Curtain: Poirot's Last Case (2013)

Poirot use to be brilliant. I used to love Poirot. Most recent and latest episodes though feel as if author was on dope and her brain was completely gone, or someone else was writing instead of her. Absurd episodes. This is opinion as if I were Poirot and had to guess what happened to what used to be a brilliant show, but now is completely nonsensical and ran into the ground mush. What is funny that this Review Process is behaving like latest Poirot shows. That is, it demands that I write at least 10 lines. So, I am trying to "water it down", my review, Mon Ami. Just like Poirot was watered-down with nonsensical lines, actions, and other stuff, just to make the show fit into required time length, I presume, Mon Ami.

Where is the fun of the early Suchet Poirot? This episode was boring to look at and boring to listen to. The best thing about it, besides Hastings (yay!), is that they finally stayed fairly true to Agatha Christie's book. Otherwise, we didn't think much of it.Poirot was portrayed as being ornery and we had to listen to him wheeze, not pleasant. In her book, Christie uses words like "twinkling" and "affectionate" and "quiet" and only "faintly scornful" when describing Poirot, but he was so demeaning in the film that by the end, we didn't like him much at all.The cinematography was washed out, which in a film industry that creates such eye-catching TV as Inspector Lewis, Midsomer Murders, and Sherlock is a huge shame and a waste. It's possible to be bleak and picturesque at the same time.Usually we try not to be too critical, but Masterpiece knows how to create fabulous shows, so when they fall below the mark, we speak our mind in hopes that they'll always go for creating characters that we care about and put them in scenery that fascinates. There are many Masterpiece and BBC shows that we watch again and again. These later Poirots aren't in that group. Major bummer.

I am someone who has enjoyed many of Poirots episodes. The calm tone, good acting and decent dialogue had made it something that I was looking forward to watching. The final episode does not do any justice to the series. The lighting and decor appear to be purposefully bleak and depressing (unlike most other episodes where the color interplay always involves some strong nice colors as well). The plot and ultimate ending are simply unbelievable. Moreover, in my opinion this episode possibly casts a shadow over the morality of both Poirot and Hastings. There is other stuff too going on in this episode that is hardly worth mentioning simply because none of the characters seemed to have any particularly redeeming qualities. They were all kind of bland like the lightning and decor. All in all, very disappointed...

*possible spoiler-not the murderer though* Firstly I am a huge fan, I have all the box sets and I often re-watch the episodes, I watched Curtain: Poirot's last case and I was not immediately taken by it, I thought it was good, quite a departure from the standard format but the more I reflected on it, the more I was drawn to well, the nostalgia of it, Poirot's last case, or more appropriately last act. Here we have an ailing Poirot, sometimes quite nasty and even unpleasant, mostly towards his closest ally Hastings, constantly in pain and in his final act he gives all he has left in his failing body to protect Hastings and his daughter from harm, not to mention many others. Where one is lead to believe he is treating Hastings badly he is really solidly behind his old friend. I was really not expecting this type of ending from Christie for Poirot but the more I reflect the more I think it was perfect.