Only Murders in my Mind
Episode 35 Anti-hero Detectives: Rule breakers in Crime
[Music] Welcome to Only Murders in My Mind. A random thought production. Hi, I'm Carol Bissett, a crime writer. And I invite you with my co-presenters, Liz Hedgecock and Mike Jackson, each week to our conversations on all things murderous. Hello everyone, and welcome to this episode of Only Murders in My Mind. And as usual, I have the lovely Liz Hedgecock. Hello. And the marvellous Mike Jackson. Sorry. Hello, Carol. I don't know why, whenever Carol introduces you, there's A, there's a pause, or she's trying to think of the right adjective to put before my name. And then laughter. Would you prefer a drum roll or a wooden tissue? I don't know. I think there's a symbol sound. Hello, you in the corner. It's probably a surprise. Oh, hello. Nobody puts Mike Jackson in the corner. No, that's true. We'll give you a watermelon. We are a trio, we operate with each other. No, that sounds painful. It just sometimes inspires each other. But yeah, we just bounce off each other. None of this, as you might well know, none of this is rehearsed. Can you imagine it would spend hours getting it just like this? Liz, just, yeah. This is Take 25, you know. We're so happy we finally got it. I would like to point out we have a really good editor. So we work extremely hard. Yeah. So this episode is about detectives as anti-heroes. And we have them, we know them, we love them. They just make the stories much more rich. And I'm just going to throw it open to the floor. Who would like to start? What I'm going to say is, if you think about Agatha Christie and you think of Poirot or Martha, they're not at all. And they're not at all. Yeah, they're saying. They're perfect. They have Phobos. I'm just trying to think of other ones from the Golden Age. So you have Inspector Elaine, you have little Peter Whimsy. You have Alan Grant from Josephine Tay. And yeah, they're all very, you know, straight laced. Yeah, very sorted. Yeah. But I won't do that. Is it a modern phenomenon? I don't know. You go back to Poirot. Could you argue that he is flawed? Because he is... But does it get in the way of the cases? No, but his perfection is not the norm. No. So that makes him not necessarily a floor detective, but a different detective because of his foibles, because of his personality, because of the way that he acts. Yeah, he's sort of... What would they call it these days where it's got to be perfect and clean and OCD? Yeah, OCD. Slightly like that. He loves to order a method, doesn't he? I mean, that's a great strength for him as a detective, is whether it ever actually impedes him. No, but then again, I mean, one of one's I was going to mention is somebody like Luther, John Luther. Oh, yeah. That's a brilliant one. You know, because you would say he was almost an anti-hero because he kicks against. The rules does things his own way. Dangles people from balcony and then let's go. See, now, tomorrow would never do that. I mean, if one thing you wouldn't be able to pick him up. It can be a bit violent. Hey, Stings, come and dangle this man for me. Yes. Yes. Yes. Miss Lemon, what are you doing? Stop dangling that man over the balcony. Your disarranging his turn-ups. But no, John Luther. You know, John Luther, I think of people like John Luther and you almost think yourself, there wouldn't be much for him to become the criminal rather than the detective. He walks a very fine line. Yeah. And that's why I think it falls into this sort of anti-hero. They've got flawed personalities. But you're on his side, aren't you, nearly 90% of the time with Luther, you want him to win. And never now and again, you go, "Ah, he's got a bit far now. That's a bit, you know, too much." But were Sherlock Holmes like that? You know, when you think of how Sherlock Holmes, he wasn't solving the mysteries to do good. He was solving the mysteries because they were a mystery. Yeah. As a satisfaction. As a satisfaction. So if he'd not got his satisfaction that way, would he have got his satisfaction from being a master criminal? Yes, because again, probably, he was very much like Moriarty. Yes. But they were two sides of the same coin, weren't they? Sort of flawed character, in many ways. I hadn't really thought about it like that, but you're right. Yes. And there's also his drug habit. Yes. Yes. And his habit of just going into a talk or when there were no cases. So yeah, very much. You know, this is the thing that keeps him going. Yeah. Had no time for other people. Like he was patient. He was happy when somebody got murdered. That's not good, really. Like in the series, right? It's like Christmas. Yes. All excited. Yeah. And I've got one here, which is Martin Road. Now we're going back to the bridge, which is