Agatha Christie purists are a tough crowd to please. Honestly, if you mess with the mustache of Hercule Poirot or make Miss Marple too sprightly, the fans will let you know about it. But when The Pale Horse TV series dropped on the BBC and Amazon Prime, it didn't just tweak a few details. It basically took the 1961 novel, threw it into a blender with some folk-horror vibes, and served it up as a hallucinogenic fever dream.
It’s polarizing. Some people love the grit. Others think it’s a total betrayal of the Queen of Crime.
If you're diving into this two-part miniseries, you've gotta be prepared for something that feels less like a cozy Sunday night mystery and more like a psychological breakdown. Written by Sarah Phelps—who has become the de facto architect of the "dark Christie" universe—this version of The Pale Horse leans hard into the occult. It asks a simple, terrifying question: Can you actually kill someone just by wishing it? Or, more specifically, can three witches in a village called Much Deeping conjure death for a price?
What Actually Happens in The Pale Horse TV Series?
The story centers on Mark Easterbrook. In the book, he’s a bit of an academic, a relatively decent guy trying to solve a puzzle. In the 2020 series, Rufus Sewell plays him as a man simmering with a sort of oily, high-society arrogance that hides a very dark interior. He’s a wealthy antiques dealer. He’s recently widowed. He’s also kind of a jerk to his new wife, Hermia (played by Kaya Scodelario).
The plot kicks off when a woman is found dead on the street. In her shoe? A list of names. Mark’s name is on it.
As the people on that list start dropping dead from seemingly natural causes—strokes, heart attacks, sudden failures—Mark starts to spiral. He travels to Much Deeping, a village that looks like it was designed by someone who had a nightmare about a 1960s postcard. There, he meets the trio of women everyone suspects of being witches: Thyrza Grey, Sybil Stamfordis, and Bella Webb.
They don't have bubbling cauldrons. They have a farmhouse and a lot of cryptic dialogue.
The Sarah Phelps Influence and Why it Matters
You can't talk about The Pale Horse TV series without talking about Sarah Phelps. She’s the writer behind And Then There Were None (2015) and The ABC Murders (2018). She doesn't do "cozy." She strips away the polished manor-house aesthetic and replaces it with damp walls, cigarette smoke, and genuine human malice.
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In this adaptation, the supernatural element isn't just a red herring. Or is it? That’s the tension. While the book eventually lands on a very logical, scientific explanation involving thallium poisoning, the show keeps you guessing about the "magic" much longer. It uses the visual language of folk horror—corn dolls, masks, weird festivals—to make you feel as paranoid as Mark is.
The pacing is frantic. One minute you're in a sleek London apartment, the next you're watching a man pull clumps of his own hair out in a dirty bathroom. It’s visceral. Christie wrote about the "banality of evil," but Phelps writes about the "rot of evil."
The Cast: Not Your Typical Detectives
Rufus Sewell is the anchor here. He has this incredible ability to look suave and utterly terrified at the same time. His Mark Easterbrook isn't a hero. He’s a man who has done something bad—or thinks he has—and the universe is finally catching up to him.
- Bertie Carvel as Zachariah Osborne: He’s the pharmacist who is convinced the witches are real. Carvel plays him with a twitchy, obsessive energy that makes him the perfect foil for Mark's polished exterior.
- Kaya Scodelario as Hermia: She’s often overlooked in reviews, but she captures that trapped, 1960s housewife energy perfectly. She knows her husband is hiding something, and her quiet resentment is a slow-burn highlight.
- The Witches: Rita Tushingham, Sheila Atim, and Kathy Kiera Clarke. They are eerie without ever being caricatures. They don't need prosthetics to be scary; they just need to stare at you.
Accuracy vs. Artistic License
Let’s be real: if you want a page-for-page recreation of the book, you will be annoyed. The ending of The Pale Horse TV series is drastically different from Christie’s original conclusion.
In the novel, the mystery is solved. The "how" is explained. Order is restored.
