Midsomer Murders, Season 16

Jimmy Fongand Madeline Villiers battle through the jungle in Borneo, searching for a rare Orchid, the Yellow Roth, worth at least a hundred thousand pounds. They find it and Madeline smuggles it back to Britain, relishing the excitement and adrenalin of the operation. Munro Hilliard is hosting the ‘Midsomer Malham Annual Flower and Orchid Show’. Margaret Winstanley, Professor of Botany at Oxford University, accompanied by her protégé, Jonathan Makepeace, is judging the orchids presented by the fiercely competitive members of the Midsomer Malham Orchid Society. Harry Rose is the local handyman. He arrives at Madeline’s house to carry out repairs, only to find her dead in her living-room chair. It appears that she was about to leave for Switzerland for her own wedding. Henry Plummer is later found dead in his garden shed by his wife. He appears to have hung himself after having found his entire orchid collection destroyed with weedkiller. But was it really a suicide?

Two families; the Ransoms and the Kirby’s are embroiled in a feud, fuelled by jealousy and ambition. The Kirby’s possess the talent for “Second Sight” and the Ransoms are driven by scientific desire to discover what lies behind the art of second sight. Everything hangs on the baptism of Christine Kirby, child to Emma Ransom and Ben Kirby. One by one the Ransoms are murdered and it is only with Barnaby and Little Mal’s intervention that the last of the Ransoms, is not killed.

A barman from the Maid in Splendour pub is shot dead as he walks near a ruined cottage in the woods. Barnaby and Scott discover a clash of cultures at the pub, between locals and new money, and between charming old landlord Michael Bannerman and his bullish son Stephen. But when Stephen, too, is murdered, past passions become as important as current enemies.

Solicitor Nick Turner falls to his death from his roof in what looks like a murder, however, Barnaby and Scott speculate whether the death is really a suicide. Nick had financial problems and they ponder as to whether the suicide has been dressed up as a murder so that Felicity (Nick’s wife) will receive the life insurance payout. The plot thickens as Otto Benham (a local Roman history expert) and Mike Spicer (former TV quiz host) are both murdered in very bizarre ways.

It’s Christmas and the troubled Villiers family get together nine years after the death of magician and eldest son Ferdy Villiers. First a cracker riddle predicts that two people will die before midnight on Boxing Day, then frail Lydia Villiers is hospitalised after a fall. As Barnaby abandons his Christmas pudding with the in-laws to investigate, it seems that ghosts from the past and cunning sleight of hand are haunting the household.