HAPPY NEW YEAR.
Hello fellow Morsonians, Lewisians and Endeavourists. I hope you and your families are well physically as well as mentally.
Here we are at the first of the Endeavour episode streams. Over the next few months I will be streaming all 30 episodes.
Remember you don’t have to join Twitch to watch but you do have to join to chat.
I have updated the times below in correspondence to the clocks going back for the USA, Canada and elsewhere.
Join me and many others at https://www.twitch.tv/morselewisendeavour
I hope to see many of you there. Bring your favourite drink and snack.
VERY IMPORTANT: For all those outside the UK you should be aware that on Sunday the UK BST will end and we will be on GMT. This means that the clocks went back one hour. I will adjust the times on Sunday.
Thank you Nate for the updates regarding times below.
Hopefully the times I have below are accurate. If not, let me know.
For the USA:
8pm in the UK is 3pm in New York.
8pm in the UK is 2pm in Chicago.
8pm in the UK is Midday in California.
8pm in the UK is 11am in Alaska
8pm in the UK is 10am in Hawaii.
8pm in the UK is 1pm in Phoenix
For elsewhere the times are;
Canadian Time Zones.
8pm in the UK is 4.30pm in Newfoundland Daylight Time.
8pm in the UK is 4pm in Atlantic Daylight Time, Halifax, NS, Canada.
8pm in the UK is 2pm Central Daylight Time, Winnipeg.
8pm in the UK is 2pm in Central Standard Time, Regina.
8pm in the UK is 1pm Mountain Daylight Time, Edmonton.
8pm in the UK is Midday in Pacific Daylight Time, Vancouver.
Elsewhere.
8pm in the UK is 9pm in Italy.
South America.
8pm in the UK is 5pm in Argentina and Chile.
If there are other time zones you think I should add please let me know.
Hope all this helps.
You don’t have to join Twitch to watch but if you do join (it’s free) it has only the minimal amount of signing up protocol to go through and this will allow you to chat to me and everybody else.
Not only can you enjoy watching the episode but you can chat (via text box) with other Endeavour fans. Some people who have watched the episodes on the live stream have said that they have not only learned more about the episodes but come to appreciate episodes they had previously disliked.
Please join me and many others to watch this great episode on the social media platform, (one of the biggest in the world) TWITCH and watch the episode on a live stream. Twitch is FREE to join and FREE to watch.
https://www.twitch.tv/morselewisendeavour
For those not in the know in regard to Twitch, when I write ‘watch and chat’ the chat is via a text window so there is no actual talking over the episode.
To ‘chat’ (this means to type in the chat window that runs alongside the video) you need to register but that is all rather simple. It’s only a matter of choosing a screen name and entering your email address.
So, over the next weeks I am hoping to live stream all 30 of the Endeavour episodes on Twitch. Twitch is one of the biggest social media sites in the world which allows people to live stream their various activities.
I would like to say a huge thank you to those who have become Patrons of the site and also a huge thank you to those who have made donations. What do I mean by Patrons?
What is Patreon? Patreon is a membership platform that makes it easy for artists and creators to get paid. It’s a membership platform that provides business tools for creators to run a subscription content service, with ways for artists to build relationships with their subscribers, or “patrons”.
With Patreon you set up how much you wish to pay monthly. There are three tiers, $5, $10 and $15. It’s like paying for a magazine subscription.
Patreon primarily uses Paypal which is easy to join and a safe way to send money. https://www.paypal.com/uk/home
Here is my Patreon account where you can read more about it, https://www.patreon.com/morseandlewisandendeavour
Here is where to find me on Twitch; https://www.twitch.tv/morselewisendeavour
Please subscribe to to my website. Subscribing to this website can be done in two ways.
If you have a WordPress account then click the ‘following’ button. If you don’t have a WordPress account then enter your email and click the subscribe button. Entering the email only means subscribing to my website you will NOT be creating a WordPress account. (WordPress are the company that I pay to use their platform).
To help run my website I have set up a Paypal account for donations. Thank you to all those who have made donations.
My Twitter, https://twitter.com/Jag248RPA?lang=en-gb
My Twitch Channel; https://www.twitch.tv/morselewisendeavour
My Youtube Channel, https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjIIGCcVpSIFwtRlS8hKWDA?view_as=subscriber
I have started my own Facebook page. It is primarily an extension of this website. I decided to start the Facebook page as there has been times when I have an update to a review post or some interesting news or information but it was all to small to make into a full blown post here on my website. So, come and join and keep up-to-date with all that happens in the Morse universe.