In the TV series? Things get... metaphysical. Without spoiling the final frames, the show suggests a cycle of guilt and punishment that is far more cynical than the source material. It leans into the idea of a "guilty conscience" being its own kind of curse. Some critics argued this gutted the logic of a detective story. Others, like those writing for The Guardian at the time, praised it for modernizing a story that could otherwise feel dated.
The hair loss is a major plot point in both. In the real world, thallium poisoning is a horrific way to go. It was actually used by real-life killers like Graham Young. Christie, who had a background in pharmacy, knew her poisons. The show stays true to the symptoms—the lethargy, the tingling, and the iconic clumps of hair—but it frames them through the lens of a curse rather than a chemical.
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Why Much Deeping Feels So Familiar
If you got a weird sense of déjà vu watching the village scenes, it’s because the production design is tapping into a very specific British subgenre. It’s the "Summer of Love" meets The Wicker Man.
Filming took place largely in Bristol and the surrounding Cotswolds. The village of Much Deeping was actually the village of Bisley in Gloucestershire. They transformed the sleepy town into a 1960s fever dream, complete with vintage cars and that oppressive, "everyone is watching you" atmosphere.
The cinematography by Adam Etherington uses a lot of saturated colors and Dutch angles. It’s meant to make you feel nauseous. It works.
Addressing the "Logic Gap"
One of the biggest complaints from viewers was the lack of a clear "detective" figure. Inspector Lejeune (played by Sean Pertwee) is there, but he’s not Poirot. He’s a tired cop trying to make sense of a list of dead people.
In a traditional Christie story, the detective is the smartest person in the room. In The Pale Horse TV series, everyone is stumbling in the dark. Mark Easterbrook is a terrible detective because he’s too busy trying to save his own skin. This shift changes the "Search Intent" of the viewer—you aren't watching to find out whodunnit as much as you're watching to see what happens to Mark.
Is It Worth the Watch?
Honestly, yeah. Even if you hate what they did to the ending, it’s a beautiful piece of television. The costumes are incredible. The 1960s London setting feels lived-in and oily, not like a costume party.
But you have to accept that this is a reimagining.
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It’s about the psychology of belief. Thyrza Grey says something in the show that basically sums up the whole theme: "If you believe in the power, then the power exists." That’s the core of the horror here. It’s not about whether magic is real; it’s about what people will do—and how they will crumble—if they think it’s real.
Essential Takeaways for Viewers
If you’re planning to binge this, or if you’ve just finished it and are scratching your head, here’s how to process it:
- Don't expect a Poirot-style wrap-up. This is a psychological thriller first and a mystery second. The "clues" are often emotional rather than physical.
- Watch the background. There is a lot of foreshadowing in the set design of Much Deeping. The dolls, the masks, and the way the villagers move all hint at the ending.
- Research Thallium. If you want to understand the "science" side that the show downplays, look up the "Teacup Poisoner." It adds a layer of real-world terror to the hair-loss scenes.
- Compare with the 1996 and 2010 versions. There have been other adaptations. The 1996 one is more "TV movie" style, while the 2010 version was actually an episode of Agatha Christie's Marple. Seeing how they all handle the "witchcraft" vs. "science" debate is fascinating.
Next Steps for the Christie Fan:
If the dark, atmospheric tone of this series worked for you, you should immediately jump into Sarah Phelps' other Christie adaptations. Start with And Then There Were None. It’s widely considered the gold standard for this style of "prestige" mystery. It features a similarly doomed cast and a mounting sense of dread that doesn't let up.
After that, read the original The Pale Horse novel. You’ll be shocked at how much was changed, particularly the character of Mark. In the book, he’s a much more sympathetic figure, and the romance subplot feels like a completely different genre compared to the icy marriage shown on screen.
Finally, for those interested in the real-world history of the 1960s occult revival that influenced the show's aesthetic, look into the "Black Magic" panic of the era. It explains why a 1961 audience would have found the idea of village witches much more plausible—and terrifying—than we do today.