The Stitcher Society

A post-operative heart rehabilitation club is an unlikely setting for murder, which is exactly why Midsomer picked it. The members are people who have been given a second chance and intend to make the most of it. Then the club admits a local outcast, a man controversially acquitted of murder years earlier, and the atmosphere shifts from gentle convalescence to something far less safe. The members' dreams of a second chance begin to be cut short. For a room full of people who have survived surgery, the sudden danger feels especially unfair.

Barnaby and DS Jamie Winter are drawn into a group that was supposed to be a refuge, and the mystery turns on what the newcomer's arrival has disturbed. The members all have pasts they would rather keep stitched shut: Rueben Tooms, Alberta Tooms, Mimi Dagmar, Georgie Tremayne, and the Marxes, Harry and Erika. Every conversation in the club seems to circle back to the acquittal, and everyone has a reason to want the old case reopened or buried for good. The inquiry has to sort out which of those reasons is worth killing for.

Jeff Povey wrote the episode with Caroline Graham, and Roberto Bangura directed. Neil Dudgeon and Nick Hendrix anchor the investigation, with Fiona Dolman as Sarah, Annette Badland as Fleur Perkins, Silas Carson as Rueben Tooms, Lizzy McInnerny as Alberta Tooms, Hannah Waddingham as Mimi Dagmar, Harriet Thorpe as Georgie Tremayne, Keith Allen as Harry Marx and Natalie Simpson as Erika Marx. Hannah Waddingham gives the whole thing a bit of glamour, which only makes the danger feel closer.

The show has always been good at settings that make murder feel like a betrayal of a promise, and a rehab club is a strong version of that. These people were told they would get better. And they believed it, which is exactly what the killer counts on. The quiet, decent setting makes the whole business feel more unpleasant than a dozen country-house murders.