The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (Part 12, The End)

Loose Thread #3, The Beatnik Preacher/Police Chief

Much like how your local police department is a small potatoes version of the FBI, the Beatnik Chief's appearance is a small potatoes version of the J. Edgar Hoover call.

What we are told: The Beatnik shows up somewhere in the second half of the movie, during Wadsworth's manic explanation of events, as a door to door evangelist. He is warning the group, specifically Mrs. Peacock, that Armageddon is at hand, that their souls are in danger and that now is the time to repent. He has a flyer that he is trying to show them. Peacock slams the door in his face.

What we find out: That the Beatnik is in fact the chief of police. He only comes back into the movie once Green shoots Wadsworth and opens the door to let the cops in. He asks "Whodunnit?" Green tells him they all did and the movie ends. Quite anticlimactic.

From a logic and storytelling point of view, the Beatnik visit serves no logical purpose. The only reason I can think of as to why the Chief of police, of all people, would do that is to theoretically tell the undercover Green that the local police were on the scene and ready to spring when notified. The whole stuff about Armageddon and Repenting could have been various kinds of code to get a message of some kind to Green.

But why on earth would that be necessary? This movie takes place in the 50's, there was no high tech surveillance going on. There would be nothing to prevent the cops from hiding in the woods around the house to stage the arrest. They should have just told Green they would be there and to act accordingly. To that extent, Green does nothing different really once the Beatnik appears. Its just a fun interlude. Furthering the logic problem is how Wadsworth reacts, or doesn't, in this case. Again, everybody in the movie is either an informant, a blackmailer or a victim, carefully invited by Wadsworth to execute his plan. The house was chosen because it was so in the middle of nowhere that Wadsworth believes he can kill a bunch of people, stack them in the basement and then leave quietly one at a time, without getting caught. The implication of an utter stranger appearing at the door to do some bible thumping should have sent off a million alarms in Wadsworth's head. But like the Hoover call, it seems to have no impact on Wadsworth or his plan.

What I think this actually is though, is a scene that was only in there to help facilitate a fake ending. In the real ending Green lets the cops in to arrest everybody but ending #2, the Peacock ending, is different. In the Peacock ending the Beatnik appears and leaves as before but after that Wadsworth solves the crime and exposes Peacock as the murderer. They sing "For She's a Jolly Good Fellow" and Peacock leaves. At this point, the Beatnik has his big scene where he strolls out of the bushes, hits his catchphrase, "Oh Mrs. Peacock, the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!" he drops the flyer, pulls the gun, the spotlights flood on and Peacock gets arrested! Beatnik does a Doc Holliday gun spin into the holster and informs Watson that they got her. Very exciting stuff indeed.

Even in this fake ending it makes even less sense that he would ring the bell as Wadsworth had complete control over the house and surrounding yard, he could have let the cops hide hours or days before the guests got there so there would be no reason for the Chief to get him a message. Oh well, I think the writers just decided that the movie needed more things to happen and for some other people to show up, no harm, no foul.

A final point about the Beatnik Cop. He looks nothing like a beatnik, anti-materialistic, bongo drumming hippie that I think of when I hear Beatnik. In fact, he looks exactly like the Chief of Police. I have no idea why Peacock calls him a beatnik. He was offering a kind of hellfire preaching, warning of God's Wrath as described in the Book of Revelations. Peacock must be hard core if she considers that Beatnik.

And finally, the local cops are useless. Numerous people get killed while they were standing around, having the boss call in to ruin things and knocking on the door to make sure people are suspicious. Maybe they could argue that they couldn't see what was happening inside but they let the poor Singing Telegram girl walk right up to the door and get shot. And then did nada. Just an observation.

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (Part 11)

 Loose Thread #2 - The call from J. Edgar Hoover

A bizarre aspect of the movie that is ignored by everyone in the movie.

What we are told: Prior to the surge killing of the Cop, Singing Telegram Girl and Yvette a call from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover is answered by the off-duty cop right before he makes his own call for help.

What we find out: It was a fact a call from J. Edgar Hoover and it was intended for his undercover Agent, Mr. Green.