one of my favourite detective series from Denmark. Was it Denmark and Sweden? Yes. So I'm just having the past said that this starts off with a body that was cutting to on the bridge that links the two countries. I can't remember how I said the body was cut last time dissected. It was actually cut at the waist. Let me get this right. The top half was a Swedish politician and the bottom half was a Danish prostitute. So somebody was definitely sending a message about politicians that were they do not do you know what I mean? And this Martin was, it came across because he was a poet with saga, who was the detective for all. I'm just trying to think of Swedish. Yeah. Saga was Danish. No, Swedish. Was this a series with all that work? Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Saga was who I'm interested in. Martin was Danish. And he was the opposite to her because she is on the artistic spectrum and is very to the point and honest to the point of being brutal. And he was the softer side of the two. However, he had issues and the one that came across most in the first series was the fact that he was being unfaithful too. And he was a lovely wife who had lovely children. And this came as a bit of a shock to us and he does actually fall from grace spectacularly. But I won't give you any spoilers about that. But yeah, he came across as this really nice person and he had this dark underside which we started seeing as the layers were stripped away. Rather than light looser, you know with looser from their get-go. He is someone to be frightened of. You know, both as a criminal and probably as a police officer because he did get things done but in his way. I think that's what we like. I mean, I think he made me think that he was talking about John Rebus. Yes. Yeah. Alcoholic. Yeah. He ignores authority. Does it his way? Yeah. Yeah. Go away. It feels like, you know, if you've got a police detective there, they are bound to have some kind of substance problem or some kind of, you know, compulsion or something going on. It's like you read psychological thrillers and if it's a police procedural type, there's going to be like a female police inspector who, whatever, whatever. You know, can't compartmentalize, even get a teeth in. Her work, you know, doesn't spend time with your family possibly, you know, drinks too much, whatever, whatever. It's like, it feels like almost a standard trope in the genre. But I suppose if you're working, really, I mean, if you're working in that sort of environment, it is going to be so stressful. It is, but if you take somebody like John Rebus, the character that comes across is somebody that will always bend the rules to suit himself. Yeah. Even if it means dragging other people down with him or upsetting other people and where else you get other detectives or fictional detectives like Lewis, you can't imagine the member acting like that. They would always follow the police procedure, a party line. He was very straight ladies as well, wasn't it, about the way things were done and everything. And I don't know what it is, because I think people are, the Lewis of this world and the Morse of this world, appeal to readers and to people who watch on television. But then the John Rebus, appeal to us as well, must be for different reasons. Yeah. And it's less so the mysteries that they're solving. I think it's more the characters that we take to, or don't. Yeah. Yeah, well, one of Liz's boots, the, the, the book, Barge and the... Oh. Oh, which, Jaden V, Mavic. Yeah, I mean, I'm invested in the famous characters now and the fact that we saw crimes just by the way, you know, I want, I want to know what they were in and what... Oh, we've got so much effort in some of those crimes as well. Oh no, they live from here anyway. The crimes are all good. Well, you know, one tries. But yeah, I, I, I feel like, as I said, I said before, I feel like I go out for a drink with them too. Yeah. And I'm a bit of a laugh. You wouldn't go out for a drink with John Rebus. No, no. Well, am I to the crowded pub? But do you, do you find that people like John Luther, Rebus, they tend to have a lot more violence. Yes. Around what they do. Luke Haus and the other one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Harry Holt. Yeah. Oh, yes. I've never read one of those. Oh, they're great. Tell me about Harry Holt. Um, Oslo Detective. Ah. Does he have good knitwear? Well, funny enough, when you, when you think of Luther, Rebus, you know, Harry Holt, their dress sense is usually scruffy to the point of worrying something that they will be worrying for the last 10 years. You know, same old jacket, same old trousers. I'm saying nothing. No. But, but they all, um, they all have this sort of relentless, they want to get the job