The Miniature Murders

The Midsomer Museum of the family has a new collection to show off: a row of miniature dollhouses, each one a perfect little world. The unveiling draws a crowd, which is exactly what a murderer needs. A prolific real-estate agent is shot in full view of the onlookers, and the worlds of miniature homes and real ones collide with a bump. It is hard to think of a more Midsomer way to kill someone than at a display of domestic perfection.

Barnaby and DS Jamie Winter arrive to find a museum full of people who all saw something and none of whom will say what. The investigation spreads from the tiny rooms on display to the actual properties the dead man dealt in, and the connections between the two keep the inquiry busy. Around them move the people whose lives and secrets are interwoven with the town: Carys Nicholson, Jemima Starling, Alexander and Fiona Beauvoisin, Holly Ackroyd and Maxine Dobson, each of them a small world of their own, kept as carefully as any dollhouse. In a village that prizes order, somebody has left the lid off.

Helen Jenkins wrote the episode with Caroline Graham, and Toby Frow directed. Neil Dudgeon and Nick Hendrix anchor the investigation, with Fiona Dolman as Sarah, Annette Badland as Fleur Perkins, Rosalie Craig as Carys Nicholson, Katy Brand as Jemima Starling, Roger Barclay as Alexander Beauvoisin, Clare Holman as Fiona Beauvoisin, Joanna Page as Holly Ackroyd and Eleanor Bron as Maxine Dobson. Eleanor Bron alone is worth watching, and there is a good argument the whole thing is.

The miniature setting does more than supply a quirky backdrop. It gives the show a running joke about order: people tidy their houses and their lives, and put the unpleasant parts in the attic. And the dead man's work had pulled him through a great many such lives, more than one of them with something to hide. The mystery is in finding which of them finally turned the key.