This entire element of the movie makes no sense, regardless of the ending. In the two false endings, Wadsworth is the undercover Agent trying to catch the blackmailer and killer. The call from Hoover comes and the Cop answers it and Wadsworth answers it as a representative of the house. All we see is after the call a slightly exasperated Wadsworth take a deep breath, then move on. If the call was for Wadsworth I suppose there could be a reason for Hoover to call with the expectation that Wadsworth would answer the phone, being the butler and all. But once the Cop answered why on Earth would Hoover just continue on and tell the Cop who he really was? No reason.

In the true ending it makes even less sense. Mr. Green is undercover and not in control of the household. Why on Earth would Hoover need to tell him something so badly that he would do it right in the middle of a sting operation where there is very little chance that Green would be able to answer the phone? There is no reason and the movie provides none. Green doesn't get the call and doesn't mention it again until he tells everyone at the end it was for him, in case his badge and gun wasn't enough to convince them he was an undercover Agent.

The call only really serves one function and that is to let the people watching the movie that something is not as it seems. Which we already knew due to the spy, blackmail, Boddy reveals. But I suppose this lets us in to the fact that there is a law enforcement element involved that we may not be hip to yet. The problem though is that while we get that info and do whatever with it, the people in the movie react to it in no way whatsoever. In the true ending, a call from Hoover should have immediately clued Wadsworth/Boddy into the fact that one of the guests was an undercover agent of some kind, or at least working with the Feds. Given that moments later Yvette is killed by White, the Cop by Scarlett and the Singing Telegram Girl by Wadsworth himself, the fact that Green is the only person in the house who hasn't killed anyone yet should have been proof positive that he was the mole. Frankly, Wadsworth should have known that already since all the guests had their informant in the house, besides Green. Wadsworth had the gun and the element of surprise and already had a house full of people being blackmailed who all just killed someone. He could have done anything with Green and pinned it on them. Or hid him in the basement. Or just fled. Anything. We don't know what the conversation was like between Wadsworth and Hoover but its impossible to imagine anything that could have been said that would have eased Wadsworth's mind. Wadsworth reacts by just doing . . . . . . . nothing. Nothing at all. 

Even if you were inclined to believe that the Hoover call was a missed edit from one of the fake endings, the same logic applies. If Wadsworth was the undercover Agent and Peacock or Scarlett was the killer, the fact that the Cop announces to everyone that Hoover was calling the house would have clued the killer into the scam immediately. What actions that would have caused we can't say but it wouldn't have just been ignored. I think it likely that it would have made Wadsworth an immediate target since all the blackmail victims had proven that they would not have worked with the Feds and the whole operation was being orchestrated by Wadsworth. This whole business with the call was for the audience only.

Up next: The final part, the Beatnik Preacher loose thread

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (Part 10)

Loose Thread #1 - Who is Mr. Green?

One of the stranger aspects of the movie that gets lost in the shuffle of multiple endings and slightly different scenes is the true circumstances of our hero, Mr. Green.

What we are told: Green is a State Department employee that is being blackmailed because he is secretly gay and would lose his top secret clearance, and job, if it was exposed.

What we find out: He's a gun toting, super macho, married FBI Agent working to bring down Mr. Boddy and his ring of informants.

This setup doesn't make much sense. If we accept the scenario at face value, one of Mr. Boddy's spies (Yvette, the Cook, Cop, Butler, etc.) found out that Mr. Green was gay, got enough incriminating evidence on him that it would allow for blackmail, then informed Mr. Boddy who initiated the long term blackmail. But how could that happen? To get ironclad enough evidence to blackmail someone, you would think visual proof, probably photographic but maybe a honeypot scenario, would be needed. If Green is straight then that didn't happen. Secondly, how does Green impersonate a State Department agent if he works for the FBI? Presumably the evidence against Green would have been collected before he was aware it was happening, he would have had no reason to believe he needed an undercover job at the State Department to cover his FBI roots.