done. So if there is a horrific murder, they want to find a person who did it. They're driven by the right to do good. Is it by anything as possible? Yes. So they, they're driven to do the right thing, but they don't want to get hampered by red tape and what have you. You know, if they want to, if they can cut corners, then they will. Yeah. Um, and I think it's that flawed. It's, it's that mixture, isn't it? You'd like to read about somebody who's doing good. And it's that bit of you that quite likes the flawed bit. You know, quite likes them cutting quite. Because one of us are perfect though. No. I'll speak for yourself. I'd like to think I would, uh, I want you to, because I'm a scaredy pants, but I'd like to think I, if I was a detective, if it was going to make a big difference, I'd cook corners. I don't think I'd kill anybody or dangle them over them. The balcony. But, you know, I think, I think I'd try the old, is that a baby who's been here crying in the, oh, somebody's obviously in danger. We'll have to force an insurer. I like it with it too. The other one that comes to mind is the low level misdemeanors. Yeah. Uh, the unorthodox and eccentric detectives. So, Sherlock's in there. Sherlock's in there. Yeah. That saga. Yes. Because of her, um, autistic tendencies tends to be on that. Monk is another one. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Slightly odd. Slightly odd. But endearing in a way. Yes. Clumbo. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. It was always a bit odd. Yeah. I'm going to add him as well. And I can't believe we're not mentioning yet. Jackson. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, with Clumbo, she used to get big. Coming soon. Jack's, tell us a bit more about Jackson and Lamb, because some people might not know that. No. Okay. Oh, he, uh, he runs Slough House, which is where all the, um, All the, uh, failed spies and rejects from MI5. That's right. Isn't it? They all hang out. And I mean, in that it's a great concept, because all of the characters, the main characters have a flaw, which is why they're there in the first place. And they don't get on. Oh, no. There's no, there's no team. Well, they're all angry. They're all angry. They're all together. They don't get to play with the big proper spies anymore. You know, they don't have all the tech and, you know, they're just condemned to do things like check the last five years of traffic, traffic events is in Camden or, you know, things like that. It's that almost cross reference, what else against the phone. I mean, Jackson and takes great pleasure in setting them terrible things to do. But the idea is the service wants rid of them. Yeah, because they don't want to pay them, but they cannot sack them. So they want them to leave at their own volition. Yeah, basically, they're trying to make life so unbearable for them that they will actually go. But it's a mixture of that. They put them in this building that sort of is tucked away somewhere and that was heard of. And it's sort of almost out of sight, out of mind. You know, if we put them in this building, we can just forget they exist. Yeah. It's like your police station where nobody goes anymore. Oh, it's worse than that. Oh, yeah, right. Well worse. I was going to say about Palumbo, one of the things he used to like about Palumbo is the fact that he'd be very friendly to somebody who was interviewing and very sympathetic. Yeah. And then he always did this thing. He'd be walking away and he'd go, "Oh, can I just ask?" And there'd always be that one question that he'd asked that would throw the person. Yes. It was usually the guilty party. He'd just go, "All right, I need to walk away." You could see them going, "I'm really concerned now what's going on here." 'Cause he just threw, you know, like a hand grenade into the room and then you went out sort of thing. I used to like it. Yeah. Used to like that. The thing with Jackson Lamby is awful to his team. Yes. Rude to them. You know, he's abusive. Yeah. Yeah. I think pleasant about him. Not at all. No. But it's that thing. He has this belief of, you know, "My team are all Joe's." Yeah. You know. And therefore, I have to look out for them because no one else is going to. So if it comes to, you know, one of them against MI5 Regent's part, he will support his team. Yeah. Yeah. Except he won't let them know he's supporting him. Oh, of course not. No, not ever. And quite often he'll have something and have a piece of information that gives him a hold over. Yes. The people at the park and he will use that. There's a hundred million beings with MI5 and MI6. They haven't plotted to kill him. I think when you read through it, I think there probably are some people there that would like to. Oh, absolutely. They