Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries (2012) s03e04 – Blood & Money
"Miss Fisher's," as a rule, doesn't do children in danger episodes. There's been at least one other one, maybe another (but I don't think really think so), but this episode opens with a kid buried in a shallow grave. It's very intense right off.
Though it's also got some post-war things to work through and they're not as intense as usual so it sort of evens out.
Essie Davis's client this episode–though Dr. Mac (Tammy Macintosh) is also going to have need of her)—is young Jarin Towney. He and his brother live on the very mean streets of Collingwood, where they hear of heroic Miss Fisher and her golden revolver. It's pretty awesome to hear about the lore; Davis is a real-life (non-powered) superhero, she should have a fan club.
Towney's aforementioned brother is missing; will Davis take the case and find him? Pretty soon, Macintosh is calling with some bad news—that dead boy in the shallow grave from the cold open? They find him near her hospital.
And it turns out there are three boys missing in total, so even if it's not Towney's brother, there's still something very unpleasant going on.
The prime suspects are a nurse (Diana Glenn) and a severely disfigured war veteran (James O'Connell), who Davis and Ashleigh Cummings espy being up to strange shenanigans but maybe not illicit ones. Macintosh and her boss, Dan Spielman, are trying to get a donation to the hospital to fund a veteran rehabilitation program and the dead kids thing is really not helping. So Davis is doubly on the case.
And not just because she's the Collingwood girl made (quite) good.
It's a good mystery, with some excellent twists, and a decent enough finish. Besides the danger to the kids, there's also the surprising unpleasantness of Hugo Johnstone-Burt's subplot. He's been cast out of home because of his conversion to Catholicism (for Cummings) and he's keeping that situation secret from her. It's the darkest Johnstone-Burt's ever had to go and it's rather affecting.
No drama for Nathan Page and Davis this episode, just the comfortable flirting—though there is a touch of some significant, which Cummings interrupts. It's a good episode; Towney and Davis are excellent together.
When you think about it, it's kind of a surprise she hasn't assembled The Esplanade Peculiars yet. She does live at 221B, after all.
2015, Directed by Peter Andrikidis, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, Television
Anthony J. Sharpe, Ashleigh Cummings, Blood & Money, Essie Davis, Hugo Johnstone-Burt, Nathan Page, Tammy Macintosh, Travis McMahon
Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries (2012) s03e03 – Murder & Mozzarella
Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries (2012) s03e02 – Murder & the Maiden
Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries (2012) s03e07 – Game, Set & Murder