Midsomer Murders (TV Series) The Creeper (2009) User Reviews

Trouble in successful families

[Tweekums · 9/10 · 1 February 2010]

Once again there are crimes being committed in the Midsomers although as the episode starts the crime is theft rather than murder. Somebody is breaking into the houses of the well to do and stealing items from the residents' bedrooms while they sleep, this thief has been given the nickname The Creeper. Sgt. Jones is in charge of the case until the Creeper robs the Chief Constable then Barnaby is put on the case. Of course the case will get more serious. Jack Filby has invited family and friends around to celebrate the birthday a friend's son. This being Midsomer the party ends with raised voices; Jack's daughter Martha being thrown out for flirting with friend David Roper and him later leaving after an shouting match with his host over a threat to write a book featuring the lives of their circle of friends. David turns up at the Chetthams' house bleeding from the head. During the night The Creeper pays a visit and the next day David is dead... was he murdered by The Creeper or is there somebody else committing crimes?

At first The Creeper is the obvious suspect but Barnaby isn't convinced, he is even more convinced when The Creeper pays him a late night visit but instead of robbing him leaves him two photographs, one of which has a hair caught in the frame... it appears the Creeper has made their first mistake. I won't say more as I don't want to spoil the ending.

While the plot is fairly standard for country house murder mysteries it doesn't feature the silliness some episodes contain. Having become a classic of its genre Midsomer attracts a range of well known guest stars including Rik Mayell, Jenny Agutter and Amanda Ryan, these all performed well as did the less well known guests. I especially liked Amanda Ryan in the relatively minor roll as "bad daughter" Martha who flirts with David, Sgt. Jones and the audience. I had an idea what the ending would be and it turned out Barnaby had the same idea... but this proved to be incorrect and he had to turn to an unlikely source to solve the crime.

Suspend some of your disbelief, and you will love it.

[Sleepin_Dragon · 9/10 · 25 September 2019]

I often find that episodes of Midsomer Murders get better with time. The Creeper for example, I didn't care for it when it first went out, however after a recent viewing I thoroughly enjoyed it.

It's a great murder mystery, it's superbly acted, and features a few moments of humour. A few minor gripes. The Creeper, is pretty acrobatic, which I can deal with, the problem I had, is that he or she had a great ability to find heavy sleepers, as everyone he or she encountered slept heavily. The upper class family is once again shown as being utterly dysfunctional and potty.

Those minor gripes aside, it's actually a brilliant story, character driven, with the focus more on the plot then the extravagant murder method.

Mayall was tremendous, deserved a bigger part, as was the entire cast. All in all, this is a great episode. 9/10

Jeepers creepers

[vitoscotti · 8/10 · 16 February 2020]

Very obvious who the creeper was seeing the slender athletic build. Outstanding story that was well crafted. Tallis and Martha were marvelous. The villianous devil ladies was a curve ball. Look for the rediculous toupee on the police commissioner. Especially at his first appearance when it's flying all over the place. Later it's jelled or trimmed down. Barnaby is lenient when he finds the creeper? The same person who caused Joyce to almost break her neck falling down the stairs? Barnaby is now a pushover for the hot ladies. Vito S 2:15-20

Fun Episode - Creeper as Gentlemen Robber

[vintagegeek · 10/10 · 17 January 2019]

A slew of reliable actors including Jenny Agutter. Gentlemen robbers are always fun, especially when they interact with their targets. You can take in the sub-plots as well as the main one. I always enjoy scenes involving the beautiful estates, horses, dogs, etc. I especially liked the twist / encounter at the end between Barnaby and the creeper.

An enjoyable episode

[wjspears · 9/10 · 3 October 2021]

The very first scene has a masked cat burglar--The Creeper--in the darkened bedroom of an elderly lord and lady, stealing personal items.

The elderly woman groggily wakens, and thinking it is her husband who is up, asks for the glass of water and a kiss. When the cat burglar obliges with both requests, we know that this episode is going to have a whimsical vibe to it--that Midsomer Murders can do so well.

Who the Creeper is--it seems to me-- is telegraphed fairly early on, just as it is also clear, early on, that the cat burglar is not the murderer.

It is always nice to see haughty lords and ladies getting their comeuppance from civil servant, DCI Barnaby!

Almost the whole Chettham family are snobs. But the grand dame, My Lady Elizabeth Chettham (terrifically played by Barbara Jefford) is particularly obnoxious.

The murder mystery itself is admirably complex, with evidence and motives being revealed in small doses. Everyone has secrets, and they want it kept that way--the police have No Business prying into personal affairs!

