Series / Sister Boniface Mysteries

Sister Boniface Mysteries is a British cosy mystery detective period comedy drama television series, created by Jude Tindall, which is produced by BBC Studios and BritBox. It is a spin-off of Father Brown, as the Sister Boniface character was introduced in a Father Brown episode (Series 1, Episode 6: "The Bride of Christ").

Within the backdrop of 1960s England, the series is set in the fictional town of Great Slaughter in the Cotswolds. Sister Boniface (Lorna Watson) is a devout Catholic nun residing at St. Vincent's Convent. Embracing a unique blend of faith and intellect, she not only fulfills her religious obligations but is also a wine-maker and holds a PhD in forensic science. This rare combination of skills positions her as an invaluable scientific consultant to the local law enforcement, lending her expertise to their ongoing investigations. Other characters include DI Sam Gillespie (Max Brown), DS Felix Livingstone (on loan from the Bermuda Police) (Jerry Iwu), reporter Ruth Penny (Miranda Raison) and WPC Peggy Button (Ami Metcalf).

---

Tropes:

• All Women Love Shoes: In "Crimes and Miss Demeanours", Sister Boniface determines that the Victim of the Week was killed with a blow from a stiletto heeled shoe. Sister Boniface says that if they can find the shoe, there will probably still be trace evidence on it; regardless of how well the killer cleaned it. DI Gillespie suggests that the killer might have destroyed the shoes, but Ruth Penny snorts and tells him that no self-respecting woman would willingly get rid of a pair of designer stilettos.
• Away in a Manger: At the climax of the Christmas special, a young woman gives birth in a train carriage... and the trope is lampshaded by Sister Boniface's obligatory Imagine Spot, in which the tableau is transformed into a Nativity scene.
• Bad Habits: Combined with Disguised in Drag in "My Brother's Keeper", when Sister Reggie hides her brother Alfie, who is on the run from the police, in the convent by dressing him in a nun's habit.
• Bedsheet Ladder: In "My Brother's Keeper", Sister Reginald's incorrigible brother Alfie Lynch uses a bedsheet ladder to climb out of Mrs Clam's boarding house after curfew.
• Benevolent Boss: Although Chief Constable Lowsley occasionally comes across as Captain Oblivious, he has nothing but praise for the people working under him. He reserves his disdain for those from outside who would try to change the (highly effective) way they do things in Great Slaughter.
• "Blackmail" Is Such an Ugly Word: Miss Darcy in “Star of the Orient”.
• Bomb Disposal: In "Lights, Camera, Murder!", DI Gillespie realises the bullet and electrocution reflected scenes from the episode of Operation QT being filmed and the last scene features a briefcase containing a bomb. Sister Boniface, who had rudimentary training in bomb disposal when she worked at wartime Bletchley Park, lends a hand.
• Brig Ball Bouncing: While stuck in Mrs Clam's boarding house in "My Brother's Keeper", Sister Reggie's brother Alfie does this in his room.
• Calling Card: The Serial Killer in "Love and Other Puzzles" leaves his victims with their faces slathered in cold cream in front of a completed jigsaw with one piece missing.
• Caustic Critic: In "My Brother's Keeper", one of the suspects is caustic art critic Dicky Whitfield, who was involved a very public feud the Victim of the Week, egocentric artist Gerry Ardwell.
• Continuity Nod: In “Dead Air”, the pirate radio is playing a number by Queenmakers, the band featured in “A Song for the Dead”.
• Cordon Bleugh Chef: In "Queen of the Kitchen", the hopelessly vague Dottie gets confused as to what recipe she is making in the cooking competition. The judge takes one bite and then asks why there are carrots in the banana cake.
• Crossover: Father Brown appeared in a S1 episode of this show, and Sister Boniface made a guest appearance in S11 of the parent show. An unusual aspect to this is that while the shows share a 'Verse, Sister Boniface Mysteries is set about a decade later than Father Brown, making her crossover into his show into a Prequel, or at least an Interquel.
• Curtain Camouflage: In "Scoop!", Ruth is snooping around the minister's study when the minister enters and she hurriedly conceals herself behind the curtains. Hidden here, she overhears a compromising argument between the minister and his wife.
