How other detectives would handle the end of Murder on the Orient Express
(Spoilers, obviously.)
I haven’t seen the newest version of this story, but I have seen the one with Albert Finney and the one with David Suchet, so I know the wealth of happy or conflicted responses Poirot may have to this situation. But how about other great detectives?
Sam Vimes: Sam Vimes once personally fought off a revenge demon, so he’s not going to buy the ‘this man deserved death’ rhetoric and will arrest everyone. He will also, however, speak as a character witness at each of the murderers’ trials to vouch that they probably would never do something like this again. Vetinari pardons them all, and Sam throws up his hands wondering what was the point of anything.
Sherlock Holmes: Sherlock Holmes once accidentally completely intentionally murdered an abuser, so he’s probably going to be sensitive to this case. Not only would he let the killers go, he’d have Watson write a whole story about how a mafia assassin killed the guy and history would be none the wiser.
Phryne Fisher: She’d probably handle it like Poirot did (unless Jack was there to frown at her until she let him arrest people) but the bigger question is, who would she sleep with? I think it would be the young couple who are always played by the hottest people in the cast.
Philip Marlowe: Given his trouble with both the police and the mafia, his judgement on this issue will be rather clouded, and he’ll probably spend a night in jail as the suspect before the Transylvanian police let him out. On his way home, he will think back on the mystery, smack his head with his hand, and yell “GOD DAMN IT!”
Kinsey Millhone: Kinsey hates rich people slightly more than she hates herself, so she’ll turn them over to the police and reflect that most of the killers here are rich and will afford good lawyers, whereas if she killed a guy in cold blood she’d get forty years.
Sam Spade: Unless he was being paid to solve the mystery, I highly doubt Sam Spade would give a shit.
One might argue that Marlowe would have intentionally set himself up as the fall guy to nobly spare the passengers, which he would of course hate himself for. He’d spend that whole night in jail playing cards with a handsome young officer who may be a reflection of himself, or the devil, or simply Chandler being oblivious to his own homoerotic subtext, before being let out in the morning and never seeing anyone from the train again. He’d make oblique references to one of them in the next book, probably Linda (having the name of his wife and also being played by Lauren Bacall.)
Other than that, completely co-signed.
Ooh, that’s good! And if Philip Marlowe were to have sexual tension with anyone here, it would absolutely be the loud, mean American woman rather than the cute young things.
Here’s the Mickey Spillane version and I warn you it’s not going to be pretty:
After having dessert with Ratchett (Johnny Depp) Mike Hammer follows him back to his compartment where he starts beating a confession out of him. As Ratchett’s teeth fly across the room, sweet little Mary Debenham (Daisy Ridley) breaks in and cries: “Please Hammer don’t hurt him!” Hammer is confused by this, so he asks her:
“What’s a nice girl like you doing on a train like this?”
Hammer returns to his compartment where he finds a nighties clad Caroline Hubbard (Michelle Pfeifer) curled up in his second class bed. She makes a lot of sweet talk but also asks a lot of shrouded questions. “What’s her angle?” Hammer wonders. Any responsible detective would have sent the dame packing but Hammer was never a responsible detective…
When Ratchett shows up twelve kinds of dead, the Bulgarian Police have their suspect and rough up Hammer pretty good but he gives them nothing. He re-boards the train where it passes on to Romania, where the Romanian police have been alerted and do the same. Next stop Hungary. This is looking to be a mean ride for Mike Hammer.
Eventually, Hammer’s devoted secretary Velda Wickman (I’m thinking “Agent Carter’s” Lyndsy Fonesca) springs him from the interrogation room of the Austrian Police. What of the real killer(s) on the train? They’ve all done each other in to keep each other quiet. Hammer and Velda take the bus back to Paris.
I want to hate this, but even more I want to see Johnny Depp get a punch that sends his teeth across the room.
I don’t know what the James Ellroy version of this plotline would entail, but it would absolutely involve two homoerotic homophobe cops grimly surrendering to the inherent and unshakable injustices underpinning “modern”, “civilized” society and also Johnny Depp being digitally replaced in post-production by Danny DeVito.
Your last sentence is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever read.
bee-squared-official