But when even Barnaby's superior, CC Richard Lovell (Paul Shelley) is being less than candid with him, Barnaby's reaction is priceless--a mixture of impatience and civility.

Incredible plot but well done

[jeff-playsorgans · 8/10 · 21 July 2014]

The plot, as is usual with Midsomer, was daft, but the acting is always good, and it is pleasing to have an English semi-rural setting and English dialogue that we can understand. I thought Amanda Ryan was brilliant as the sexy daughter. Is she normally blonde? The dark hair suited her well. Jaydee

I am told that I must write more lines. Why? I've said what I want to say, and kept it brief.

Moreover I object to having my CORRECT spelling of the word 'dialogue' being challenged, I suppose you want the American spelling?

Well buddy, if you want American spellings, you write 'em yourself but don't put MY name to them.... STET

One of the best episodes of MSM

[ursino-35217 · 10/10 · 21 October 2020]

Brilliantly acted and written, the premise of 'The Creeper' could have easily been spun off as a series of its own.

Family intrigue in Midsomer as always

[safenoe · 7/10 · 11 March 2016]

It was great to see Rik Mayall (who I loved in The Young Ones all those years ago) in Midsomer Murders, as it's like a rite of passage for any British actor to be in the show. He plays an author who knows a bit too much and you can foresee what his fate is. What's not obvious is the culprit(s).

The beautiful Jenny Agutter was in the episode, and I remember her from An American Werewolf in London.

One trope in this episode, the family doctor makes a phone call to meet up in a spot, and before you can say "murderer" she is murdered. It's a trademark Midsomer plot line but it's still fun seeing it when it appears on screen.

The best of season 12 so far

[boxyfella · 9/10 · 13 May 2022]

This is a really good story, and one of my favourites, despite my revulsion at the killers. Yes, most killers are nasty, but has there ever been a nastier pair of killers in Midsomer?

A lot of the fun in this episode is watching Barnaby and Jones rattle the upper crust family's cages - a familiar theme in Midsomer. Why is it whenever someone kills to protect the good name of the family, they don't realise that the ensuing scandal involving a conviction for murder would be far more damaging? Still, if they did we wouldn't have a story, and this is one of the best. There is also some good fun at the Chief Constable's expense, much to Barnaby's amusement.

The guest stars are wonderful, Jenny Agutter, Barbara Jefford, Julian Wadham and especially Rik Mayall put in great performances.

DC Stephens is wasted in this episode. In fact I was beginning to think she wasn't in it until she appears in a scene lasting less than a minute.

There are a couple of things I didn't quite understand. How did the Creeper know that the Rembrandt drawing was a fake? Also, I'm not sure how much William Chettham actually knew. In the big denouement at the end he seemed genuinely shocked at the actions of his wife and mother, seemingly also not knowing that Freddy was the gangster's son. But earlier there is a scene with the Chettham family and Jack Filby where they are all trying to persuade Freddy that he must not reveal 'the big secret' to Barnaby. What secret was that? That Freddy was the gangster's son or that he was Jack's? If the latter, it wasn't exactly a big secret.

The Old Uncooperative Rich Family

[Hitchcoc · 6/10 · 17 May 2016]

Once again Barnaby and his sidekick have to get past a group of snobbish landowners. Even when a murder is committed, they have no interest in assisting the police. Oh, yes, we have the vampish daughter who drinks too much and embarrasses the family. The second plot has to do with a near-mythical burglar named the Creeper. This figure comes into people's homes while they sleep and brazenly robs them, sometimes moving around their sleeping bodies. It isn't that there is anything inherently wrong with all this, except it has been done to death. The creeper even shows up at Barnaby's, Joyce awakening while he is in their bedroom. There are some pretty far-fetched events and the characters, while hating each other, still keep secrets.

Barnaby outfoxed

[xmasdaybaby1966 · 9/10 · 13 December 2020]

The best episode for a while with not only the pathology department in need but there is a serial thief element to the episode too to keep you guessing.

not a high point

[blanche-2 · 7/10 · 22 January 2014]

Two plots that collide into one: in "The Creeper," someone is going into the homes of the wealthy during the night and robbing them. One of the people robbed is the Chief Constable. He assigns DCI Barnaby to the case.

After one particular burglary, a man is found dead -- David Roper, a ghostwriter who was visiting the Chettam family. Everyone had spent an evening at the home of Jack Filby, the now-owner of the Chettam estate, with the family having had a reversal of fortunes and living in another house on the estate.

Roper is a recovering alcoholic, but after a huge fight with Filby, he grabs a bottle of brandy and runs out of the house. A second murder, from the same group that attended the dinner, is murdered. The Creeper then breaks into the Barnaby home and leaves two clues.