One scenario that seems to be hinted at in the film is that maybe Green is a stand in. When Wadsworth is answering doors he says something to the effect of "You must be Mr. Green" after seeing Green bumbling about. We know from the end that Green is not the awkward, uncoordinated dolt he portrays himself to be for most of the movie. Is it possible that some other State Department Agent is in fact gay, has in fact been blackmailed, and is in fact a doofus and that the Mr. Green we see on the screen is simply an FBI Agent impersonating a victim to bring down Boddy? It seems highly unlikely. Mr. Boddy simply has to know what the real Mr. Green looks like. The evidence for blackmail has to be physical and incontrovertible to be effective. If you couldn't tell who it was it wouldn't work. This movie takes place in 1954 too, there was no computer trickery that could create the evidence and its doubtful that Mr. Green was willing to go to Cruising levels of undercover to create it. 

So if the proof of blackmail couldn't be faked and Mr. Green couldn't be impersonating a real victim, how did he get pulled in close enough to Mr. Boddy's group to infiltrate the dinner? Remember, in theory, Mr. Boddy is so sure of his evidence against the dinner guests he thinks he can get them to murder people, then replace them as his spies.

The Answer:

One of Mr. Boddy's spies has to have turned against him and is working for the government. Mr. Green could not have instigated the blackmail against himself on his own. That would involve faking a gay lifestyle just hoping that one of Boddy's spies notice and try and exploit it. That may never happen. But if the Cook, Cop, Butler, Yvette, etc. turned informant for the government and started bringing false info on FBI Agent Green undercover as State Department Agent Green to Boddy, then it becomes much more plausible. While photographic evidence would still not exist, other plausible, first-person information could be created by Green and the informant that would convince Boddy's and bring Green into the fold.

So which informant could it be? Who knows. Given Yvette and Mrs. Scarlett's proximity to the sex trade, its possible that Yvette could be a first person witness to some faked gay prostitute and fake Green. The movie provides no Clue that I can see however.

Up Next: The J. Edgar Hoover Call

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 9)

 THE EIGHTH MURDER - MR. BODDY

(Wadsworth, just prior to the reckoning)

The Situation: The supporting cast has fulfilled their roles yet the banshee wails still. After explaining to the cast the events of the entire evening, Wadsworth exposes himself (with ladies present) as the one who killed the Singing Telegram Girl and that he is in fact Mr. Boddy.

The Murder: The murder itself is straightforward. After Wadsworth nee Boddy gives his villain speech,  Mr. Green quick draws his service revolver and shoots Wadsworth directly in the heart. I think. Kind of unclear where the shot hits but Wadsworth dies almost instantly. Mr. Green reveals that he is an FBI Agent investigating the blackmail and that he is totally not gay and is going to celebrate solving the mystery by sleeping with his totally real wife. The religious beatnik makes his final appearance as he is actually the chief of the local police force, I assume. They call him chief and the cops there look like regular police and not other FBI Agents so I think Green had local backup on this one.

There are a number of problems that we'll get to in the loose threads portion of the series but one question to look at now is; "Why did Green shoot Wadsworth?"

Looking back at the evidence it seems like a pretty clear cut case of a bad shooting. At this point everybody in the house has been exposed as a murderer, been murdered or involved in a fairly elaborate blackmail scheme. It's true that Wadsworth had a gun but he has made it very clear that he is not going to kill anyone else at the party. The whole point of the night was to compromise the guests so that they can replace the cook, butler and Yvette as his informers so the blackmailing racket could continue. In addition to Wadsworth's lack of motivation, Mr. Green knows that the house is surrounded by police. Had Green simply waited and continued his ruse, they would have stacked the bodies in the cellar, left quietly one at a time and been subsequently arrested as they left. In a movie about a series of murders, the justice delivered at the end, was in fact, just another murder.

Conclusion: Wadsworth is very much a Macbethian figure. He too is the protagonist of this theater yet is ultimately the baddy. Also, Wadsworth only realizes at the very end that he has confused the message of the apparitions and that Macduff has stormed the gates and is approaching. Jonathan Lynn should've had Green cut off Wadsworth's head at the end. At least as an alternate ending.

