Murdoch Mysteries Season 5-8

DVD Wholesale Quick Overview:

I raced through the 62 episodes in this collection in a couple of weeks. Like the Collection 1-4, there are many great episodes. I like the ones that involve real persons and characters from classic fiction, like Sherlock Holmes. Original characters like James Pendrick recur, as do several serial characters, who make good foils for Murdock. The stories happen over the background of real historical events, which are mentioned from time to time and sometimes become the focus of an episode. The Boer War is featured. As an historian, I appreciate the writing and the costuming. I’m not an expert on every detail, but everything is pretty authentic, including many of the expressions people use and the fads that are introduced – ragtime music, hot dogs, banana splits, chicken wings with sauce. The use of irony is great too – Edison saying in one episode that moving pictures with sound would never catch on, Murdoch telling Crabtree his investments in companies like General Electric would never bring him a return, and so on. This was a great buy, and some $30 Canadian less than amazon.ca even with shipping and exchange. Highly recommended!

– Norman Wolf

My family has become great fans of the Murdoch Mysteries and we have progressively purchased and watched season after season. The mysteries take place in Canada at the end of the 1800’s and involve invention and technology to solve the crimes. You follow the effect of electricity, motion pictures, horseless carriage, powered bicycle, transmission of messages through the air, development of the telephone, finger printing and much more, creating a fascinating perspective of the turn of the century. The four central figures of Murdoch the detective, Julia the woman’s rights advocate and Murdoch’s soul mate, George the constable, and the Inspector of Station No. 4 are memorable and well characterized. The murder is usually at the beginning within the first few minutes. There are many scenes of autopsies as the evidence uncovered during them is often critical in solving the crime. Placing Julia as the coroner and later replacing her with her female assistant emphasizes the changing role of women in society, as well as softening the shock of seeing the incised bodies being examined. An interesting feature is the reappearance of characters from an episode often widely separated from the present one. It is fun to see if you can remember and recognize these miscreants and identify the episode in which they first appeared. While sometimes seemingly formula based and sometimes fantastic, this is a thoroughly enjoyable series!

-Hope

Do you watch the “Murdoch Mysteries” all at once or do you dole them out to keep the enjoyment going? That’s the problem for the viewer. Murdoch’s world in Season 5 is still in the 1890s, but eventually Queen Victoria dies and King Edward takes over. Murdoch is played by Yannick Bisson and Station House 4 in Toronto has his assistant Constable Crabtree; his boss, Inspector Brackenreid; his love interest, Dr. Ogden; and others.Likable characters, all. The mysteries will often involve historical individuals: workaholic Thomas Alva Edison, Nicolas Tesla, Teddy Roosevelt, Bat Masterson, et al.

– Howard Denson

DVD Wholesale Main Features:

Actors: Yannick Bisson
Directors: Cal Coons, Don McCutcheon, Harvey Crossland, Laurie Lynd
Format: Box set, Color, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Language: English
Subtitles: English
Region: Region 1
Number of discs: 18
Rated: NR – Not Rated
Studio: ACORN MEDIA
DVD Release Date: August 2, 2016
Run Time: 2780 minutes
ASIN: B01EIS45ZU