What follows is the discovery of a family secret people are eager to cover up. Did The Creeper commit the second murder? Barnaby has to sort it all out.

This is a somewhat ordinary Midsomer Mystery, but it sports a good cast: Jenny Agutter, Amanda Ryan, and Barbara Jefford. I figure in 12 seasons they can't all be winners, and Nettles and Jane Wymark as Joyce Barnaby always are fun.

Another disappointment in a disappointing season.

[poolandrews · 5/10 · 19 May 2010]

Midsomer Murders: The Creeper starts as a burglar dubbed 'the Creeper' in the press is terrorising Midsomer breaking into the homes of the Midsomer influential & rich, the latest to fall victim to the Creeper is Midsomer police Chief Constable Richard Lovell (Paul Shelley) who is straight onto his best man DCI Tom Barnaby (John Nettles) to apprehend the culprit. Meanwhile rich businessman Jack Filby (George Costigan) is planning his annual party for friends & family at his Chettam Park House estate, Jack's usual guests are invited including ghost writer & author David Roper (Rik Mayall) who wants to write a book about their generation, starting right back during the 60's. Jack fumes & refuses to have anything to do with the book which threatens to stir up old secrets, secrets that someone will kill for as the next morning Roper is found dead. Barnaby has to put the Creeper case to one side & find a murderer but the two cases seem linked somehow...

Episode 6 from season 12 this Midsomer Murders mystery wad directed by Renny Rye & The Creeper is the last of the episodes from season twelve that I had not see but now that I have I would consider the twelfth season as a whole pretty average with Small Mercies (2009) featuring the cute model village probably the highlight. Like the majority of season twelve The Creeper is average at best, the first kill doesn't happen for thirty odd minutes & while there's plenty of scene setting & character development it does start to get boring & feel like padding as you just want the murder mystery to kick in. The sub-plot about the Creeper is a reasonable distracting but after the first half the Creeper's involvement becomes virtually nil. The Creeper is one of the few Midsomer Murders episodes where two killers were working together, the motive is rather flimsy as it's not much more than saving the families name & avoiding any embarrassment. OK, so if your friends & neighbours knew that you a posh lady of the Manor had slept with a gangster & had his son it might be embarrassing at first & a bit of a surprise but to kill two people in cold blood to cover it up seems extreme & rather unnecessary especially in today's liberal times. I mean they could have just had it out on an episode of Jeremy Kyle or something, right? At over 90 minutes with plenty of exposition you need to listen & concentrate but there aren't that many suspects or red-herrings, even the methods for murder are rather dull & forgettable. The Creeper is also another prime example of Barnaby breaking the law & bending the rules to suit his own moralistic judgement as he turns a blind eye to the Creeper's identity & lets them go free, aren't the police meant to impartial & have sworn to uphold the law?

There are two murders here, neither is particularly memorable although the shotgun blast to the throat might have been messy if we had actually seen it. Animal lovers beware that a Pidgeon has it's neck broken on screen, I couldn't tell if it was special effect or not but it looked real to me. Another fine looking episode Polesdon Lacey House owned by the National Trust was used as Chettam Park House. The acting is fine as usual & two pretty heavy weight guest stars Rik Mayall & Jenny Agutter both appear.

The Creeper is yet another disappointingly average episode in a disappointing average season twelve, sure it's watchable & feature a fine cast & nice locations as usual but the motives for murder are plain dull & it wastes two great actor's in small roles. Lets hope for better in season thirteen which kicks off with The Made-to-Measure Murders (2010).

Pretty average!

[harrykivi · 5/10 · 19 November 2022]

The previous episode "Small Mercies" was a solid episode that managed to intrigue. "The Creeper" though continues the 12th season on an average note. It's not as uninteresting as "The Glitch", but doesn't fall far behind.

Let' s start with the good aspects, shall we?

. The production values of the episode are great as usual. The episode is well-directed and the music's good. John Nettles and Jason Hughes are great in the leads, but out of the solid guest stars Jenny Agutter, Julian Wadham, Amanda Ryan and especially Rik Mayall fare the best.

. The story has some intrigue, wry humor in it. The plot about a theif committing robberies was interesting to begin with and the solution (there is more than one killer here) had its moments.

But....

. There are serious issues with pacing in this episode. There story drags quite a lot at times to be honest. The plot about the creeper started off very promising, but then goes nowhere with Barnaby deciding to let the theif go, which is a very unusual step for Tom Barnaby. The murders are very forgettable too and the motive for the murders is very dull, to put it mildly.

Overall, an okay episode.

5/10 HK.