Tortured historical metaphors aside, Wadsworth is ultimately an unimpressive mastermind. The plan itself is bizarre. Killing of proven informers just to replace them with people already rung out and on the hook? Why not keep both? Even if you accept the notion that the old informers had to be killed off to allow the Next Generation of informers to thrive, what kind of Umbrella Corp level nonsense is this? The Umbrella Corp for those not in the know is the evil corporation that unleashed the T-Virus on Raccoon City and other places in the Resident Evil oeuvre. The unanswered question in those games is how unleashing a virus that turns people into uncontrollable killing machines that spread the virus independently has any military application that couldn't be better achieved through a smart bomb, drone, robot soldier or just about anything else the military already has. For Wadsworth the question is how creating a tense pressure cooker situation that you hope will explode into chaos that will conveniently kill only the people you want is a better idea than hiring a hitman? Or killing them yourself? The explanations I thought of don't hold water. Getting the guests to kill the informers could potentially give Wadsworth more leverage over these people to continue the blackmail. But they're already being blackmailed effectively. No more leverage is needed, you run the risk of just making them desperate. Second, Wadsworth could've gotten the guests to do the killing so that he could keep his hands clean of any actual killing or hiring of hitmen. He blew that though when he stupidly killed the Telegram Girl. No matter how you look at it, the plan was odd.

Up Next:
Loose threads. Who was Mr. Green, the J. Edgar Hoover call and the beatnik interruption.

Recap:
Wadsworth: 1 murder
Peacock: 1 murder
Green: 1 murder
White: 1 murder
Mustard: 1 murder
Scarlett: 1 murder
Plum: 1 murder

Mr. Boddy: dead

The Cook: dead

Yvette: dead

Stranded Motorist: dead

Off Duty Cop: dead

Singing Telegram Girl: dead

Wadsworth: dead

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 8)

THE SEVENTH MURDER - THE SINGING TELEGRAM GIRL

The Situation:
The final murder takes place near simultaneously with the previous two. The group is split into pairs and are searching the house, Ms. White turns off the power. Chaos ensures.

The Murder:
We get almost nothing to chew on about this murder. In the darkness, the doorbell rings, is answered and the poor telegramist is gunned down. We find out during the subsequent investigation by the group that the girl was the one who had an affair with Prof. Plum, cost him his practice and then informed on him to Wadsworth.

This murder breaks the pattern and to some extent the logic of the movie. The setup of the whole film is that each game piece character kills the person responsible for their blackmailing troubles. By this logic, Prof. Plum should be the one to kill the Singing Telegram Girl. Yet the setup of the movie makes this impossible. All of the other victims existed in the house for the entirety of the movie. Long enough for each killer to get over the shock of seeing their blackmailer and accomplice and then try and put together a murder plan. In this case, Prof. Plum isn't even 100% sure the girl is informing on him, he only suspects. He probably would've figured it out had she been there the whole time but that didn't happen. At no point can he possibly know that she is even coming, let alone make a plan to kill her. When she arrives during the power outage, Prof. Plum is in the basement with Mrs. Peacock and the gun is strewn on the hallway floor. Impossible that he can get upstairs, figure out who is at the door, find the gun, take the shot and return to the basement. No, Plum's murder was spent on Mr. Boddy.

So instead of Prof. Plum logically killing his nemesis, the duty falls to Wadsworth. In one respect that makes sense. Like all the other visitors that have been killed, the Singing Telegram Girl was brought to the house by Wadsworth. Only he knew about it, so he could be the only one who developed a plan to kill her. The question though is why? All during the movie Wadsworth has done nothing proactive to ensure that the group killed their informers. Aside from instructing Mr. Boddy to bring all the weapons, he essentially let the rest of the cast determine how the events played out. The main goals of this passive stance was to allow the game pieces to do all the killing, leaving Wadsworth with no blood on his hands, no troublesome informers left and more information with which to blackmail the group. Killing the Singing Telegram Girl ruins all of that though. Suddenly he himself is wrapped up in a mass murder house, just as guilty as the rest. It damages his ability to blackmail the group as he no longer has informers to their government dirt and they have equal dirt on Wadsworth as a murderer. Wadsworth has ultimately weakened his position.

