramatic comedy). According to Radio Times when describing the episode "Death and the Divas" (series 15, episode 4): "Midsomer Murders never takes itself too seriously but here it's got its tongue so far into its cheek, it hurts."

Nostalgia has also been a feature of the show, especially in its Nettles era. Most episodes have been set in hermetic rural villages of a kind that were already changing rapidly by the time the series began, Nettles opined in a 2003 interview. The old-fashioned settings are true to the Graham novels: "Although the books are set in the present", wrote one reviewer, Graham's country villages "seem to come from another time". "The spirit is obviously of the '50s", Nettles remarked, and the less crowded, less complicated village/world was clearly part of the books' appeal.

Filming locations

Causton is represented by a number of towns including Thame and Wallingford, in Oxfordshire.

The Six Bells, a pub in Warborough, Oxfordshire, repeatedly features as the Black Swan in the Midsomer village of Badger's Drift. The Bull & Butcher, the village pub in Turville, Buckinghamshire, featured in both "Murder on St. Malley's Day" (renamed as The Chalk and Gown) and in "Schooled in Murder" (renamed as The Spotted Cow).

Filming took place on Sunday 11 August 2013 at White Waltham Airfield, southwest of Maidenhead, for episode 4 of Series 16, "The Flying Club".

The Buckinghamshire tourism authority announced in 2021 the launching of three themed tours of locations in the county that have been used to film the series.

In "The Killings of Copenhagen" – number five in the sixteenth series and the 100th episode overall – several scenes are filmed on location in central Copenhagen, like Rådhuspladsen ("the City Hall Square"), Nyhavn ("New Port") with its canal and old colourful houses, a Danish countryside church, and at the circular courtyard inside the Copenhagen Police Headquarters building. The murder in Copenhagen is one of three within the entire series (until episode 114, at least) that take place outside the fictional county of Midsomer, the others being in Wales where DCI Tom Barnaby (John Nettles) and DS Ben Jones (Jason Hughes) travel in "Death and Dust" and Brighton where Inspector John Barnaby (Neil Dudgeon) is introduced.

Characters

Main article: List of Midsomer Murders characters

:Table key:

Episodes

Main article: List of Midsomer Murders episodes

The pilot episode of Midsomer Murders was shown on 23 March 1997. 140 episodes have been produced across 24 series. As of 30 December 2025, 138 episodes have been broadcast in the UK, comprising 24 series. New series may air in different territories before the UK. Air dates may vary by region.

20th anniversary special

In June 2019, British-American streaming service Acorn TV began streaming a 20th Anniversary Special presented by John Nettles. The one-hour documentary brings together former and current actors on the show as well as producers and others working behind the scene to discuss memorable moments from the past 20 series and the peculiar quirks that have made the show a success.

25th anniversary documentary

In May 2022, ITV announced that there would be a documentary celebrating the show's 25th anniversary.

Entitled Midsomer Murders – 25 Years of Mayhem it featured contributions from cast members including John Nettles, Neil Dudgeon, Jane Wymark, Fiona Dolman, Daniel Casey, Jason Hughes and Annette Badland, as well as writer Jeff Povey and producer Ian Strachan. It also delved behind the scenes of filming series 23 and highlighted pre-fame appearances by actors such as Orlando Bloom and Henry Cavill.

ITV subsequently announced that the one-hour documentary would air on the channel on Sunday 29 May 2022 at 7pm.

Controversy

In March 2011, series producer Brian True-May was suspended by All3Media after telling the TV listings magazine Radio Times that the programme did not have any non-white characters because the series was "the last bastion of Englishness and I want to keep it that way". When challenged about the term "Englishness" and whether that would exclude ethnic minorities, True-May responded: "Well, it should do, and maybe I'm not politically correct." He later went on to say that he wanted to make a programme "that appeals to a certain audience, which seems to succeed." True-May's comments were investigated by the production company. He was reinstated, having apologised "if his remarks gave unintended offence to any viewers", but subsequently stepped down as producer. ITV said it was "shocked and appalled" at True-May's comments, which were "absolutely not shared by anyone at ITV".

True-May's replacement, Jo Wright, confirmed that she was committed to on-screen diversity when she took over the helm, saying: "I feel strongly that a range of ethnic groups should be represented on screen. And that will be reflected in some of the episodes in the new series with key guest casting. I will cast the series in the same way as I always do, by starting with the best script. And a good script will include a variety of different characters." In series 15, Asian actors played central characters for the first time, in the episode "Written in the Stars". Black characters also began to appear starting in that series. Beginning with series 18, the show gained an Asian member for its main cast: pathologist Kam Karimore, played by Manjinder Virk. However, she left at the end of series 19.