My Facebook Page; https://www.facebook.com/groups/1084993125023468/
I hope to see many of you there for a fun time at what has become known as the Sunday Night Endeavour Club.
I can not say “Thou” to Endeavour. He did nothing for me. Lewis was another matter.
Hi Chris. Just thought it was just worth reiterating, that the pilot episode, “First Bus to Woodstock”, is a wonderful and magical Endeavour!!! It was a pleasure to watch it with you, and all your followers, last Sunday on Twitch. Thanks also for agreeing to my suggestion, Chris, that the discussion on a Wednesday, should be called “A Critical Endeavour”!! Everything was marvellous in this episode, the acting, the music, the location scenery, and the numerous connections to the original Morse series. Most importantly of all, the writer, Russell Lewis, scripted an excellent and exciting story, covering all sorts of subjects, such as corruption in the police force and the wider community. This was interconnected with political scandal (the sex parties at a grand manor, where a sleazy Minister was involved with underage girls). The contrast between the good and bad detectives. Old Morse favourites, such as our hero being unlucky in love, and also his passion for classical music and crosswords. The association with the historically famous, Oxford colleges, this time through a Classics lecturer, romantically linked to the missing, later found murdered, 15 year-old schoolgirl, that he was supposedly mentoring. Finally, the commencement of a new and intriguing detective partnership, between of course, Thursday and Morse.
I have a few more points to add to this little piece, another day, and maybe some questions, as well. That is all for now. Thanks Chris, and take care.
Hi Chris. Further to my above comments, I should have said that corruption was interconnected with political scandal, because the crooked and dodgy car dealer, with policemen in his pocket, named Teddy Samuels, organised the sex parties at a grand manor, and procured underage girls, for the Minister and other prominent people. The episode is set in June 1965, and It has slight echoes of the notorious Profumo Affair of 1963. This of course, was referenced, when the character Dempsey, mentioned, “he did not want another Cliveden”, which is an English country house and estate, on the border between Berkshire and Buckinghamshire. The main house of this privileged estate, sits above the banks of the River Thames, and it was the setting for key events of the aforementioned Profumo Scandal.
Speaking of the River Thames, this pilot episode had as many connections to the original Morse series, as bridges that connect the Thames, through London!!! A number of these are delightful, as you illustrated in your excellent review on this website, Chris. According to Antony Richards and Philip Attwell in their book, “The Oxford of Inspector Morse”, there is another connection, regarding the wonderful conclusion to the episode, when young Morse looks into the driver’s mirror and sees the face of John Thaw, just before the soothing Morse theme music, plays out the show.
Wendy Spencer in the Colin Dexter books, better known in the original television series as Susan Bryce-Morgan, or using her married name, Susan Fallon, lived at 22 St. John Street, Oxford, during her University days. This was at the time, Morse fell in love with her, which was half-way through his third year studying classics. In the acclaimed Morse episode “Dead on Time”, we are told Morse and Susan were briefly engaged, during this period. The affair, led to Morse failing his degree, and not long afterwards their relationship had broken down. Morse thus left Oxford with a broken heart.
Back to the events of “First Bus to Woodstock”, and of course, Morse returns to Oxford for the first time, since that turbulent phase of his life, now as a policeman. At the very end of the episode, Morse driving his boss’s Jaguar, stops at the traffic lights, towards the very end of Pusey Street. His new mentor, Fred Thursday, asks him where he would like to be in twenty years time. Cue the previously described, poignant and emotional scene. It is therefore entirely appropriate, that this was filmed at the corner of St. John Street and Pusey Street, because No. 22 St. John Street, is clearly in shot, as Morse drives off.
To back up the evidence provided by Antony Richards and Philip Attwell, here is a Google Maps satellite link, which portrays the exact location of No. 22 St. John Street, Oxford. As Morse drives out of Pusey Street, choosing to go to his right, the house is immediately on his left, and it has a green door, that you can see just beyond the black and white pole of the traffic lights.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/22+St+John+St,+Oxford+OX1+2LH/@51.7564008,-1.2619549,98m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x4876c6a68613894f:0x1a9145b657e3824d!8m2!3d51.7564055!4d-1.2617323
I wonder whether I have located another possible, tenuous connection. This pilot episode, perhaps contains a small similarity in one aspect, to the Morse episode, “Service of All the Dead”. Both episodes feature a murder, where clothes are removed from the victim, for reasons of subterfuge. In “First Bus to Woodstock”, after killing 15 year-old Mary Tremlett on the Saturday night, Rosalind Stromming, the operatic soprano, and one of Morse’s favourite singers, removed Mary’s clothes and placed a new dress next to Mary’s body. She used that to forge an alibi. The next morning Rosalind wore an identical dress at the bus stop, to the one left beside Mary. She had, of course, bought two identical dresses to perform this devious trick. In addition, she wore a red-haired wig, at the said bus stop. This deception was carried out to disguise Rosalind as Mary. The second dress and the wig were later burnt. As we know, a vet passing by in his car, thought he saw a red-haired girl in the previously mentioned dress, early on the Sunday morning, waiting for the “First Bus to Woodstock”. This witness account, made it look as if Mary was still alive at some point early on the Sunday, before being killed later that morning, at the time shown by Miles Percival’s damaged watch, which Rosalind had also left, close to the murdered body. This created an alibi for Rosalind, as she was in church at the supposed time of the murder, represented by the time on the watch.