• A Day in the Limelight: In "A Tight Squeeze" Sister Boniface is indisposed, so she sends Ensemble Dark Horse characters Sister Reginald and Sister Peter to investigate the crime in her place.
• Death by Looking Up: In "Sister Town", the Victim of the Week Ellis Everett yanks hard on a cord to free a jammed curtain at a plaque unveiling, only for the sabotaged heavy metal plaque to come away from the wall. Ellis has just enough time to look up before it lands on his head, killing him.
• Denser and Wackier: Downplayed, as it is still a murder mystery series played straight, though the show amps up the whimsicality a fair bit more than Father Brown.
• Disguised in Drag: Combined with Bad Habits in "My Brother's Keeper", when Sister Reggie hides her brother Alfie, who is on the run from the police, in the convent by dressing him in a nun's habit.
• Disqualification-Induced Victory: In "St George's Defence", Sister Boniface wins the chess tournament after her final opponent is disqualified for doping.
• Evolving Credits: When Miranda Raison left the show, the sequence with the newspaper remained in the opening credits, but the illustration of Ruth on the back of the paper was changed to one of Peggy, and it became Ami Metcalf's introduction instead.
• Faceplanting into Food: In "Queen of the Kitchen", the Victim of the Week is poisoned with belladonna and collapses: falling forward and face-planting in her cake.
• Fish out of Water: DS Livingstone, newly arrived from Barbados, who instead of being assigned to Scotland Yard as he expected, finds himself stuck in a rural backwater full of Eccentric Townsfolk where the police are regularly assisted by a genius nun... and nobody there seems to find this at all unusual.
• Flash Forward: The entire show is this to Father Brown, which is set in in the 1950s.
• Frame-Up: In "My Brother's Keeper", the killer plants the stolen painting in Alfie Lynch's room to frame him for the theft and Gerry Ardwell's murder.
• Gardening-Variety Weapon: The murder weapon in "Dem Bones" is a three-prong cultivator kept in one of the sheds on the allotment.
• The Ghost: We've met Sister Boniface's mum and dad more than once, but her (familial) sister Penelope has yet to put in an appearance.
• Given Name Reveal: In the Christmas special, a young couple announce that they will be naming their baby after Reverend Mother Adrian - which, since the baby is a girl, Sister Boniface thinks is a bad idea (though she doesn't say so out loud). Then they clarify that they will be using the Reverend Mother's given name, which at this point neither the nuns nor the viewer know. It's left hanging for a while until at the end of the scene it's revealed to be Hepzibah. Sister Boniface is still not sure this is a good choice.
• Grievous Bottley Harm: In "My Brother's Keeper", Sister Reggie is awoken with a Hand Gag over her mouth. She grabs an empty glass jug off her nightstand and smashes it over the intruder's head before realising it is her brother Alfie.
• Hand Gagging: At the start of "My Brother's Keeper", a dark figure sneaks into Sister Reggie's room and puts a gloved hand over her mouth before waking her. Reggie smashes a jug over his head before realising it is her brother Alfie.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: Mrs Clam and Miss Thimble give this vibe, to the extent that Mrs Clam seems to have taken on the role of carer to Miss Thimble, revealing her own Hidden Depths in the process.
• High-Voltage Death: In "Lights, Camera, Murder!", producer Dick Lansky is found dead in a chair, electrocuted; mimicking a torture scene found in the script.
• I Choose to Stay: At the end of S1, Felix is offered the post at Scotland Yard that he wanted all along, but realising that his would-be boss is not a particularly nice person and he is already accepted in Great Slaughter, he decides to stay.
• I Don't Like the Sound of That Place: After all, what do you imagine would happen in a village called Great Slaughter? Exactly. Outsiders sometimes lampshade that it's not a very appealing name. (The series is set in Gloucestershire where there are real villages called Upper and Lower Slaughter, but no Great Slaughter.)
• Imagine Spot: Sister Boniface has one of these Once an Episode. Sometimes it's just a fantasy, but often it leads her to some sort of breakthrough.
• Impairment Shot: In "Queen of the Kitchen", the Victim of the Week is poisoned with belladonna, and then asks the woman she is talking to what is wrong with her face. The camera the cuts to her POV, showing the woman's face twisting and deforming as the belladonna kicks in. The victim then accuses the woman of being a demon before face-planting in a cake.
