Well, this ends Death in the Air and this entire series. I don’t have a whole lot to say about this episode as separate from the previous episodes in this four-parter; it’s solid and you probably won’t be surprised by the culprit, but the flashback sequence where Poirot explains how the murder was committed while everyone was in the same room is very well done. But a word or two about this series on the whole. I went into this series expecting a kind of goofy good time; Agatha Christie anime starring a teenage girl and her pet duck? I mean, this is going to be wacky, right? And it did have some funny stuff in it and some cute stuff, usually revolving around Oliver.
But what I wasn’t really prepared for was just how serious this show took the original stories. Every episode had two credited directors; there was a stable of rotating directors, but Naohito Takahashi got a director credit on all 39 episodes, leading me to believe he was basically the show-runner and I have to say he did a great job. The show never got overly silly and it was willing to take its time and let some adaptations stretch out into two or four parters. Mabel and Oliver never felt intrusive and I was surprised to see that the show actually took Mabel on an overarching character journey, from being a little silly and childish to ultimately facing some sad situations and learning how to be more mature and compassionate. I loved that the show adapted some of Christie’s darker stories and it let them be pretty sad. Sleeping Murder is the prime example, in my opinion, which has a really melancholy and bittersweet ending that’s all about the characters. And so, as this episode rolled to a close, instead of getting the usual “next week on,” we saw a reel of clips from earlier in the show as Mabel closed us out with a voice over about how much she’d grown and changed over her adventures with Poirot & Marple. And you know what? She really had and that felt super-great. All in all, this was a fun show and I’m glad I watched it.
Oh, one small thing. I really thought that the show would end with Poirot & Marple finally meeting. I mean, this show posits that they exist in the same universe, but also that they have only ONE degree of separation since they both know Mabel. I don’t know how you don’t let them meet in that case. I mean, I’m enough of a purist that I wouldn’t have wanted them to solve a case together or anything, but it would have been super-cool if the final scene of the show had been Marple visiting London and Mabel introducing them. Just that would have been really fun. Anyway, whatever. Still a really good, if flawed, show that was even occasionally downright great. 3 ½ stars.
tl;dr – series finale is solid as usual and the show has a nice button on Mabel’s overarching character journey; a fun series all the way around. 3 ½ stars.
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