One of the worst episodes in a usually-good series

[spetersen-79-962044 · 3/10 · 19 July 2015]

I have become somewhat of a fan of Midsomer Murders, but in any series this long, it's inevitable that a few bad shows creep in among the good. I'm sorry to report that "The Creeper" is one of the worst.

DCI Barnaby behaves out of character, "forgiving" a criminal on his own recognizance (in previous episodes, he has been quite normal, for a policeman, in his attitude towards the unlawful). The mystery itself was not well portrayed. I mean, I do not always guess the killer (I'd say I have a scoring rate of about 25-40%), but this time I had to roll my eyes and say "oh, come on! THAT was hardly fair." I kept feeling that the screenwriter was fixated on some hobbyhorse I couldn't understand, rather than just giving us a fun murder.

If this was the first episode I'd ever seen, I don't know if I would have stuck around for more. Maybe, because I wouldn't have known how wrongly Barnabay was displayed. But now I know and love Barnaby, and this wasn't him.

'Midsomer Murders' meets "The Creeper"

[TheLittleSongbird · 5/10 · 19 February 2017]

As has been said by me a number of times, 'Midsomer Murders' is one of my most watched and most re-watched shows. It is nowhere near as good now and the Tom Barnaby-era wasn't alien to average or less episodes, but when it was on form or at its best boy was it good.

Season 12 mostly was a very mixed bag, with none of the episodes being disasters but the best ones ("Small Mercies" and "The Black Book") being only decent. No 'Midsomer Murders' low-points but no classics either. "The Creeper" was an example of an episode that struck me as instantly forgettable on first viewing other than Barnaby being out of character that the Creeper character. On repeat viewing, it is an episode that still doesn't strike me as particularly memorable at the end of the day and is one of the weaker episodes of the season (though not of the show, there's worse before and since).

"The Creeper" has strengths. The production values as always are just great, the idyllic look of it contrasting very well with the story's grimness, and quaint and atmospheric photography, as well as a genuinely creepy look in places. The music fits perfectly, with some lush jauntiness and sometimes an ominous quality, and the theme tune one of the most memorable and instantly recognisable of the genre.

John Nettles and Jason Hughes are both superb, individually and together (their chemistry, and the chemistry with Daniel Casey and John Hopkins before Hughes, being a huge part of their episodes' charm and what keeps it afloat). Can't fault the supporting cast either, was very impressed with Amanda Ryan, Jenny Agutter and Rik Mayall. Parts of the script are thought-provoking and humorous and the Creeper plot-line had real potential and got the episode off to a genuinely creepy start.

However, "The Creeper" primarily suffers from a story that too often doesn't engage enough due to some draggy and at times extraneous padding, a general lack of atmosphere after a promising start and parts not making sense or being as plausible as they ought, less padding and more explanation would have made things better. After seeing many inventive murders throughout the show, one of the most imaginative ones being in the previous episode "Small Mercies"!, the murders here felt very ordinary (the second one too unnecessary plot-device-like). As did a rather limp and far-fetched final solution (where the reveal of the responsible was surprising but they could not have dreamt up a more old-hat motive if they tried, really felt like "they killed for that?").

Much more could have been done with the creeper story-line, that had potential and started off creepily but was side-lined too early and the revelation of the perpetrator and their motive were predictable. The characters generally are too vanilla, outside of the chemistry between Barnaby and Jones and with Barnaby's family, likewise with most of the script. Barnaby being out of character and unlawful was a turn off with no real justification.

In conclusion, okay but forgettable. 5/10 Bethany Cox

Nothing significant

[enkiddu-725-703632 · 3/10 · 3 May 2010]

While watching this episode I always had an impression that Payne had very little time to invent something decent and was in a hurry. After the brilliant "The Dogleg Murders" - a total blunder. The plot is absolutely not worked through, contains too many clichés repeated many times in previous episodes. The whole plot seems not plausible enough! Why was it so much important to keep secret the real identity of Freddy? Maybe I misunderstood something, still, the final solution disappointed me greatly. The circle of suspects was very narrow, some of the characters appear maximum twice, everything goes around three or four characters and it's not very difficult to guess who of them "dunnit". But that an old lady-invalid was also took part in murders - that is something really unusual! And absolutely improbable. The characters still are vary pale, clichéd, no touch of personality, the plot rather boring than exciting and absolutely not convincing. The second murder seemed to me out of place, one could've easily done without it, but it was necessary 'cause without a second murder the plot would've been too much boring. And the identity of the Creeper becomes evident right from the scene with the dinner in Freddy's honour! Honestly, I wasn't impressed, I could hardly wait till the end of the film without awaiting anything striking - and nothing didn't really happen. So, the episode is mediocre, below average