Campion - The Complete First Season
"Do you take the long road?" asks a gruff restaurant manager of a hapless  drifter. Thus is launched one of the serpentine mysteries written byMargery Allingham, featuring a genteel 1930s sleuth named Albert Campion  (played by Peter Davison, a formerDoctor Who), whose bland good manners mask  a macabre humor and a relish for solving crimes. All of Allingham's  stories take the long road, winding their way through a collection of  eccentric personalities, improbable murders, and unexpected narrative  twists.Look to the Ladycenters around the attempted theft of a  1000-year-old golden chalice from the upper-class family entrusted with it  care, encompassing witchcraft, a vast criminal organization, strange  rituals, and a murderous horse.The Case of the Late Pigtakes  Campion and his cantankerous manservant Lugg (Brian Glover) into the  British countryside, where they encounter a childhood bully, enigmatic  letters, a human corpse replaced by a dead pig, and some very important  ice cubes. InPolice at the Funeral, Campion and Lugg investigate a  murder among an upper-crust family of bickering middle-aged siblings and  their imperious mother. And inDeath of a Ghostthe normally  unflappable sleuth loses a bit of his objectivity when murder strikes  among some good friends, the bohemian enclave that's built up around a  deceased artist who decreed that every year after his death one of his  12 last paintings should be unveiled. During a sudden blackout at the  annual event, someone stabs an abrasive young artist with a pair of ornate  scissors. Campion's interplay with the crusty Lugg, a former burglar with  an almost impenetrable Cockney accent, is the series' strongest element.  The roundabout plots poke fun at the conventions of murder mysteries while  providing all the comfortable pleasures of the genre.--Bret Fetzer