This week’s TV on DVD Season I am going through and doing wrap ups of is the double sided 3 disc Murder, She Wrote Season 1 set. I will be posting about one disc each day until this Saturday. This is the wrap up of Side A of Disc 1.

“The Murder of Sherlock Holmes - Pilot” - Yes, one of the minority of shows that has given there pilot show an actual title and not just called it pilot. The episode starts with a woman coming downstairs to find the doors open and then finds a man with an ax in a closet. Lights come on and it is revealed to be a rehearsal for a play. Jessica Fletcher is introduced as being there as part of the PTA in charge of refreshments. They are hurried out by the director, who is stunned that Jessica already figured out who the murderer was. Jessica Fletcher’s nephew Grady tells her about finding her manuscript for her book and found a publisher that wants to publish her book. It then skips to a scene of it being a bestseller and being booked to be on a television show. Before the two friends from the PTA help her get a makeover. Grady meets Jessica at the train station in New York. The next couple scenes are promoting the book tasks such as television interviews, book signings, and radio interviews. She is overwhelmed by New York City and is about to leave to go back to Cabot Cove, but her publisher convinces her to come stay the weekend at his mansion with some real people. It turns out the party is a costume party of favorite literary characters. At the party Grady finds a Private Investigator going through his room. The next morning a body dressed as Sherlock Holmes is found in the pool having been killed with a gun shot wound to the face. Jessica looks around the property looking for clues and the Chief Detective ends up confiding in her and asking for her help. Jessica notices the shoes the body was wearing was probably the private detective and not the Captain Caleb they originally thought it was. Jessica thinks the killer might have been trying to kill the private investigator or the Captain depending on who they thought the person was. Again Jessica is about to leave to go home, but then she learns that Grady was arrested as a suspect in the murder of the PI. It seems Grady is also accused of being involved in stealing money from the company he works for, which the PI was looking in to and why it seems he had a motive to murder the PI. Jessica’s published bails out Grady. Jessica goes to a harbor to see the Captain. Grady and Jessica go to Grady’s office at night to try to figure out who is really the one stealing money from the company. This leads her to a co-worker named, Ashley, and a man that suddenly has come into money to put on a new musical. They admit to the money fraud, but not murder. The Captain’s body is found on his sailboat, which leads to them realizing he was the original intended victim. Yet again about to leave for Cabot Cove, but Jessica leaves the train and decides to go to New Holvang (where the PI was murdered) instead after getting some sort of clue after reading something in a newspaper. The house is deserted at first, but then the publisher shows up. She realizes that the light in the backyard was enough to have known that they were really killing the PI. She realizes that he purposely killed the PI, who was blackmailing the publisher because he figured out that he was an escape convict, although he was a scapegoat for the crime. He turns himself in and it is hard on Jessica because she had fallen in love with him. Grady takes Jessica to the train station and she finally does actually leave on the train, although it ends with her being intrigued about a case the New York Police want her help with and possibly considering helping as the train pulls away with her still in the entryway to the train car.
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