The enduring charm of Midsomer Murders 

Liz Nicholls

Bucks tour guide Tony Long ponders the enduring appeal of Midsomer Murders 28 years later… 

Midsomer Murders, the long-running ITV drama series, has become a phenomenon. It’s still going strong after 28 years, with 132 episodes – more than Morse, Lewis and Endeavour put together – seen by a billion people in 200 countries worldwide. 

Where is Midsomer?

But where is this fictional county of Midsomer? Overwhelmingly it is in Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire. Beaconsfield, Amersham, Chesham, Marlow, Thame and Henley have all been used frequently. Not to mention the dozens of picturesque villages. Including The Lee (where the opening scene in the very first episode was filmed), Long Crendon, Little Missenden, Haddenham, Turville, Cuddington – the list goes on and on. 

These days, screen tourism is remarkably popular. Thame Midsomer Tours have been offering Midsomer walking tours. Visiting no fewer than 23 filming locations in Thame’s town centre. The group also hosts coach parties touring many of the nearby villages used in the series. Visitors come from all over the world to see the many locations. From Australia, New Zealand, USA, Canada, and most of Europe. Indeed, part of the 100th episode was filmed in Copenhagen, partly because the show is so popular in Denmark and many other parts of the continent. 

Why is Midsomer Murders still so popular?

But why has Midsomer Murders lasted so long and remained so popular? In 2022 ITV produced a documentary celebrating the first 25 years of the show and many of the stars pondered this question. Including John Nettles, Jane Wymark, Neil Dudgeon and Jason Hughes, to mention just a few. The answer seemed to revolve around the bizarre ways in which people are murdered and the fact that the show never takes itself too seriously. As well as, of course, the beautiful and quintessentially English villages used as the backdrop. 

Midsomer Murders is based on the Inspector Barnaby series of novels by Caroline Graham. The first of these – The Killings at Badger’s Drift – was adapted as the inaugural episode to be filmed in 1997. It was a huge success, the most popular crime drama of that year. But curiously, Caroline Graham never used the name Midsomer in any of her books. Apparently, Anthony Horowitz, the scriptwriter for that first episode, was looking at a map of Somerset and noticed the small town of Midsomer Norton. The alliteration of Midsomer and murders was impossible to resist, and Midsomer Murders was born. 

Rumour has it filming for series 25 will begin soon. So, with more than 400 murders so far, we can be sure more dastardly ways of killing people will be dreamed up. The show’s millions of fans worldwide will again be enthralled as John Barnaby solves yet more cases in the idyllic setting of Midsomer County. 

Book a Midsomer Murders tour

For more info and to book a walking tour of Thame, visit thamemidsomertours.co.uk