This murder also adds to the general chaos of the last murder scene. As we know now, during the house searching scene, Plum and Peacock were in the basement and out of the action entirely. Mustard and Scarlett were on the main level, separated. White and Wadsworth were on the second floor, separated and Green and Yvette were in the attic. As they groups were searching, Ms. White goes down to the main level and turns off the power. Then, Wadsworth and Yvette go to the main level as well. So now we have Mustard, Scarlett, White, Wadsworth, Yvette, and the Off-Duty Policeman are on the main level and the Telegram Girl is on the front step. Additionally, Scarlett and White have to get their weapons from the same cabinet while Wadsworth has to get the gun, in the dark, from the mess in the front hall which is in plain sight for everyone. Weapons acquired, Scarlett has to get to the library, White has to get to the billiards room, Wadsworth has to stand in front of the door waiting for the bell to ring and all of them have to do this without being seen by each other or the wayward Col. Mustard who is doing something. Maybe just hiding somewhere. Even in the dark, that is a lot of movement by a lot of people in relatively short time and confined spaces. It also assumes that Mr. Green, who we know is an FBI agent investigating the blackmail, is unaware or has chosen to do nothing about the fact that Yvette has split from him. The attic didn't look huge so its very hard to believe he was fooled in any way. Ultimately Green played no role in the final burst of action.

Conclusion:
Like Yvette, the Singing Telegram Girl just had to be killed so that the movie could get to the fun part. The lack of a cohesive plan by Wadsworth finally reaches its apex as he is forced to ruin his own plan by killing the Telegram girl. I understand that the movie needed Wadsworth to do something evil so that there could be the big shocking reveal at the end that he was actually Mr. Boddy. If they couldn't figure out a way for Prof. Plum to kill the Telegram Girl, they should have left her out completely. In that situation, all six game characters would have killed someone and Wadsworth could have revealed his true identity some other way and left his master plan intact. Of course, that would leave Wadsworth with one informant left operating in the world. Maybe they should have just found a way to get Plum's informer into the house and had him kill 2 people. Would've made more sense.

Up next:
Murder #8, the final overall death. No mystery but interesting in some ways.

Up Later:
The phone call from J. Edgar Hoover and the interruption from the beatnik have to be addressed but only after the main mystery has been unraveled. Soon.

Recap:
Wadsworth: 1 murders
Peacock: 1 murder
Green: 0 murders
White: 1 murders
Mustard: 1 murders
Scarlett: 1 murders
Plum: 1 murder

Mr. Boddy: dead
The Cook: dead
Yvette: dead
Stranded Motorist: dead
Off Duty Cop: dead
Singing Telegram Girl: dead

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 7)

THE SIXTH MURDER - YVETTE

The Situation:
Literally speaking, Yvette was killed before the Off-Duty Policeman but the story of the movie followed the policeman so I did him first. Either way, as discussed in Part 6, both murders happen nearly simultaneously. To recap, the group has split up and is searching the house in pairs. Yvette is all the way up in the attic with the clandestine FBI agent Mr. Green. The lights go out and the murder is afoot!

The Murder:
Yvette occupies unique space in this movie. On one hand, she is an informant like the cook or motorist which lines the hands of fate against her survival. On the other hand, she also acts as a member of the main cast. There are 6 game pieces characters plus Wadsworth. You need one more character to balance out the group for when they split up in pairs and Yvette was the choice. Because this is Hollywood and this was a comedy made in the 80's, I'm going to assume that the reason they kept Colleen Camp around for as long as possible are self evident.

Yvette also has more connections to other people than anyone in the movie except Wadsworth. She works for Wadsworth, she works for Ms. Scarlett, she serviced Col. Mustard for Ms. Scarlett and she had an affair with Ms. White's husband which led to the murder for which Ms. White is being blackmailed. All of these connections help explain why her murder makes utterly no sense.

When the lights go out, Yvette heads back down to the main level. Somehow without Super G-Man Green noticing. She returns to the billiards room and has a perplexing conversation. This is directly from the script:

"99 -- INT. GROUND FLOOR--BILLIARD ROOM -- 99

Yvette enters quietly.

An off-screen voice can be heard.
It can't be identified, even as being male or female.
The first line sounds male, the second female.

VOICE
Shut the door.
Did anyone recognize you?

Suddenly, Yvette's French accent is gone.

YVETTE
They must have. And not just my face.
They know every inch of my body.
And they're not the only ones . . .

A noose flies onto Yvette's neck!

YVETTE
(gasping)
It's you!"

