Jan 6
ENDEAVOUR 1x3 — ROCKET
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ENDEAVOUR 1x3 — ROCKET
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We talk about the tiger being weird, but like, remember the pelican???
This was also the first episode I ever saw… and also that I did recognise Anton Lesser from Game of Thrones so I most likely went “that’s Qyburn. And a pelican?”
ITV Endeavour Characters as art!! (Part 2?)
Names and explanations of things are under the cut!! (A lot of it is colour-based and somewhat repetitive, be warned)
I really do think that all Endeavour fans need to read a) the Discworld Watch books and b) Monstrous Regiment, because Russell Lewis is *such* a Discworld fan, and there are literal lines lifted (omg the moment where Max gets a line spoken by the Watch's Igor is INCREDIBLE), and it's a delight to know that Thursday is very blatantly partly based on:- 1. the most cynical copper who ever lived, who is constantly fighting his own darkness and has a son called Sam and can be terrifyingly protective of the people he loves 2. the most horrifyingly competent and scheming and also terrifyingly protective of "his little lads" sergeant who ever sergeanted and who is also canonically... (behind the cut is a fairly major Monstrous Regiment spoiler...)
... a trans man. <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 (This means so so so much to me I cannot tell you. :) )
(And omg, yep, Jackrum's "talking to Ruperts" voice and Vimes's "talking to aristocrats" voice is totally deployed when Thursday is dealing with Bright before Bright's upgrade to awesomeness. And, um, one of the aristocrats who Vimes deals with on a regular basis? Is called Ronald Rust. NO ONE can tell me that Reginald Bright wasn't originally partly based on both Rust and Lt Blouse, though of course Bright (like Blouse) does get that upgrade. :D )
(I think it's not too much of a stretch also to see Endeavour's Morse as just a little bit based on Carrot (as well as a bit on Vimes too), to see Jakes as based partly on both Nobby and all three of Wazzer, Lofty, and Tonker (AAAAAAAAAH MY HEART FRICKING OUCH), and so on. And I am still waiting for someone to write a fic in which Joan's a werewolf; I'm not usually a Morse/Joan shipper but I would read the *fuck* out of that. :D )
"No one is suggesting that Detective Inspector Thursday has any involvement. Not for a moment." "We just need to be sure of him. Word on the wire is he's got pretty tight with Box."
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Endeavour: Character Catchphrases and Iconic Lines
A conversation the other day got me thinking about the idea of catchphrases. Morse never really has one. I'm sure if asked his opinion, he'd call the whole idea pedestrian and clichéd—although by the time we arrive at the Inspector Morse series, "Lew-is!" is a good candidate.
Other characters in Endeavour, however, most certainly have signature phrases or at least frequently used words:
Thursday: Mind how you go
Strange: Matey
Jakes: Wotcher
DeBryn: Shall we say 2 o'clock?
Win: There, then, you'll do, Fred.
In addition, you've also got characters in Endeavour with iconic lines that somehow manage to embody their personalities and/or storylines. For me, these include:
Thursday: Then I'll have to take off my hat.
Bright: This pelican is an albatross around my neck.
Trewlove: Maybe I like grim.
Cyril Morse: I never liked the police.
Jakes (In response to Morse asking, "Didn’t you go to Sunday school?"): You don't want to know where I went.
Ronnie Box (as described by Morse): He's a fist with a warrant card.
There are probably more—but that's where my brain stops for now.
endeavour musings xix
featuring: Exeunt i
MORSE: "Is that it?" CONDUCTOR: "That's it."
1. I just watched this last night, and the rest of the season in the last week or so. This is probably not the only thing I'll write on this (and the show as a whole), but I had to write something because, well, that's it. So, you can call this a bit of a first impressions post, reacting in the cooldown of the moment. And honestly? I'm a bit disappointed. And hurt -- if I'm allowed to be such a thing about a fictional show with made-up characters. One of the lessons you learn as a musician is that what the audience remembers is the beginning and the end: those are the two bits you have to land and land well. And Exeunt? Well, it's a bit of a mess isn't it? Every time I start thinking about it, I feel the need to launch a separate monograph, so I'll just stick to what's churning the most. Caveat lector.
2. Fred Thursday is not a murderer. He absolutely killed Tomahawk, but what is clearly depicted on screen is self defence. Tomahawk has verbally threatened Sam, he has a knife out, Thursday tells him to be "on [his] way" and Tomahawk replies he'll "do for the pair of them," and tries to stab Thursday. Thursday at this moment is unarmed, has not provoked him or threatened him--he has no intention of killing him. We later learn that Tomahawk in particular has two convictions for GBH, and is wanted for attempted murder. Thursday is more than twice his age, clearly ill, and under an immense amount of stress. Thursday even calls it "instinct." What little we are shown is absolutely self defence. The fact that even TvTropes lists Thursday as having "murdered" Tomahawk ! There are a lot of other unvoiced problems I have with this scenario, but the fact that the show managed to leave this ambiguous for viewers really bugs me. Laying everything else about Thursday aside, I don't think Morse would ever cover up an actual murder or attempted murder. Even for Thursday.