• Kick the Dog: In "Crimes and Miss Demeanours", DCI Winner establishes his Jerkass credentials by failing to treat Peggy as a member of the team and sending her to fetch him tea.
• The Mole: In "Scoop!", Sister Boniface is called by DI Gillespie to the home of the Minister of Defence, Charles Stratham, where guest Mary Sparkes was found dead at the bottom of a staircase. As the investigation proceeds, a missing secret document concerning Britain's next generation of nuclear missiles points to KGB involvement, and it becomes apparent that one of the guests may be a KGB agent.
• Murder by Mistake:
  • In "Queen of the Kitchen", the killer plants poisonous belladonna berries atop a cake intending the poison the judge of a cooking competition. However, the contestant who made the cake spots that there are too many "blackcurrants" on the cake, pulls the extra ones off and eats them.
  • In "Sister Town", the murderer sabotages a plaque to to be unveiled by the visiting mayor of a German town. However, when the curtain cord designed to topple the plaque on the mayor's head proves stubborn, the local handyman gives it a firm yank and the plaque falls on him instead.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: GREAT SLAUGHTER?
• Never Suicide: This is a rock-solid rule of the series, resulting from showrunner Jude Tindall's brief association with CASUAL+Y when she learned that whenever a suicide storyline appeared, there would be a spike in real-life suicides the next day. Since she didn't want to be responsible for that, any story pitch with a Suicide, Not Murder twist is immediately rejected.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: In "Queen of the Kitchen", Prunella and James Gladwell are blatant caricatures of TV cooks Fanny and Johnny Cradock. In "Don't Try This at Home", while the presenters of the Blue Peter expy Jolly Roger are relatively generic (Danny Lemon is perhaps a little like John Noakes, but only a little), the editor Dinah Morgan is more obviously based on Biddy Baxter. In "A Tight Squeeze", the film series Oh - Do Behave! is based on the Carry On series and there are recognisable caricatures of many of the regulars including Hattie Jacques, Kenneth Williams, Sidney James, Barbara Windsor and Bernard Bresslaw. (The killer in "A Tight Squeeze" is Sally Chagford, a busty blonde who did stag films before trying to break out as a mainstream actress. Margaret Nolan was a busty blonde who did stag films and nude modeling before starring in Carry On films.)
• Non-Indicative Name: Mrs Clam's Seaview Guesthouse does not have a sea view. In fact, Great Slaughter doesn't even appear to be near the coast.
  • The nuns all take the names of MALE saints.
• Not-So-Fake Prop Weapon: In "Lights, Camera, Murder!", top television spy series Operation QT is filming at the convent, and when a real bullet is fired narrowly missing the leading actor, Sister Boniface investigates. Together with DS Livingstone, Sister Boniface works out the real target was the show producer Dick Lansky, who has many enemies on and off set and a roving eye for the actresses.
• Nuns Are Funny: One of them also happens to be a pioneering forensic scientist and bona fide genius, but the nuns are every bit as eccentric and funny as the rest of the townsfolk.
• Overly Narrow Superlative: When Chief Constable Lowsley calls Peggy (as a genuine compliment) "the finest WPC in the county", Peggy immediately lampshades that she's the only WPC in the county.
• Pungeon Master: DI Gillespie and Sister Boniface are often seen laughing at each other's incredibly weak puns. DS Livingstone remains immune.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: DI Gillespie has great respect for Sister Boniface's skills and rarely attempts to interfere with her access to cases.
• Scatterbrained Senior: Dotty Thimble is extremely forgetful and constantly misunderstands things - it is very likely she is actually senile, but fortunately she has Mrs Clam to look out for and protect her.
• Science Hero: Sister Boniface is a nun and a forensic scientist with her own laboratory in the convent. While her knowledge of religion and esoterica occasionally comes into play, the main focus is on her application of science in solving the suspiciously high number of crimes in Great Slaughter.
• Serial Killer: In "Love and Other Puzzles", Sister Boniface is called to examine the body of Hilary Sympson-Smythe who has died mysteriously, her face covered in cold cream and a completed jigsaw with one piece missing. A lonely hearts connection to Ruth Penny's newspaper leads Gillespie and Livingstone to investigate the male respondents. Ruth believes there is another victim who died in identical circumstances. A third victim is murdered with the only clue some mud from a shoe.
