User Reviews

The story is up to snuff, with perhaps a bit more subtle comedy and a little more emotional engagement from Morse. Morse's old room mate at college, Daniel Massey, hasn't kept in touch but one day rings up Morse and arranges for lunch. Massey's conversation is elliptical. He seems to want to say something but can't bring himself to do it.

He's soon found dead in a hotel room, drugged and electrocuted. The search leads Morse and Sergeant Lewis to a cricket team led by another old friend of Morse's. This gray-haired, gimpy old friend picked up the habit of calling Morse by the nickname of "Pagan" because Morse had refused to reveal his Christian name at college. Lewis is infiltrated into the team to learn what he can. Lewis takes advantage of his incognito to call Morse "Pagan" once or twice, while Morse must wrinkle his nose in disgust and absorb it.

I grew to like Lewis in this episode. He has a secret meeting with Morse in the john. When it's over, Morse tell him he can leave. But Lewis doesn't want to leave until he -- gesturing towards one of the stalls -- "Unh, you know." It develops that at home Lewis refers to his excretory functions by numbers, just as we did when we were kids in New Jersey. I never realize they did that in Britain. The revelation of this lexical concordance left me with a warm glow, which I had a chance to ponder later during number one. There's another reason I grew fond of Lewis. For the first time I noticed that when he comes up with his big smile over that big chin, he looks quite a lot like Stan Laurel.

The main babe in the case is Daniel Massey's wife, Sharon Maughan. Now, in most instances, the women that Morse finds attractive are unexceptional in appearance. That's okay with me. But Maughan is tall, with a long mane of floppy red hair, and looks striking. She's more than usually affectionate towards Morse too. He finds this pretty satisfying but we -- and poor Morse -- find out that her taste runs to extravagant mesomorphs.

"Deceived in Flight" has a pun title, as this is cricket terminology (in baseball the equivalent phrase is to be thrown a curve) relating to a basic motivation for murder. There's also a pertinent connection with Zen philosophy made in the enthralling script written by Anthony Minghella, who later went on to become an Academy Award winning director (English Patient, Cold Mountain). The acting is some of the best in the series, especially Daniel Massey's superb early scenes with John Thaw playing Chief Insp. Morse. As always, Kevin Whately's performance is impeccable as Morse's long-suffering, but solid and loyal deputy, Sgt. Lewis, who is given the chance to display his prowess as a cricketer as well as to go undercover for the only time I can recall in the series.

Having read most of Colin Dexter's novels, his original screen story here is not quite as intriguing as those episodes based on his novels, but what's gained is that this episode has a stronger emphasis on characters and dialog rather than the customary propulsion from twists and turns of the plot. It rewards the attentive viewer with rich language and a profound exploration of human nature.

If you have not seen this Morse episode yet, you're in for a great treat as it's one of the most riveting in this brilliant television series, arguably the best UK series of all time.

As a cricket hater I only watched this episode when I'd run out of new ones to watch. As a lover of first impressions being proved wrong and strong characterisation I was so glad I did. It's one of the best stories for combining drama with humour and I like that Lewis gets to strike out a bit more on his own. It's funny to see him and Morse pretend they're strangers to one another, especially around the parking of the Jag. It was about time Morse paid Lewis back for all those free drinks!

My favourite aspect of Deceived By Flight, though is the surprises it constantly springs on the viewer. The villain and victim roles swap so instantaneously but so believably, too. Roly provides genuinely great fun and comedy until the moment he's unmasked as a drugs dealer. Then you can sense the bile so acutely you almost expect to see it pouring through the screen.

Likewise although you can tell Peter and Philippa are harbouring secrets, it's a shock when you learn they're actually on the side of right. Jane Booker does a tremendous job of switching from Philippa's public persona to her real one. She's a wonderful actress who helps make the 1989 series of Morse a benchmark for its female supporting roles.

She and Sharon Maughan carry on Patricia Hodge's excellent work from its opener Ghost In The Machine (among my favourite episodes). They play strong, capable women with far more of an identity than Morse's love interest/damsel in distress.

However, it did annoy me that Morse was inviting Kate to dinner when her husband was still on the mortuary slab. As with Ruth in Service Of The Dead she could have had and did have criminal involvement within the case. At the least it was totally failing to keep the personal and professional separate as expected of Morse.

I would say, too that unfortunately it's around Kate the main negatives of this episode lie. Tony demonstrated evidence of being emotionally abusive threatening to kill himself or Vince. Elaboration upon this would have worked much better than the arson subplot which went nowhere or the excessive cricket match airtime. As it was, Anthony seemed to have got let off the hook far too much.

Kate was undeniably cold blooded in her murder and playacting to cover it. Yet surely she had good reason to fear for the lives of herself and her children. That motive would have made her far more realistic and sympathetic - not to mention provided the script's best confoundment of the victim and villain perceptions.

I find these early episodes of Morse difficult to follow and full of procedural gaffes that an experienced DCI would not make.

For starters murders are never investigated by just two officers and a DCI would be managing the enquiries not out and about.

Why is Morse allowed to use his own car and who authorised the fitting of a police radio to it?

In this episode Morse is again romantically pursuing a witness before the case has been resolved.

Lewes acts as an undercover officer, when that would be a specialised role.

And At the end Morse turns up at the suspects place of work and charges her with murder without arresting her and in any case the decision would not be his to make unless PACE does not apply in Thames Valley.