And so ends the tale of the tragic maid, prostitute spy. We know the power outage was caused by Ms. White. And we also know that Ms. White was not who Yvette was expecting to see. So who was she expecting to see? And how did they plan to meet in the billiards room at that point? Whoever she thought she was meeting couldn't have known about Ms. White's actions, so what was the original plan to get all the way from the attic back to the billiards room with out anyone noticing? In her mind, she had to get away from Mr. Green, then past White and Wadsworth and then avoid Mustard/Scarlett on the main level to get to the billiards room unobserved.

The only logical explanation was that Yvette was going to meet Ms. Scarlett or Wadsworth. I would guess Scarlett since she was already on that level of the house. Had she wanted to meet Wadsworth she only would have had to go down one level and Wadsworth had already split from Ms. White. Of course we know that both White and Wadsworth had snuck to the main level at that point but Yvette wouldn't know that. The only problem with either explanation is that the conversation makes no sense. Ms. Scarlett and Wadsworth would have no reason to ask if anyone recognized Yvette. It was made very clear to everyone that Yvette knew Ms. White at the very beginning and that Scarlett and Mustard knew each other. During the examination of the film and later during the endings, it was exposed that the pics were of Yvette and Mustard in flagrante delicto. Even the cop recognized Yvette in front of everybody. Of all the mysteries in the movie, what Yvette was up to isn't one of them. Everyone recognized her essentially. So that beginning question is nonsense. Yvettes answer is equally nonsensical. She essentially admits that everyone knows who she is. Then she admits that some of them have slept with her. She then mysteriously hints that that there is another person, maybe who she thought she was talking to(?), also knew "every inch of her body." Also, the French accent is gone. This scenario only points to some situation where Yvette thinks she is talking to someone outside the people in the movie that we already know. An outside police presence, J. Edgar Hoover perhaps? She is then surprised to find out that she has been talking to Ms. White instead of the mystery contact and is killed. The problem is, we never get an ounce of evidence as to why she did what she did. Here are all the people in the movie that she could have been trying to see:

Mr. Boddy - dead
Cook - dead
Stranded Motorist - dead
Off-Duty Policeman - possible that Yvette might have been trying to talk to him. He also worked for Scarlett in service of the brothel. But everyone knew he was in the library and Yvette went to the billiards room.
Singing Telegram Girl - not arrived
Wadsworth - perhaps but the location and conversation make no sense.
Scarlett - perhaps, location is good, conversation makes no sense.
Mustard - no, he might want to kill Yvette himself and that conversation wouldn't make sense. Yvette would know better than to try and meet him privately when she helped blackmail him.
Peacock - no, wrong location, no connections, no reason to meet.
Plum - no, wrong location, no connection, no reason to meet.
Green - This might have made sense, that Yvette was secretly working for the FBI and needed to check in with Green. Bu they were paired together all the way in the attic and could have talked in private all they wanted.
White - She never would have tried to meet her in private, same reasons as Mustard.
Police Chief - the beatnik chief hasn't arrived yet and even if he had, he wasn't in the house.

That's every character in the movie. Yvette's intended contact is a mystery and remains so. It doesn't make sense in the context of the movie. The movie needed to get rid of Yvette so that only the game pieces would be left at the end having murdered someone. This contrived plot thread was what they came up with.

That brings us to the nonsensical Ms. White plan. Apparently, she turned off the power, got the rope and then went to the billiards room to wait for Yvette. We know that's how it went because White was in the room when Yvette arrived. So how did White know that Yvette would return to the billiards room given the opportunity to do so secretly? No idea. We've already determined that Yvettes motivation for going downstairs is unknowable in the context of the film. If we can't know, then White can't either. And there is no other reason for Ms. White to go downstairs for a weapon. Mr. Boddy is already dead and none of the other people alive can inform on her. Had Ms. White went downstairs, got the rope and then, as she was heading to the attic to kill Yvette, noticed that Yvette had come downstairs, she could have snuck up behind Yvette to strangle her. That would have made some sense. As it stands, Ms. White pretending to be Yvette's mystery contact to lure Yvette into the billiards room is lacking in believeability. That conversation still makes no sense, Yvette dropping the accent makes no sense and Ms. White's knowledge of what Yvette was doing makes no sense. Pretty sloppy murder that they quickly slip into the part of the movie mostly dedicated to the Off-Duty Policeman. Yvette gets only slightly more screen time in death as the Singing Telegram Girl.