Broadcast

In 2004, Midsomer Murders was among the three most-sold British TV shows worldwide, whether as TV programming or DVD. , Midsomer Murders had been sold to more than 200 countries around the world.

In Australia, first-run episodes and repeats are screened on the national free-to-air network ABC with repeats also shown on the Nine Network channel, 9Gem. The series was originally only aired on the Nine Network. Repeat screenings are also aired on the subscription channels UKTV and 13th Street. A measure of the success of the series in Australia is that repeats of the series still rate highly and often feature in the nation's top twenty shows in national surveys.

In Canada, the series is broadcast on TVOntario and Book Television in Ontario, on Knowledge in British Columbia, and via American PBS channels available throughout southern parts of Canada. , the first thirteen series are currently available in Canada on Amazon Prime Video, while only series 21 is available on Britbox. The first nineteen series are also available on streaming service/app Tubi and Acorn.

In Ireland, the series is aired on Virgin Media Three every Monday night at 8 pm. It is one of the channel's highest-rated shows.

In New Zealand, the series was broadcast on TVNZ 1 and it was broadcast for a number of years on the free-to-air channel Prime.

In the United States, the series was first aired by A&E, which broadcast "The Killings at Badger's Drift" on 28 June 1998 and followed with the next four episodes over the 1998–99 series. The show remained on A&E for many years until it was syndicated by American Public Television for broadcast on public television stations. All 24 series are currently available on the streaming service Acorn TV, which also offers the programme in Canada. The show was also broadcast on Ion Mystery and is currently on Ion Plus, and it has a dedicated channel on the streaming service Pluto TV.

The Paramount Channel broadcasts episode reruns daily.

PBS also occasionally shows Midsomer Murders on some stations from time to time.

Soundtracks

Composed by Jim Parker, the main theme is a moderate-tempo waltz, performed (primarily though not exclusively) on an unusual electronic musical instrument, the theremin, which has a sound not unlike a low whistle or a human voice. The theremin part was played by Celia Sheen (1940–2011). From the 14th series onwards the soundtrack was altered so that during the closing titles a standardised version of the theme is played on a solo violin in place of the theremin. Occasionally a version with a longer introduction opens the show, using a flute rather than a theremin as the lead instrument.

The closing theme for "The Scarecrow Murders", shown on 29 May 2022 to celebrate 25 years, was a more jovial clarinet version.

Multiple soundtrack CDs have been released so far, containing versions of the theme and musical cues from various series.

Home media

All 140 episodes have been released in the US (Region 1) and in the UK (Region 2) including three Christmas specials, by Acorn Media. The first 18 series and "Part 1" of series 19 of Midsomer Murders have been released in Australia and New Zealand (Region 4).

Note that episodes 1 to 100 were originally released as 25 DVD "sets", which were not in chronological order and are now discontinued. They have been re-released in 2015 as a chronological "series" 1 to 16 in redesigned packages. To confuse fans further, Costco Warehouses sold 5 abbreviated (region 1) sets with one less disc, but used the same "set" numberings even though they did not match the retail "sets".

Blue-ray discs were released for "Sets" 17 through 25 and "Series" 16 through 24, picking up where the "sets" left off but not re-issuing the "sets" in redesigned packages like the DVDs did.

In January 2006, Midsomer Murders started a DVD and Magazine Collection, available at newsagents in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and the UK.

Acorn Media had released DVD chronological order collections of Midsomer Murders in North America, which are:

• The Early Cases 10 disc collection of 18 episodes includes the pilot episode and those of series one, two, three, and four (except the last episode), as well as a bonus disc featuring a behind-the-scenes documentary.
• Acorn's "Barnaby's Casebook" 10-disc collection has 17 episodes, including the last episode of series four, followed by those of series five, six, and seven.
• Acorn's "Village Case Files" 8-disc collection includes the 16 episodes of series eight, and nine; and a 4-minute bonus clip from series one.
• Acorn's "Mayhem & Mystery" 15 disc collection includes the 17 episodes of series ten and eleven.
• Acorn's "Tom Barnaby's Last Cases" 15 disc collection includes the 17 episodes of series twelve and thirteen.

Below table are the release dates for complete series sets in both Australia Region 4 and the United Kingdom Region 2.

