Review of Inspector Morse: Last Seen Wearing/Settling Of The Sun

Introduction

With the recent passing of the much admired John Thaw, I review these discs with a touch of sadness. Thaw was the crown jewel of British TV. From the hard edged Sweeney to softer comedy moments like Home to Roost and a fabulous turn in the acclaimed production Goodnight Mr Tom. He was an amazing all-rounder and it`s a real shame his talents never took him to the big screen, as I`m sure he would have been a top contender for an Oscar.

On the other hand I have never been a huge fan of the Inspector Morse series. I could never get into the books and found many of the shows too similar in story content and production value. I always saw it as a program aimed at the elderly or middle-age. Don`t get me wrong Thaw brings alot of life to the show as the grumpy inspector, but the plots just fail to grab me. This isn`t just a criticism of Morse. I think the majority of TV murder mysteries are too long winded and don`t have decent payoffs. They resort to cheap stereotypical endings where you can work out who the killer will be in the first ten minutes.

This DVD review is part of a series of 2-Disc sets. The two episodes in this set are, Last Seen Wearing and Settling Of The Sun. I won`t go into full details of the plots as I do believe most of these sets will be purchased by ardent fans. A brief synopsis is given in the disc details, above.

Video

The picture, in standard 1.33:1 format, is the usual good but not great quality. What you`re really getting here is digital TV broadcast quality, which means the colour levels are vivid and a bit over saturated plus the contrast levels are just about above average, with blacks never being solid and bright whites showing some bad smearing. The menus are static.

Audio

This is a nice clean Dolby Digital stereo 2.0 track which is bouncey and vibrant with some nice ambient touches in the outdoor sequences. With no dedicated bass the track still copes well with its matrixed redirection and does have some decent low frequency sections that are mainly used to fabulous effect on the music score.

Features

Not a thing, not even a sneak peek at the other discs in the set. It would have been great to see some behind the scenes footage of the series.

Conclusion

For fans who love this much applauded series it will suit their needs. I don`t see many of these fans wanting much from their DVDs as long as all the episodes are present. After watching these I still haven`t warmed to the adventures of Morse and his sidekick Lewis, but I can understand why it does have a big following not just in the U.K. but worldwide.