3. Yes, the Requiem, Morse closing his heart forever, everyone is dead to him, etc etc. I'm not trying to be trivial, I did think it was a beautiful fitting meta ending, but also, I do think it doesn't really work. Do I think it's a lovely mirror action of the Pilot? Absolutely. Do I think it works as a last scene? Yes. Is it beautiful? Yes. But does it wooooork to cast off Endeavour for IM? For me? No. The man who is IM tries over and over to let people in; to the point where his desperation blinds him to people who are murderers (should I say especially murderesses?). His old university professors, his old friends, random drunks he meets in pubs, the old guy around the corner with his car, Adele, Strange, Lewis. He still loves Joyce, and eventually his niece / nephew. He has an extended correspondence all over the world. Whatever he thinks of Gwen (you know, the stepmother who drove him to think about suicide as a teenager, and contributed to his serious drinking problem in Scherzo), he still helps take care of her in a nursing home. This is not a man who's closed his heart forever.
4. The way the show treats Morse's alcoholism and Sam's alcoholism / drug problem or dealing. I'm sorry, but what? Magical wand waved, and Morse has managed to get sober, go back to drinking but only in an as-needed way as the plot demands? The same thing with Sam, he's been wandering around in a drunken stupor for three episodes but now magically, at the end, he's bright-eyed, cleaned up and going to join the police. I do think this is a serious flaw of this season, and of the show as a whole, standing in the shadow of both Book!Morse and Thaw!Morse, where alcoholism is treated in a much more realistic and sophisticated way.
5. Justice and redemption: these have been our key motifs throughout the seasons. I do think part of the issue with Exeunt for me on a philosophical level is the loss of exactly what thrilled and consoled me about Deguello. Which is that Morse finally has to face up to the fact that ideal justice isn't possible. It's not just the dilemma with Thursday either. We have Jakes too, who shows up at BV because " It's like half of me has always been here. Half of me never left," and wanting to know about Peter Williams. And Morse (we assume) can't tell him for the same reason he can't tell Thursday: because Peter Williams was dead a long time ago. He can never "find" him for Jakes. He can never get justice for either Peter. Half of Peter Jakes will always be at BV. In some sense, it's just like Morse all over: justice for the dead is an answer that can be gotten because the dead no longer have questions, or change, or live. They are a book to be read, a puzzle to be solved. But in Deguello, into that gap -- which is always there, in justice-- stepped mercy and the hope of redemption. Box: "The world is bent. Always has been. We can't fix it." Thursday: "We can try." We don't get that hope here -- and that's what feels like a kick in the teeth about this ending. Justice, suum cuique, is impossible, and thus drives away Morse. There is no redemption; this death is the end.
6. Morse is once again saved by the narrative. Those bikers just neatly showed up so Morse never has to kill anyone. I don't know how many times I've pointed this out over the course of 36 episodes, but unlike Thursday, Morse is never faced with that final dilemma: it's always taken away from him by deus ex machina. Even in this episode: Lott shoots at Thursday, and he has to defend his brother and himself. There's no one to save him. Tomahawk tries to stab him and Sam, and he has to defend himself. There's no one to save him. And yet, Morse is saved here just like every other single time Morse is saved by the narrative.
7. The Joan / Morse plotline and wedding fantasy. I didn't think they put in the work to show us a happy Joan/Strange wedding but making it Morse-centric really is something else.
8. One of the themes about this episode / season in particular is straight out of 1850 and I Do Not Like It. We've learned, over the course of 9 seasons, that Thursday's background is the worst in the show (save perhaps Jakes). His father was an abusive alcoholic, he grew up in extreme poverty in the East End (an outside privy, "one for every eight houses. 20 families." Quartet), and as a result of that he is personally known to many of the villains who come from the East End: Vic Kasper, Eddie Nero, Ken Drury, Mickey Flood. Arthur Lott, the Big Bad, is his former bagman. Charlie, his brother, is responsible for involving him in a long term fraud ("My whole life. Everything I've worked for. You've dragged me into the sewer." Icarus), which as of Exeunt was revealed to be a blind, just so Lott would have something on Thursday--we're not actually sure how much Charlie is involved but he clearly has serious connections to Lott ( Lott: "It's only being Charlie's brother that's kept you above ground.") Thursday is betrayed and stolen from by Charlie btw s5-s9, and Sam in s9; his life savings are all gone. This giant messy web of corruption eventually sucks Thursday in: he's trapped by it and as a result, shuts down BV and also covers up Tomahawk's death. It's that old Victorian favorite: Poor People Have No Moral Fiber. Perhaps it's not on purpose? But there's a definite correlation between working class poverty and corruption here with a fatalism that I don't like. 9. I promise there are things I liked, even loved about this final show: I just need to wait out the frustrated heartsickness of it first. And I have no doubt I'm going to write more about it. And I will absolutely defend that every single actor in this was magnificent, but particular shout-outs to James Bradshaw, Sara Vickers, Anton Lesser, Roger Allam and Shaun Evans.
- Division sent us undercover, with only half the story, and knowing that somehow Nero was involved. So they put us all at risk. - I didn't know!
ENDEAVOUR 5.6 • ICARUS