Books

References

References

1. (2 January 2008). "Midsomer shines for ITV". [[The Guardian]].
2. Morgan, Clive. (6 January 2016). "Midsomer Murders: 15 mysterious facts". The Telegraph.
3. (9 February 2010). "Midsomer Murders – The New Barnaby Joins John Nettles on Exclusive Acorn Media DVD Release". Prlog.org.
4. Hughes, Heather. (9 February 2010). "Neil Dudgeon Replaces John Nettles on Midsomer Murders".
5. (10 September 2000). "Garden of Death".
6. Griffiths, Eleanor Bley. (10 March 2019). "When is Midsomer Murders back on ITV?".
7. Mitchell, Molli. (1 February 2019). "Midsomer Murders 2019 ITV air date, cast, trailer, plot: When does the new series start?".
8. (4 September 2019). "'Midsomer Murders' Leaving Netflix in October 2019". whats-on-netflix.com.
9. Williams, Janice. (1 October 2019). "What's Leaving Netflix in October 2019: Last Call List of Movies and Shows". Newsweek.
10. Jeffery, Morgan. (17 April 2019). "Why did Midsomer Murders disappear from ITV – and when is it coming back?".
11. (5 September 2019). "Midsomer Murders Season 21: Premiere Date & Where to Watch It". I Heart British TV.
12. (29 August 2024). "Midsomer Murders Renewed for Season 25 at ITV".
13. "'Midsomer Murders' renewed for Season 26 - UPI.com".
14. Death on the Waterways by [[Allan Scott-Davies]]; ISBN 978-0-7524-5966-0; c2011; page 153
15. Lanzagorta, Marco. (28 August 2013). "Madness, Obsession and 'Midsomer Murders'".
16. "'Midsomer Murders' Schooled in Murder (TV Episode 2013)". [[Internet Movie Database]].
17. Rackham, Jane. "Midsomer Murders". Radio Times.
18. Prescott, Jean. (10 February 2003). "Series success no mystery". The Cincinnati Enquirer.
19. "Midsomer Murders Locations". Midsomermurders.org.
20. Falconer, Kieran. (19 July 2008). "Midsomer Murders: A very English setting". [[The Daily Telegraph]].
21. "Midsomer Murders – The Six Bells Warborough". The Six Bells Warborough.
22. "Brakspear's Midsomer Pubs". Brakspear.
23. "New Midsomer Murders filmed at White Waltham Airfield". Maidenhead Advertiser News.
24. (18 April 2021). "Midsomer Murders: The county that hopes a police show will lure back visitors". BBC News.
25. "Midsomer Murders–Episode Guide".
26. Picture of the round "police square" and some of the episode's main actors at [http://www.midsomermurders.org/copenhagen.htm midsomermurders.org] {{Webarchive. link. (12 April 2016 .)
27. (15 June 2019). "Acorn TV – Midsomer Murders 20th Anniversary Special".
28. "Midsomer Murders 20th Anniversary Special".
29. "ITV announces Midsomer Murders 25th anniversary documentary". ITV Press Centre. 13 May 2022.
30. "Midsomer Murders – 25 Years of Mayhem". ITV Press Centre. 18 May 2022.
31. Easton, Mark. (15 March 2011). "Midsomer Murders producer suspended over race row". BBC News.
32. Plunkett, John. (23 March 2011). "Midsomer Murders co-creator to step down at end of current series". The Guardian.
33. (23 March 2011). "Midsomer producer to 'step down' after current series". BBC News.
34. (24 September 2011). "Midsomer Murders to get {{as written".
35. Singh, Anita. (14 September 2012). "Midsomer Murders gets two Asian characters".
36. (6 January 2016). "How Manjinder Virk is shaking up Midsomer Murders".
37. (May 2005). "Strong DVD Market Boosts UK TV Export Revenues". Culture.gov.uk.
38. (29 December 2013). "Ratings".
39. (22 December 2013). "Ratings".
40. (September 24, 2024). "New seasons of 'Wisconsin Life,' 'Nature,' 'Midsomer Murders' and more begin in October".
41. "Everything British for PBS Viewers to Stream in December 2024".
42. . (2013). ["Midsomer Murders DVD sales"](https://shop.abc.net.au/t/brands/midsomer-murders?utf8=%E2%9C%93&id=brands%2Fmidsomer-murders&per_page=10&order=new_releases_first). *ABC Online*.
43. "Midsomer Murders - Complete Season 20".
44. (2 December 2019). "Midsomer Murders - Series 20 [DVD]".
45. "Midsomer Murders: Complete Season 21".
46. "Midsomer Murders: Series 21 {{!}} DVD {{!}} Free shipping over £20".
47. "Midsomer Murders Series 21 DVD".
48. "Midsomer Murders - Season 17-20 Collection (Limited Edition)".
49. "Midsomer Murders - Season 1-20 Collection (Limited Edition)".