Endeavour - Ninth Season

From the 1960s to the 21st century,

the detective world of Morse created by writer Colin Dexter

has been exploring the fictional crimes of Oxford.

It's got such a loyal fan base,

Morse, Lewis and Endeavour.

People who've followed the shows right from the start.

You never consider that it'll be going in ten years' time or

35 years' time.

The Oxford of Morse and of Endeavour

is definitely a dangerous place...

Hello.

...one filled with big characters.

But the biggest character at the helm of it

has been Inspector Morse,

the detective actor John Thaw first brought

to our screens back in 1987.

Famous for his love of crosswords,

classical music,

and his iconic red Jaguar.

The famous maroon-coloured Jag

was an old stunt car

which John himself had written off

in The Sweeney in a stunt more than once.

You could see the road through the floor.

It was hell on wheels.

But over the past two decades,

since the original Morse famously left our screens...

Thank Lewis...

...for me.

...the Morse universe has expanded.

First with his sidekick Lewis picking up the murderous threads

in 2006.

Who am I looking for?

Definitely somebody with blood on their clothes

or their person.

Thanks, Doc.

And for the past decade,

the series Endeavour has told Morse's back story

as a brilliant young copper in '60s Britain.

Who's a clever boy, then?

But after nine series,

the last-ever episode of Endeavour has been shot

and the epic story of one of TV's most popular detectives

is finally coming to an end.

Being the last-ever Endeavour director is scary.

I hope I get it right.

The final episode...

...it brings it all together

and I hope there'll be a few surprises for people.

It all comes to a crescendo, you know, at the end.

It's hard to describe.

It's rather lovely though.

It has actually been one of the privileges of my life

to work with this group of people.

I feel a lot of gratitude to have been

part of something that so many people have enjoyed.

This is for everyone, and all the fans who are involved,

with Morse, Lewis and Endeavour,

and this is the end, so let's have fun.

The character of Inspector Morse

first featured in the award-winning crime novels

written by Colin Dexter back in 1975.

Colin was very much an academic

and I think, when Kenny McBain found the Morse books,

and tracked Colin down,

Colin was a bit taken aback.

I can remember when he didn't really quite understand

how films worked, to start with.

But it was in 1987, when actor John Thaw took on the TV role,

that the wider world got to know and love the cranky academic detective.

Somebody of my age, all of us remember

the Morse theme during the '90s.

And remember the Morse series

and how loved that was and John thaw's legacy in that.

I need to be off duty on the dot tonight.

Val's dead set on going to this slimming promotion.

It's a special... I don't need to hear the details.

I don't often ask, sir.

Square up to the case, Lewis, maybe we can both be off on the dot.

How incredibly important that series is

to British television culture and history.

But I think also to the genre.

With regular audiences of 15 million viewers,

Morse was a huge hit both at home and abroad...

...and ran for the next 13 years.

I'm hugely proud of them.

I still get work now from the kudos

that I get from the Morse franchises.

In January 2012,

12 years after the original Inspector Morse left our screens,

the clocks were set back to 1965.

And actor Shaun Evans

got to explore the back story

of television's most enigmatic detective.

At that point I'd never seen any of the previous TV show,

so I came at it fresh,

and then I was intrigued then about...

...how we could see this character as a younger man.

For me, it's a coming-of-age story.

Of how we take this period of time

and take this man from

his late twenties,

right through to his mid thirties.

My name is Bright,

Chief superintendent Bright.

It's centred on a police station

somewhere in Oxfordshire,

and you have the young Morse,

who is a troubled character.

Secondly...

The brilliant detective.

Thinks out of the box.

And he always comes at everything from a strange angle.

Evelyn Balfour was strangled, sir, like Desdemona, Othello's wife.

And there was a handkerchief stuffed in her mouth

embroidered with the initial "D".

The detective element is important, yes,

but it's a sort of Trojan horse to get into

who this person was.

Squeamish, are we?

You won't make much of a detective

if you're not prepared to look death in the eye.

Find me when you're done.

It's got an unlikely character

at the helm of it, you know, this...

He is not your hero, he's not your average detective.

He is an appreciator of classical music,

of art, of architecture,

of man's achievements at its highest, I suppose.

It can't be separated from this story.

And so then it's important to show them as much as you can.

And this new world of crime expanded

beyond Morse to include a much wider cast of regular characters.

25 years ago,

I got the best bit of luck

any man ever had.

The toast is...

my Win.

Win.

'It's a beautifully written period drama.'

There's the through line of the main characters,

whose lives you see emerging and changing.

'That's why people love it.'

It is more than just a detective drama.

I think that's selling it short.

Where have you been all night?

Don't ask. So...

are you dancing?

Are you asking?

It's got wonderfully nuanced characters

that you want to meet time and time again.

...2, 1...

I suppose what's lovely about the series of Endeavour

is that there's just that plotting.

We've got all nine series

to see how he becomes the Inspector Morse

that we know he's destined to be.

But the back story to Morse

wasn't actually the work of original author Colin Dexter.

Endeavour was the creation of writer Russell Lewis.

Television writers don't normally write

every single episode of a series.

Particularly not when there's 36,

and particularly not when there's 36 of 90 minutes.

It's very, very unusual.

Russell has such a way of writing,

not only his dialogue,

but his stage directions.

I really wish people could see his scripts,

because they are so detailed.

Up a bit.

Up a bit more.

Left a bit.

Knowing the show as he did, he wrote for Morse, he wrote for Lewis,

there is very rarely a character name,

an address,

a name of a department store, you name it,

there will be a connection

to something within the Morse universe.

And Russell Lewis was inspired to create

one very special character

for an actor with a personal connection to John Thaw.

So, what's the story?

Well, there isn't one... yet.

I play Dorothea Frazil,

who is the editor of the Oxford Mail newspaper.

If that's for the morning edition, you're cutting it fine.

My agent called me and said that they were looking for

a young John Thaw basically

to play the young Endeavour.

And did I know anyone

who reminded me of my father?

I couldn't imagine it.

I said, well, I want a part in it.

Just be a nice little quirky thing.

And Russ and I talked and he wrote a little scene for me.

Have we met?

I... I don't think so.

Another life, then?

I wasn't expecting anything as lovely and as moving as that.