Agatha Christie’s Seven Dials is a new 3-part Netflix series featuring a modern adaptation of Christie’s 1929 novel, starring Mia McKenna-Bruce as Lady Eileen “Bundle” Brent, Helena Bonham Carter as Lady Caterham, and Martin Freeman as Superintendent Battle. A death, following a country house party at Chimneys, first considered an accidental overdose of a sleeping potion, is ruled a murder. The investigation into that death accelerates when another murder triggers a notion that both deaths are due to a secret society.
Jerry House correctly points out The Seven Dials Mystery (1929) Is one of Agatha Christie’s weakest mysteries. Christie brings back the characters from an earlier novel, The Secret of Chimneys: Lady Eileen (Bundle) Brent, Lord Caterham, Bill Eversleigh, George Lomax, Tredwell and Superintendent Battle.
I liked McKenna-Bruce as the feisty Bundle. But Christie’s story involving everything from a country house murder to elaborate international espionage and a secret cabal of weirdos who (at least in this Netflix adaptation) meet wearing face masks shaped like clocks ends up being a bit silly despite the murders.
Robert Barnard noted that this novel had the “Same characters and setting with Chimneys” and then concluded his view of it by adding “but without the same verve and cheek”. I agree. GRADE: C (novel), Netflix series: B
I guess I’ll have to pass on it! I don’t get Netflix and your damning review conspire to keep me far away from this tepid production! What happened to good Christie adaptations? When I was on my cruise I tried to watch Death on the Nile and bailed as soon as the murder occurred! It was terrible!
Bob, I don’t know what happened to good Agatha Christie adaptions. But recent Christie adaptations certainly lack verve.
Revealing my sexist roots, I must say that the one big plus in the Netflix series is that Mia McKenna-Bruce is cute.
Jerry, Mia McKenna-Bruce is super cute and the best thing about the Netflix THE SEVEN DIALS MYSTERY.
I agree that the book is weak. Jackie likes these “young adventurers” types, and she liked Bundle. I don’t think I’ll bother watching it, though.
She might.
Jeff, “Bundle” is a bundle of cute amid an arid production.
As much as I love Christie, her “secret society/spies” mysteries from the 1920s are some of her weakest. I guess I’ll just watch the 1980s adaptation of “A Murder Is Announced” on BritBox for the 800th time!
Deb, I remember reading THE BIG FOUR one afternoon when I was in High School. It had none of the brilliance of THE MYSTERIOUS AFFAIR AT STYLES or THE MURDER OF ROGER ACKROYD–two classics that preceded THE BIG FOUR.
Well, THE BIG FOUR comes before ROGER ACKROYD, even though the book version was published later. Reading the end of the one and the beginning of the other shows this.
Like Jackie, I love the Young Adventuress books. They may be silly, but I can reread them endlessly. Bundle is tremendously enchanting, and I can’t imagine any actress could portray my mental image of her. Mia McKenna-Bruce does a nice job, quite acceptable, but… I guess “my” Bundle starts with a very young Isabella Rossellini and builds from there.
Jeff, I would like your “Bundle”–I was always keen on the young Isbella Rossellini. Thanks for setting me straight on the Christie chronology.