Midsomer Murders is one of the greatest detective shows. I loved it when it first started, and I love it just as much now that its quality is no worse. After such a solid, beautiful and established start in the face of "The Killings at Badger's Drift", the show gets even better with"Written in Blood". It's not one of the best episodes of the show, but it's close to it, and it does a lot of the good things that we love so much about Midsomer Murders.
This is a truly great episode and also one of the most atmospheric. In this regard, few episodes can compare with it ("Dark Secrets", "The Straw Woman", "The Sting of Death", "With Baited Breath"and" Death's Shadow"). The episode has a lot of color and colorful characters, Honoria and Gerald are probably some of the most colorful characters in the series (thanks to Anna Massey and Robert Swann), and Amy, Max, Selina and Brian are slightly worse. The murder of Mr. Hanlon looks spectacular and very memorable.
The denouement is one of the best, thoughtful, spectacular, shocking and intense in the show. The ending with max's murder is incredibly unexpected and surprising, probably the most unexpected in the show. The climax of the main story with the murder of Gerald is not so striking, but it is strikingly spectacular.
I would like to say a few words about the book. It's very different from the movie version, but I can't say which one is better. The serial version is more shocking and spectacular, but the book version is better from a psychological point of view. The only drawback of the film adaptation, compared to the book, I can call the lack of disclosure of the character Laura Hutton (not quite) and some changes in the past of Gerald. Otherwise, both variations are very good.
As for the shortcomings of the episode as such, they can be considered a certain perversity of the story, although I can not say that it greatly spoils the impression of such an exceptional episode
The cast of the episode is all great, especially Anna Massey and Robert Swann, as well as Joanna David, John Shrapnel and Una Stubbs.
All in all, a great and exceptional episode, continuing the quality of the previous episode and just a great episode of the show. 9.5/10.