Once again, Wadsworth, the supposed mastermind of this movie, is not participating in the events at all. His lack of involvement becomes apparent soon.

Conclusion:
The movie knows that it's racing towards the part where Tim Curry gets to do 30 minutes of slapstick exposition and it doesn't want to waste anymore time getting there. The cops murder was the last bit of movie that provides clues that the audience could theoretically follow. Yvette and the Telegram girl (discussed next) just need to be killed so the final act can begin. Colleen Camp was a bigger part of the movie so they give her some extra, nonsensical, dialogue and off she goes.

Up next:
Murder #7, the final mysterious death.

Up Later:
The phone call from J. Edgar Hoover and the interruption from the beatnik have to be addressed but only after the main mystery has been unraveled. Soon.

Recap:
Wadsworth: 0 murders
Peacock: 1 murder
Green: 0 murders
White: 1 murders
Mustard: 1 murders
Scarlett: 1 murders
Plum: 1 murder

Mr. Boddy: dead
The Cook: dead
Yvette: dead
Stranded Motorist: dead
Off Duty Cop: dead
Singing Telegram Girl: about to ring her last doorbell

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 6)

THE FIFTH MURDER - THE OFF-DUTY POLICEMAN

The Situation:
The group has split up into pairs and has begun searching the house. During this search Col. Mustard separates from Ms. Scarlett and kills the stranded motorist. The secret passage is also revealed. Outside the house we see a cop inspect the Stranded Motorists car. Back inside the house, Yvette has shot open the door that had been trapping Mustard/Scarlett in with the dead body. Col. Mustard begins to verbally accompany Yvette for nearly killing him. The chandelier rope finally breaks from having been shot and the chandelier crashes to the ground, scaring the group. As the group deals with the crash and discusses how the weapon cabinet could have been opened, the doorbell rings. the cop has arrived to check if the Stranded Motorist had been by.

The Murder:
This murder gets padded out quite a bit. I assume thats so the movie could actually be movie length instead of a special edition episode of Mr. Bean. Mr. Green, at his mysterious best, opens the door as he has nothing to hide, then immediately slams the door. Then when the other guests try to deny the motorist was there, Green informs him that he was in fact there. Wadsworth then sends him off to the library where he is locked in. He seems to recognize Yvette. The group then decides to clean up the broken glass (odd) when the phone rings and the cop answers (odder) and reveals that it was J. Edgar Hoover on the phone (oddest). While Wadsworth handles the Hoover call, Mr. Green shows the cop around and the rest of the group stages the drunken party with the corpses of previous victims. The open-minded cop seems satisfied with the ruse and again asks to use the phone. He is again locked in the library.

The group then decides to finish the search despite the cops presence. The pairs return to their previous floors. The kitchen passage is discovered. The power is then cut and 3 people get killed, including our dear cop. In the darkness, the cop suffers essentially the same fate as the Stranded Motorist. The door unlocks and slowly opens, a gloved hand holding a pipe approaches and clubs the Policeman to death. Oddly enough, the cop was also actually calling someone and telling them how scared he was and was about to tell them where he was when he was killed. After two other killings, the lights return and the group surveys the carnage.

We know from both the A and C ending that Mrs. Scarlett killed the Policeman during the power outage caused by Ms. White. The reasoning makes sense in that Scarlett killed the Policeman for informing on her brothel activities. The footage in the movie generally supports the explanation given although not much of it is shown with the lights out. I do question some of the logistics though. Ms. Scarlett was already on the main level with Col. Mustard and we saw from their footage that they had already searched everything and were re-searching some rooms, after they discovered the kitchen passage. We don't see how Scarlett separated from Mustard but we do know that at the same time that Scarlett was killing the Policeman, both Ms. White and Wadsworth were coming down the stairs to kill victims 6 and 7 while Yvette was coming down two levels from the attic. Essentially there were 3 murders taking place at once, on the same floor, involving 6 people, with Col. Mustard wandering around. Two of those people had to return to the top floor as well before the lights were thrown back on. That's a lot of people in a small space to not bump into each other at all.