would love to be shocked with it. I've got, I don't know if anybody's watched the True Detectives series on the television. But there was a detective in that call, Rust Cole. He was a very good detective. He left no stone unturned. However, he was harder. He was obsessive and he drank heavily. So when he let those demons get it, yeah, a hold of him. He got thrown off a few cases. Let's put it like that. So it was interesting because I mean, right through that series, all the detectives were flawed. They all had, like you say, a backstory list that was like, you know, they've been divorced three times. Although their wife was murdered on, you know, all these sorts of things coming into their sidekick. And when you knew you could go, oh, well, I understand it. Why they got that man up against the world by the throat. It's fine, you know, but so that was, that was a good series. Did either of you watch any of the truth? No. No. It was, yeah. That's the only thing we're doing this podcast. It's like, there's always something else. I should read that. Yeah. Yeah. Have you got any that you want to talk about any law detectives? I've got Harry. Have you heard of, let me find him, Harry Dresden? Oh, this is the Dresden part. The Dresden part? Oh, by Jim Butcher. Oh, go on. Tell us about Harry Dresden. He's a wizard. Well, yeah. Oh, of course. He's a private investigator and a wizard. And he advertises as a private investigator. And a wizard. Where does he have the ties? Chicago. Modern day Chicago. Okay. And, but he's one of those. He's got a sort of dark past that comes out. And he uses his magic. But there is, there wasn't like a, I don't know what it's called, but there's like a magical commission. And there are certain things as a magician that he's allowed to do. So he always sort of pushes it to the boundary. If not, quite breaks it. And there's, there's one chap who keeps appearing in different stories, who just wants to kill him. But he's not, he's not a, a baddie as such. But he's from this magical commission. And because Dresden keeps breaking the rules, he comes along and says, oh, you've broken the rules again. You know, and I've got this great big sword. I'm going to chop your head off because that's what happens to people. And Dresden always seems to sort of get out of it. Possibly announcing that you're going to do it and showing them that the sword is a strategic fail. I think the thing, and it annoys this guy all the time because he thinks, you know, you're breaking the rules and because of the rules, you should be executed. You should be killed. And Dressa always comes up with some way of just getting, getting by it. Yeah. And that's just one part of it. And of course, it's like any sort of wizard that got all sorts of weird and wonderful things happening because once you're getting into the world of fantasy, anything happened. I mean, for example, you can't get into his house because he has all sorts of spells and things on the doors and wards. Yes. Great. There are about, oh, I think last time, and there must be 17 or 18 books in series. Wow. But it's certainly one world worth. And that's cool. The author is Jim Butcher. Yeah. And they are the Dresden Hiles. Harry Dresden. I think again, that goes back to that, you know, they shouldn't be able to get away with it, but you kind of want them to. Yes. And it's infuriating, but also you are chewing them on. Maybe a bit like, you know, Benedict Cumberbatch's version of Sherlock when he's being awful. Obnoxious. Yes. But at the same time, you enjoy it. Oh, I do anyway. Well, just goes to show listeners that, you know, I'm going to look at one of these books now. So we do actually, as Liz said, get ideas from each other about things we've never. So do you have any anti heroes or flawed detectives in your work, Carol? Yes. Not normally. But in this last book, for I have sinned, there is a detective who has got some issues, I would say. I'm not going to give it too much away because I'd like you to read it. But she, I wouldn't say she's always been, I mean, my books are heavily sort of female detectives. So that's not given anything away, but she has always been reliable and good, but something life changing happens to her and she struggles. Let's put it like that to the point where she breaks the law, which is not like her at all. So I quite enjoyed that writing that about, you know, because all my detectives in the wanting detectives, I've always been like, goody two shoes really. They've always, you know, done everything by. Yeah. When's very strict? Yeah. She's very strict about how things are done and the other detectives are as well that she's got under her on her team, the under her guidance if you like. So, yeah, I mean, they would never enter a property