• Serial Killer Baiting: In "Love and Other Puzzles", Gillespie and Livingstone narrow the suspects to three men and then to one, but with no evidence, they need a potential victim to attract the killer. Their landlady Mrs Clam volunteers.
• Serious Business: In "Dem Bones", the locals are more concerned that the discovery of a body buried in the allotments interrupts the judging of the annual 'Largest Marrow' contest than the fact there has been a murder: especially as the marrows and the scales have been sealed off as part of the crime scene, so the contest can't be resolved until the police release it.
• Shell-Shocked Veteran: Ex-soldier turned TV presenter Jono Hardy in "Don't Try This At Home", for whom abseiling is his Trauma Button. The whole episode could have been avoided if he'd been honest about it instead of bottling it up.
• Shout-Out:
  • Felix tells Winer that he landed in Great Slaughter by A Series of Unfortunate Events.
  • Although it's nowhere near being a Whole-Plot Reference, "The Star of the Orient" has deliberate echoes of Agatha Christie's The Mystery of the Blue Train and Murder on the Orient Express. The subplot with the somewhat difficult birth guided by a midwife who is also a nun would also be likely to put most viewers in mind of Call the Midwife, especially given the early-1960s setting.
• Shoe Slap: In "Crimes and Miss Demeanours", the Victim of the Week is killed when she is struck with a stiletto-heeled shoe and the heel penetrates her medulla oblongata.
• Smart People Play Chess: Sister Boniface was a chess champion at university and in "St George's Defence" she enters (and wins) a chess tournament in order to investigate accusations against one of the players.
• Smokescreen Crime: In "My Brother's Keeper", the killer steals a valuable painting from the gallery (and later plants it in Alfie Lynch's room as a Frame-Up) to make it look like the painting was the actual target and Gerry Ardwell's murder was just collateral damage, when Ardwell was the real target all along.
• Tainted Tobacco:
  • In "Scoop!", the murderer uses poisoned tobacco as half of the the murder weapon. Their cigarettes are laced with one half of a binary nerve agent. They exhale the tainted smoke over the victim, and when the victim applies the second half of the nerve agent—which has been added to her perfume—it completes the reaction and triggers the nerve agent.
  • A poisoned cigar is the murder weapon in "The It Girl". The killer initially plans to inject the victim with poison, but upon finding the cigar injects it instead and makes a getaway before the victim finds and smokes it.
• Tampering with Food and Drink:
  • The killer in "Love and Other Puzzles" is a Serial Killer who poisons the wine of the women from the lonely hearts column he is romancing.
  • In "Queen of the Kitchen", the killer plants poisonous belladonna berries atop a cake intending the poison the judge of a cooking competition.
• Tyrant Takes the Helm: In "Crimes and Miss Demeanours", Detective Chief Inspector Winner is sent from Scotland Yard to oversee the investigation and immediately rubs everyone in Great Slaughter up the wrong way with his abrasive attitude.
• Undercover as Lovers: Sam and Ruth go undercover as lovers at a new age retreat in "The Shadow of Baron Battenburg". It leads them to admit their Unresolved Sexual Tension but not to act on it, and Ruth is offered a job in London as a result of her story about the investigation and leaves at the end of the episode.
• The Unintelligible: Tom Thomas speaks in a growl that is perfectly understood by locals but is unintelligible to outsiders - and to the viewer. When Felix has to question him as a witness, he takes Peggy along as translator.
• Unwitting Test Subject: In "St George's Defence", Evelyn Thurleigh doesn't realise that his "assistant" has been dosing him with experimental "smart drugs" and is horrified when he finds out - especially as the assistant turns out to have murdered the one person who did work it out.
• Wire Dilemma: In "Lights, Camera, Murder!", Sister Boniface and DI Gillespie have to defuse a bomb, with Sister Boniface trying to remember the half a lesson she had in bomb disposal when she worked at wartime Bletchley Park. She tells DI Gillespie they need to cut a particular wire, which is usually red, with a pair of wire-cutters. He tells her they don't have any wire-cutters and none of the wires are red.

---