The First Look at Agatha Christie's 'Murder is Easy' Introduces the Cast of Suspects

BritBox and the BBC continue their Agatha Christie miniseries universe post-Sarah Phelps with the second stand-alone non-famous detective story Murder is Easy. The two-part story comes after 2022's remarkably well-received take on the relatively under-adapted Why Didn't They Ask Evans? Like Evans, Easy is a story that doesn't have a Poirot or Marple or even the Partners in Crime of Tommy and Tuppence. Instead, it's a citizen detective story where a retired detective takes up a case out of the goodness of his heart and the desire to see justice done.

That being said, Murder Is Easy is one Marple fans will know because the story is easily adaptable into a Marple story. It begins with an elderly lady on a train to Scotland Yard. She's discovered that the spate of passings in her small village is not a random series of accidents but murder, and she's figured out who. However, she never makes it to the police. In the original novel, she tells her story to Fitzwilliam, a retired detective who just returned from being stationed in India. In the Marple-ized versions, she tells it to Jane (obviously).

In either case, her story and her failed mission galvanize her companion to take up the task she leaves unfinished. For this adaptation, the miniseries has aged down Fitzwilliam into a much younger man, just home from war, giving us a dashing young detective.