unless they thought that was real. You know, so it really going on inside that was going to sort of, I don't know, endanger life really. Yeah. I think that's the best way to put it. Isn't that part of it that we've talked in previous episodes about the whole business? When you're reading or into a really good novel that sometimes you have to suspend belief. And when we go back to some of the people who talked about before that, John Luther, Rebers and so on, they actually wouldn't survive in a modern police force. Yeah. Because they break the rules so much. Yeah. They'd be up on a chart. They'd be up on a chart and they'd be kicked out. They would. So you almost have to sort of say, well, I know it's not real, but I like it. You know, I don't want them to wait and go and get a warrant. I want them to kick the door down and, you know, get the chapter inside by the throat and get a confession out of it. I think that's one of the reasons why I don't think I'd enjoy writing a police procedural, because the thing about writing the amateur detectives or, you know, detectives operating privately is that, you know, they're not bound by quite the same rules. They're not. Yes, they, you know, they should behave themselves, but sometimes it's very convenient for them to be able to do things that the police absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Can't be seen to do. Which is why something like going back to Harry Dresden, because you're setting it in, a fan, he's a wizard, so a lot of the crime. You're a wizard, Harry. Yeah. Sorry. A lot of the crimes have a sort of magical part to them. Then you could do what you like to a certain extent. Yeah. You know, within the rules of the magical world. Yes. Yeah. But police procedures and what have you to a certain extent. I mean, he does work along. He's a consultant to the police as well. He works alongside the police. And that tension of him working alongside the police is an interesting one too. Well, the rivers of London. Yes. That is that type of thing. They are actually a police department. They are. And they look at all the supernatural things that are going on. Yeah. There's an awful lot of that about the river. Not demons. The river goddesses. The goddesses. Yes. Yeah. And having a lot of influence on what goes on around them sort of thing. But the funny thing there is, I mean, that's these books, by the way, by Ben. Radnovich. Radnovich. Radnovich. Radnovich. And the actual main person whose name I can't feel like. Peter Grant. Peter Grant. He's the young policeman who also has these magical powers or his training. Very hard. Very hard training. Training. He still sticks within the rules. You know, he doesn't fall into the flawed character, really. Why do you think that is? What's his function? Is he there as a kind of a window on the world? I think he's there because the whole premise behind the series of books is that within, in London, within the world of crime within London, there is this undercurrent of criminal activity that is based on magic. Can't be explained away. Can't be explained away. So that's where he gets called into. So he doesn't get called into any run of the day crimes, murder mysteries. He'll get called in if the crime happens to be, oh, we saw this 34 foot monster, killing, you know, and the police were saying, well, that's, that's obviously ludicrous. Therefore, we'll get Peter Grant in because he deals with the ludicrous. Yeah. Basically. So I think it's, it's just taking normal life in, in London, in this case, but just adding that underbelly, kind of all bets are off in terms of what he can do. Does he have different procedures and a different rule to stand the force? Not really because what, again, with this one, a bit like the Harry Dresden, they work alongside, he is a police officer within the Metropolitan Police and they work alongside them. So sometimes he may very well have to wait for a warrant and what have you. But sometimes it's what they might see when they get into a building. Right. And they get a warrant to search somewhere and find that it's not the drugs that they're looking for, but these three foot goblins who've been, these are not the goblins you're looking for. Harry. I just want to think, because I watched, I can't remember when I think it was earlier this year, I watched some series and they all had a very similar theme where the detective could see ghosts, you know, and the ghost, usually the ghost of a murdered person, he was trying to give, and there was about three different series. One was in Italy around the time of the Second World War, or just after the Second World War, and due to a modern, and these detectives could, you know, have been haunted by these victims, if you like. That was interesting, but