'Miss Scarlet' Season 5 Finds More Stable Ground in "The Thames Reaper"

Miss Scarlet Season 5 reaches the halfway point with the "The Thames Reaper," an hour that's far and away the best installment of this revamped new era of the show. The episode is well-balanced regarding characters and plots, and the case of the week is fascinating for once. Sure, after this season's first two episodes, the bar was pretty low, and the mystery sputters to an evident and less-than-satisfying ending, but as such things go, it's an improvement, and we should take it.

The case starts relatively strong. A serial murderer dubbed (what else?) the Thames Reaper is dumping bodies in the river and sending notes to a newspaper providing info about the crimes. Eliza, hustling for work somewhere other than Scotland Yard for once, convinces the owner of the Morning Herald to pay her if her investigation into the now-year-old case turns up anything new he can print. She joins forces with the (generally adorable) reporter covering the case. She immediately starts doing what she does best, leaning on friends and acquaintances to give her information about the victims who died.

Since these killings have been going on for at least a year, and we've never really done a serial killer on this show before, it's rather fun to speculate about whether this storyline means Jack the Ripper exists in this universe. Theoretically, Eliza's father died in 1882, six years before the Ripper murders began in 1888. Has it been long enough for this crime to be seen as a copycat? Or is Miss Scarlet just trying to lean into the Ripper vibe for this case? 

Her partnership with Mr. Bailey (Ryan Hawley) is brief but strangely illuminating. The journalist running point on the Morning Herald's Thames Reaper investigation, he's charmingly awkward and has a warm chemistry with Eliza. Their brainstorming sessions crackle with a charming sort of nerdy, crime-solving energy, and there's something to be said for giving Eliza an investigative partner who occupies an entirely different sphere within the world of the show. (If only because it allows us to stop comparing every interaction the two share with the hole William left behind.)

Sure, Miss Scarlet sloppily telegraphed from his first moments onscreen that Bailey and/or his boss were somehow involved with the crimes he was being paid to cover. But it was genuinely so refreshing to see Eliza doing something different and enjoying it that it's difficult not to wonder what the show might be like if Eliza partnered up with a beat cop, a journalist, or a judge. Heck, even a fellow investigator, though I suppose the show did try that for a bit with Nash, though it wasn't in any permanent capacity.

In short, it would be nice if Miss Scarlet were more willing to shake up what its premise should look like. It might feel less like it is simply trying to find a way to repeat what worked before.

Part of the problem with this season* is that it's so determined to force Eliza and Blake into a partnership that mirrors her old relationship with William that it hasn't given their bond any time to grow organically into its own thing. It's unlikely any viewers want this to be Eliza's relationship with William, just with the serial numbers scraped off, so what's the harm in leaning into the ways it isn't?

(For me, at any rate, and while I'm not, I'm genuinely jealous of the folks who can enjoy it without thinking this way.)

We just spent an entire episode about how Blake is such a stickler about not working with private investigators that the guild tried to falsely #MeToo him over it. Shouldn't we spend some time on why he seems willing to break his by-the-rule ethics for Eliza constantly? 

In all honesty, Blake remains entirely too Gary Stu-ish for my liking and completely lacks any flaws or nuance. It's as if the show's afraid to let him have a bad habit beyond occasional rudeness in case viewers might see him as less than an upgrade over the guy who used to have his job. The idea of Ivy becoming his personal assistant, while somewhat implausible given her general lack of experience, is probably a good one, if only because their relationship feels surprisingly natural and might allow us to finally see some layers to his character beyond Serious Cop and Single Dad.

The best parts of this episode were the ones focused on Eliza: Contemplating dinner with Bailey, learning to cook with Mr. Potts, chatting with Ivy, hustling for work in a way we haven't seen her do in ages. (See, there are ways for Eliza to exist in this professional world without Scotland Yard, at least while her relationship with Blake is in its infancy.) In many ways, this is the most human this character has felt in a long time, and it's a nice change.

This entire episode feels much more balanced than the two that preceded it, and though I can't claim to be overly invested in whatever the reason is that Ivy seems so reluctant to set a date for her wedding to Potts, the interweaving of Ivy's new job, Potts's promotion, and Eliza's investigation gives the hour a much-needed sense of coherency. (Though one has to roll their eyes at Ivy, making it a total of fifteen minutes at her new gig before Eliza hits her up for a favor.)

If we ignore the utterly shambolic conclusion to the case of the week, "The Thames Reaper" is the strongest episode of this new era so far — though three episodes in that's not saying that much. Maybe I mean, it's the hour of Miss Scarlet that feels closest to what the show used to be, and here's hoping that the trend continues.

Miss Scarlet Season 5 airs on most local PBS stations and streams on the PBS app weekly on Sundays at 8 p.m. ET. All episodes are available for PBS Passport members and the PBS Masterpiece Prime Video Channel to binge before their on-air broadcast.