The final episode of the detective series inspired by the work of the queen of crime is broadcast on France 2 this Friday March 8. We detail the reasons for stopping this qualitative and popular series.
Farewell Commissioner Greco, Inspector Beretta and Rose Bellecour: The Little Murders of Agatha Christie broadcasts its final episode this Friday, March 8, 2024. It is on France 2, from 9:10 p.m. and in streaming on france.tv, that it will be necessary go to watch the last TV movie of season 3, but also of the entire detective series inspired by the work of the queen of crime. An unexpected surprise for fans, since the series remained widely watched and popular, even if some criticized the new season after the immense success of season 2.
It is not the audiences that are at issue in the stopping of Agatha Christie’s Little Murders, assures producer Sophie Révil at the microphone of Télé-Loisirs. The latter explains that “after fifteen years, we were a little at the end of our inspiration, you have to know how to finish a series”. But in an interview with the magazine specializing in television news, Arthur Dupont gives another version: “France 2 reduced the budget and Sophie Revil and Escazal (the production company) didn’t want to do things with less money because that meant losing quality and I think they are absolutely right. It’s all about the big money…”
Regardless, fans of Little Murders as the series was affectionately nicknamed will not be treated to a grand departure. The series ends with an overall classic episode, even if very nice. No winking appearance from Swan Laurence for example, when the actor Samuel Labarthe was said to be leaving, nor a departure with great fanfare, like the finale of season 2 which said goodbye to the trio of music investigators. If fans will be delighted to find the three protagonists in an investigation that is always well written and entertaining, they will perhaps regret that the series is leaving through the back door.
Because The Little Murders of Agatha Christie was a major detective series on French television for 15 years already. It distinguished itself from other programs of the same genre which populate the small window not only by offering adaptations in television film format of the British author’s investigations, as the title of the series indicates, but also by transposing its intrigues to different periods , and with colorful investigators.
The first season, broadcast from 2009 to 2012, followed Commissioner Jean Larosière (Antoine Duléry) and his deputy Emile Lampion (Marius Colucci) in the 1930s. Season 2 featured the investigations of Commissioner Swan Laurence (Samuel Labarthe), of the journalist Alice Avril (Blandine Bellavoir) and the secretary of the commissioner Marlène Leroy (Elodie Frenck) in the 1950s, from 2013 to 2020. Since 2021, a new trio has led the investigation in Lilles in the 1970s: the commissioner Annie Gréco (Emilie Gavois-Kahn), inspector Max Beretta (Arthur Dupont) and psychologist Rose Bellecour (Chloé Chaudoye).
The spicy writing and the entertaining interpretation of the actors, as well as the very precise work carried out on the costumes and the sets, made all the quality and salt of the series. And the spectators had responded to the meeting, since the first two seasons had gathered an average of 4.66 and 4.43 million viewers respectively. The Little Murders of Agatha Christie will definitely be missed on French television.