going back to Terevis, I've read quite a few of the boots now, and I used to watch the series where it was, it was on, I've seen the mob and what are quite like that. And he's always under investigation. Yes. Always. The people investigate the police in Scotland, who don't look like Joan, what they call them. He was always under suspicion of not doing the right thing, being being connected to the mafia and all sorts of things. Wow. They never quite proved anything. I think he got suspended a few times, but he never lost his job as far as I know. It's almost as though, because a reader might say, hang on, a policeman can't do that without being investigated. You almost wonder if Ian Rankin threw that in. Well, I'd better have him being interviewed. In a petrol state. In a suspended. But again, in the real life, he wouldn't have had that many suspensions or that many investigations. Probably would not have that many chance. No, they would have got rid of them. Yes. But then that doesn't make a story. No, that doesn't make for a character. And again, you don't know, I mean, I don't know, when Ian Rankin wrote the first Rebus, did he intend to have a series of books that went on and on and on and on. Well, that's it, isn't it? It was popular. It turned him his bread butter. Yeah. And people love it. So, you could be right, because we've discussed this before about famous rights. It's not like, I'm not saying that Ian Rankin doesn't like Rebus. Because he did write a last Rebus and now he's back. Back again. So, yeah. So, that could just be that that is the money part that owns in his bread and butter. But, you know, we've talked about coming to an actor, Christy, not liking some of their characters and not wanting to kill them off. Yes. Oh, as a sort of a side. I was following the journey of someone on Twitter, or X, if you want to call it that, political animal. And he does these amazing travel trips using trains usually or buses. And he recreated or went on again, Holmes and Watson's journey to the Reichenbach. Oh, right. Yes. And it is such fun with little videos of all the landscapes. So, yes. If you want to look up political animal and he talks about, you know, he quotes from the books and all of that. And, you know, what train Holmes would have got and all of that. So, yes. I have been to that hotel. A great train and journey that Anne and I went on. And the whole hotel is just, you know. Dressed up for it. One wouldn't necessarily dressed up, you know, but there are plaques like your home state here is. Yes. And also a nice guy who had problems with Ted Hastings at a line of duty. And I know probably the last two series that there was this, is he H, which was somebody they were trying to catch, is he H? I'm not going to say, I'm not going to tell you whether he was or not, but he did have personal issues. He'd become bankrupt. He was living in a hotel and his wife didn't want anything to do with him. So, you know, there was that about him. Yeah. But that's the discrepancy, isn't it, because he was a flawed character, but not necessarily a flawed detective. Yeah. Because he was very much backed by the rules. Yeah. And that's, that's what we've been discussing it. You can have, in some ways, going back to what we said about the beginning, Hokeu Poiro was different because of his, what we would call OCD. But that didn't make him a flawed detective. We just needed a hanky to sit on a bit of time. Yes. Yeah. He just made him a strange, like, a strange blab there. Yeah. Yeah. Strange bloke. Yeah. I've got these new teeth. I've got these new teeth. I think it's time for a cup of tea. Quite possibly. Yes. So, yeah, we, we, we know them. We love them. And as I say, they make a lot of the stories, much richer. And we don't want detectives to be boring. So these people, when we, when we see them coming back, as you say, about the horses. So horses. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I cannot wait. Yeah. So we'll, we'll say goodbye now. Just before we go. Oh, yes. Sorry. We love reviews and comments on YouTube. And also, don't forget, we've got the only murders in my mind blog. Please go and have a look at it. Only murders in my mind.worldpress.com. And we put a short, we put a writing prompt up every week. So if you'd like to have a go at the writing prompt, put a story up there, maybe we could read it out one week. Yeah. I'll just say hello or comments. Yes. Yes. Interact week. We will get talked to us. Yeah. Yeah. Cool. That note. On that ghostly note, yeah. So we'll see you all same time next week. Bye for now. You have been listening to Only Murders in My Mind. A random thought production produced by John Bissett. The music in peril was composed and recorded by OM Studio Strings. Music [MUSIC PLAYING]