Elderly Catholic priest and part-time sleuth, Father Brown, wanders around the 1950s British countryside annoying the local police inspector and solving crimes with the assistance of his daft, old biddy housekeeper, Mrs. McCarthy, and a tubby, over-the-hill debutante called Bunty.

The stories and characters in this series bear no resemblance to those created by G. K. Chesterton, and it seems pretty certain G. K. Chesterton would turn over in his grave if he ever saw these episodes and the bastardization of his well-known character.

Most of the murderers depicted have good ‘justifications’ or excuses for their crimes and are depicted as good people reduced to doing bad things because of the circumstances in which they find themselves; as a result, the killers are often given a pass—legal and/or spiritual—for their misdeeds. There is no discussion of ‘evil’ in these episodes because many of the criminals are represented as inherently decent people. In fact, it is usually the victims who are somehow depicted as the ‘bad guys’. The concept of evil is key to much of Chesterton’s writings and to the realities of murder. A whole bunch of well-meaning, goodhearted killers just comes across as contrived and downright phony.

The political agendas being pushed down the throats of viewers by this series are also heavily contrived. Homosexuality, abortion, bigamy, immigrants, interracial marriages, and any number of other popular progressive causes are positively (& unrealistically) promoted with an overwhelming rush of sermonizing fervor. So much of the content just does not ring true to Catholicism or to the 1950s; the storylines and characters are so completely out of place in the 1950s, one has to wonder why the producers didn’t just set the series in modern times.

The idea that a Catholic priest would benevolently encourage the relationship between a couple of lesbian bell ringers, or that 1950s English society would readily accept a black opera singer’s fifth marriage to a much younger white guy just doesn’t pass the smell test for believability. This flagrant attempt at societal indoctrination really detracts from the entertainment value of the show, and it also succeeds in taking all of the mystery out of what little mystery is included in the stories—you know for a fact that the final solution to the puzzle is never going to contradict the filmmakers’ vision of Utopia.

This series was a profound disappointment. It is more of an exercise in heavy-handed propaganda than light-hearted entertainment. What could have been a quality, entertaining TV mystery show based on the literature of G. K. Chesterton is actually a preachy, boring, and utterly pretentious mess. It is a very condescending depiction of a fictional Catholic priest as seen through the distorted interpretive lens of British atheists, determined to intentionally insult and offend Catholic audiences…& many others. ( )