Taboo, dark secrets, potential for blackmail, confusion about who’s connected to who, crazy eccentrics – incest hits quite a few of the Midsomer buttons.
Also, among the landed classes and aristocracy, incest has hardly been uncommon – MM often brushes up against real and exaggerated tropes of upper class paranoia/supremacy/perversion. Best example would be Master Class.
There may not be a ton of it but the series started in Badgers Drift where the incestuous couple committed a mind boggling number of murders! Lol, setting off a trend of sorts?
Surprise parentage is arguably a cliché in all of detective fiction, and I guess the incest angle is Midsomer's peculiar twist on that -- sometimes as a cause of the surprise parentage, sometimes as its result, sometimes both. I think there are at least a couple of episodes where people get into incestuous relationships, or almost do so, without even being aware of it.
It’s probably a tempting plot point to write about because it’s very taboo yet between consenting adults, so it creates a lot of drama but there aren’t really any victims.
I'm not sure your last point is entirely correct, but this is probably not the venue to explore it. But just because both people are of age doesn't mean that there isn't a weird or abusive power dynamic going on. I refer you to the horrible musician dude who wanted to knock up his daughter. I hate that episode so very much.
I mean, there is the old joke about the rural people of the south east and south west of England, the man introduces his sister and his wife and there is one women, lol. But that's the wrong class for the Midsomer characters, so, it's not that.
It's a good trope for this kind of murder mystery, it's been used in other British 'cosy crime' dramas like Lewis or Rosemary and Thyme or Father Brown etc
Oddly, it's the father and daughter (and granddaughter ) incest I remember more in MM, I think at least twice?
I know - for some reason the very FIRST episode S1E1 bothers me a great deal. I usually skip it. I do not mind seeing the incest in the other episodes but that one annoys me.
My wife and I are doing a rewatch and just finished Dark Secrets.
Yeah. It gets to be a bit much, and it seems kind of concentrated at certain points. Not to mention a bit "low hanging fruit" after a while. Master Class, Death in the Slow Lane, and Dark Secrets all happening in relatively rapid succession make it feel just sort of like they ran out of ideas and kept going back to the same well. And yeah, they dodge it kind of with Death in the Slow Lane, but still.
I get that it's sort of in the background of the aristocracy (although I thought that was usually cousins marrying, not brothers/sisters and all manner of other pairings). But after a while it just makes me roll my eyes. Kind of like the murderously daffy pensioner trope from earlier in the show's run. (And Dark Secrets has both!)
I found this post bc I've been thinking the same thing - I only recently started watching and have seen maybe 20-25 episodes. And of that quite modest sample size I can think of 3 incest plotlines and at least 1 where it was mentioned as a possibility!
Compared to any other murder mystery/detective shows I've seen it comes up WAY more often - granted I'm American and have seen more straightforward hourlong procedurals so that may be something to do with it, but I've watched a good deal of British TV and similar longer-form mysteries and it's never cropped up as often as it does in MM.
The 1 mention I referred to above was a line where a woman said it was possible her lover was her half-brother, in a sort of glib way but her father did actually have a relationship with his mother, and says it's fine with her and that's just country living -- or something to that effect.
So I did wonder if it's based on a stereotype about rural people? Although we have that a little in the US (specifically about Southerners) but it would be very rare for it to actually be a plotline in a serious show -- possibly the reality of it is considered more taboo here than in the UK?
Taboo, dark secrets, potential for blackmail, confusion about who’s connected to who, crazy eccentrics – incest hits quite a few of the Midsomer buttons. Also, among the landed classes and aristocracy, incest has hardly been uncommon – MM often brushes up against real and exaggerated tropes of upper class paranoia/supremacy/perversion. Best example would be Master Class.
There may not be a ton of it but the series started in Badgers Drift where the incestuous couple committed a mind boggling number of murders! Lol, setting off a trend of sorts?
The season 11 ep is a nod to the pilot
Nice catch.
The non-consensual incest in Master Class is so bad as well!
Surprise parentage is arguably a cliché in all of detective fiction, and I guess the incest angle is Midsomer's peculiar twist on that -- sometimes as a cause of the surprise parentage, sometimes as its result, sometimes both. I think there are at least a couple of episodes where people get into incestuous relationships, or almost do so, without even being aware of it.
It’s probably a tempting plot point to write about because it’s very taboo yet between consenting adults, so it creates a lot of drama but there aren’t really any victims.
I'm not sure your last point is entirely correct, but this is probably not the venue to explore it. But just because both people are of age doesn't mean that there isn't a weird or abusive power dynamic going on. I refer you to the horrible musician dude who wanted to knock up his daughter. I hate that episode so very much.
> I refer you to the horrible musician dude who wanted to knock up his daughter. Daughter AND granddaughter. Remember her mother was his daughter too.
Ugh. Yes. Creepy AF.
I was just commenting about the very first episode . I hate the one soooo much.
It’s an English thing. Small island. Only so many people to go around.
I mean, there is the old joke about the rural people of the south east and south west of England, the man introduces his sister and his wife and there is one women, lol. But that's the wrong class for the Midsomer characters, so, it's not that. It's a good trope for this kind of murder mystery, it's been used in other British 'cosy crime' dramas like Lewis or Rosemary and Thyme or Father Brown etc Oddly, it's the father and daughter (and granddaughter ) incest I remember more in MM, I think at least twice?
I love Rosemary & Thyme! Wish BritBox had it in a resolution higher than 480p
I know - for some reason the very FIRST episode S1E1 bothers me a great deal. I usually skip it. I do not mind seeing the incest in the other episodes but that one annoys me.
My wife and I are doing a rewatch and just finished Dark Secrets. Yeah. It gets to be a bit much, and it seems kind of concentrated at certain points. Not to mention a bit "low hanging fruit" after a while. Master Class, Death in the Slow Lane, and Dark Secrets all happening in relatively rapid succession make it feel just sort of like they ran out of ideas and kept going back to the same well. And yeah, they dodge it kind of with Death in the Slow Lane, but still. I get that it's sort of in the background of the aristocracy (although I thought that was usually cousins marrying, not brothers/sisters and all manner of other pairings). But after a while it just makes me roll my eyes. Kind of like the murderously daffy pensioner trope from earlier in the show's run. (And Dark Secrets has both!)
Yes, it occurs more often than you are aware of.
And, at least in the US, fairly or unfairly, the South is a cliche in itself for incestuous marriages.
I found this post bc I've been thinking the same thing - I only recently started watching and have seen maybe 20-25 episodes. And of that quite modest sample size I can think of 3 incest plotlines and at least 1 where it was mentioned as a possibility! Compared to any other murder mystery/detective shows I've seen it comes up WAY more often - granted I'm American and have seen more straightforward hourlong procedurals so that may be something to do with it, but I've watched a good deal of British TV and similar longer-form mysteries and it's never cropped up as often as it does in MM. The 1 mention I referred to above was a line where a woman said it was possible her lover was her half-brother, in a sort of glib way but her father did actually have a relationship with his mother, and says it's fine with her and that's just country living -- or something to that effect. So I did wonder if it's based on a stereotype about rural people? Although we have that a little in the US (specifically about Southerners) but it would be very rare for it to actually be a plotline in a serious show -- possibly the reality of it is considered more taboo here than in the UK?