Guvf vf ernyyl vagrerfgvat greevgbel sbe Wbanguna qenzngvpnyyl naq V guvax vg nyybjf gur fubj gb cerfrag Wbanguna va n fyvtugyl qvssrerag yvtug – erpbtavmvat uvf cerivbhf cevqr naq birepbasvqrapr znl unir pnhfrq uvz gb znxr reebef. It’s an episode that shows both the delights of the programmes in its ’90s heyday as well as the bad habits its fallen into in recent years. And so we come to ‘Daemons’ Roost’, which may well represent the final nail in the coffin of the series (though, of course, the body may creep out and reappear elsewhere somehow…). Similarly, the last few minutes are given over to a strangely forced emotive storyline that involves Creek’s brother Terry – who despite all the nostalgic elements featured, is one plot point that’s never been mentioned in the previous two decades.

He summons Alison back to the house to tell her the truth, before being paralysed by a stroke and unable to spill his secret. For the viewer, however, there’s a certain amount of suspension of disbelief required for the crucial moments, and indeed throughout the episode the quality of output varies widely.

Alison having been knocked out finds herself in the rumoured underground dungeon and is forced to watch Stephen levitated across the room and into the fire. When the two plots eventually collide, it gets stranger still, with Oliva seemingly being refused a speaking role. It’s a bittersweet moment, not least because soon I will have to confront the problem of figuring out what on earth I’ll be posting about on the weekends now. Following a series of strange events at the mansion and a near-miss with the criminal, Johnathan and Polly end up retreating to the mansion to investigate…. What is in the strange chequered box he forces onto his daughter and who is the mysterious "Mr G" with whom they have a deal?

Guest stars: Rik Mayall, Hannah Gordon, Francis Matthews, Suzanna Hamilton, Sanjeev Bhaskar, Murray Melvin, Kate Isitt and Vincent Wong. Pictured: Happier days… As the series wore on the impossibilities became slightly more abtruse — series four’s ‘The Tailor’s Dummy’ is probably about a man changing race on the spot, but also about a man jumping out of a window; ‘The Chequered Box’ has a weird impossibility which could be resolved in about four seconds but isn’t really an impossibility from the key character’s perspective; and whatever the hell ‘Gorgon’s Wood’ is about I honestly don’t know.But it turned out that his new wife and two of her three children were mysteriously killed in the home. It was a quite ridiculous caper involving vicious Victorian demons, a horror film director and enough bickery banter between Alan Davies’ hero and his new wife Polly (Sarah Alexander) to last a lifetime. All in all, I remain a fan of all the Creek canon, but still long for the days of Caroline Quentin, windmill living, and duffle coats. With his health failing, Clore has summoned home his stepdaughter Alison, to finally share with her the chilling truth of what happened to her family there when she was a child.

The otherwise empty bunker is locked from the inside, which would suggest that the man shot himself, but he has crippling arthritis in his hands and could barely pour a drink, much less pull a trigger, so how did he actually die? The solution to the satanic levitation murder was satisfying and fiendishly simple, and the neat solution to the ‘Striped Unicorn Affair’, it’s subsequent subversion, and then it’s link to the motive and solution for the death at Daemon’s Roost lifts those plotting elements from good to brilliant. There is a legend that a hundred years ago a sorcerer named Jacob Surtees was able to open a fiery portal and throw his victims into it using telekinesis. I think your point about the essential simplicity of the solutions it is what I liked and what made me feel, despite the difficulties, that I was getting a shot of classic Renwick.As the story unfolds, the terrible rituals that were performed by Jacob Surtees are frighteningly revived with terrifying consequences. After two year's away, Jonathan Creek is back with a 90-minute special, reuniting Alan Davies with Sarah Alexander.