In “Service of All the Dead”, the Vicar and his congregation gave morphine laced wine to the Vicar’s brother, a Vagrant, who had been blackmailing the Vicar, in order to remove his clothes more easily, and redress him as someone else, before finally completing the brutal murder. The Vicar and his friends then purposely misidentified the body, and created a pretence, that it was another murder victim altogether. They hoped this would send Morse and the Police on a wild goose chase. As they would be looking at the motives behind the killing of someone, completely different to the person, who was actually murdered. In fact, it did indeed cause Morse to spend much of the episode thinking the first murder victim, the Vicar’s brother, was alive, and that he was the killer. In the meantime, the falsely identified dead person, was the one actually alive, and he went on a killing spree himself, until Morse finally worked out this bewildering puzzle of deception.
Needless to say, Rosalind had deliberately damaged the watch of Miles Percival, the ex-boyfriend of Mary, and she placed it, in the vicinity of the crime at Bagley Woods, to frame Miles for the murder of Mary. She would later kill Miles, but dress it up as suicide, to make it look as if Miles had murdered his ex-girlfriend, and then shot himself, in a fit of remorse.
Anyway, I hope you are feeling better Chris. You were badly missed on Wednesday, as the host and leader of the Twitch discussions, but thanks for replaying the Endeavour episode, “Girl”, again.
Actually, I have a couple of questions about the great Endeavour pilot episode. Regarding, the character Dempsey, played by John Light, what precisely was his job title or role? Obviously he was doing his very best to protect the sleazy Government Minister, played by Patrick Malahide. In order to prevent the Police and Media from finding out the sordid truth, relating to the sex parties. When Morse and Thursday asked Dempsey, “are you Special Branch? He answered, “yes, why not, you could call me that”, or something along those lines. Hence, I just wondered, who was he employed by, the government, special branch or military intelligence?
My second point, concerned the discussion we had last Wednesday week. Who was the father of Mary’s aborted baby? I feel we came to the conclusion, it could have been the Minister, or the various other prominent people, that attended the sex parties. What about another suggestion, I forgot to mention, Rowan Stromming, the Classics lecturer, who was supposed to be mentoring 15 year-old Mary, after a stupid bet with his fellow academic, Alexander Rees. Rowan’s wife, Rosalind, obviously was suspicious enough, that it led her to kill Mary, as I previously described, so could Rowan be another possible candidate, as the father of Mary’s aborted baby?
Finally, I have found a very interesting conversation with the writer Russell Lewis, all about the wonderful Endeavour pilot, he scripted. The interview on this link I have discovered, was from 2014, just before the broadcast of the first episode of the second series, “Trove”. Nevertheless, the article is mainly all about “First Bus to Woodstock”, and there is also a shorter interview with Abigail Thaw, John Thaw’s daughter, who of course, plays the Oxford Mail Editor, Dorothea Frazil. Here is the link:
http://dmbarcroft.com/2014/03/
It is very possible Stromming was the father. I have read most of Barcroft’s interviews.
Thanks for the quick reply, Chris. I look forward to joining you and others, as usual, for tomorrow night’s Endeavour episode, Fugue, thank you.
Hi Chris. As I have said before, given how busy you must be with your university studies, I’m very grateful for all your kind replies to me, thanks. If and when, you find the time to read my comments further above on this page, I would just like to know what you think of those tenuous connections, I wrote down. If you don’t mind, please. That is the connection, provided by Antony Richards and Philip Attwell, regarding the final poignant scene of the pilot episode. Related to when Morse, after seeing John Thaw’s face in the driver’s mirror, drives out of Pusey Street, and the camera shows very briefly, the front green door of 22 St. John Street, which was the former home of Wendy/Susan in her university days,