Once again though we have to return to the motivations and plans of the characters. The behavior of the policeman makes no sense. He was called to the house by Wadsworth for some reason. Perhaps he was given the cover story of investigating the found car on the road belonging to the stranded motorist. I originally thought that maybe the Policeman was the most realistic of the victims as he recognized Yvette and was suspicious of what was going on in the house. This would make sense if he was invited by Wadsworth but found the situation was different than he expected. I don't think that's the case though as the cop really starts investigating whats going on in the house. He should know for certain that something is going on with the criminal conspiracy that he is a part of. He should be trying to leave or get in contact with Wadsworth. Instead, he's searching rooms, threatening to be let out and answering the phone when it rings. He even investigated the Stranded Motorists car outside the house. Just like the stranded motorist, he spent his last moments on earth calling some stranger to express his misgivings about what was going on. No, his actions only make sense in the context of him being a real off duty police officer investigating an abandoned car. Any sensible person, especially with police training, would realize something was off when the door opened and he saw his boss, one of his boss's prostitutes and the person he was informing on his boss to all together. You don't question whether you know the prostitute and ignore the main players.

Also, Wadsworth has no plan whatsoever here. Wadsworth allows the members of the gathering to be scattered randomly around the house at the direction of Col. Mustard. This makes it infinitely more difficult for each new victim to be killed. Scarlett is on the first floor and ready to deal with the cop but, as we will see in our discussion of the next 2 victims, Ms. White, Yvette, Prof. Plum and Wadsworth are all completely out of position. Had the drawing of straws gone differently then Ms. Scarlett could easily have been in the attic or paired with someone more intellectually resilient than Col. Mustard. Had either of those things happened, Scarlett probably doesn't get near the cop. It also depended entirely on the rogue actions of Ms. White settling a personal vendetta that the limited opportunity presented itself. During this sequence, Wadsworth is a bystander whose bad planning ultimately get him involved in the final action, probably against his desires.

Conclusion:
Through a very narrow looking glass the Scarlett killing of the Off-Duty Policeman is fine. The power went out, she was close to the victim and she took her chance to take him out. All well and good. The scene as a whole though, beginning with the Policeman's arrival and ending with the discovery of the Singing Telegram Girl, is pure nonsense. We shall see more why in the next two parts.

Up Next:
Murder #6, technically happened before murder #5 but not from a storytelling perspective.

Up Later:
The phone call from J. Edgar Hoover and the interruption from the beatnik have to be addressed but only after the main mystery has been unraveled.

Recap:
Wadsworth: 0 murders
Peacock: 1 murder
Green: 0 murders
White: 0 murders
Mustard: 1 murders
Scarlett: 1 murders
Plum: 1 murder

Mr. Boddy: dead
The Cook: dead
Yvette: dead but awaiting discovery
Stranded Motorist: dead
Off Duty Cop: dead
Singing Telegram Girl: about to ring her last doorbell

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 5)

THE FOURTH MURDER - THE STRANDED MOTORIST

The Situation:

By this point, Mr. Boddy has been killed again and there has been a small panic in the hallway before they bring all the bodies into the study for safekeeping. After a short discussion that reveals that weapons are all over the place, Wadsworth suggests that all the weapons be locked up in the cabinet. As they open the front door to throw away the weapon key, the Stranded Motorist appears looking to use the phone. After some discussion, the group invites him inside to use the phone in the lounge. They key then gets thrown away.

The Murder:

This is where we see the first concrete evidence of a murder plot. Recognizing the motorist, Col. Mustard then interrogates Wadsworth to see if there is anyone else in the house. Under the pretense of verifying that the house is empty, Mustard hatches the plan to split up and search the house in pairs. Clearly,  Mustard has already made the decision to kill of the person informing on him. 

There hand of fate is firmly on the scale against the Motorist at this point. By blind luck of the draw, Mustard, paired with Scarlett, draw the stick that places them on the main level with the motorist. We see the various pairs searching but the Mustard pair is the only one that matters. First they check the billiard room. Then they check the hall closet. Aggressively. When they get to the piano room(?) Mustard leaves Scarlett to go "search the kitchen". Now that they are separated, Mustard goes to the study and burns the evidence, retrieves the wrench and kills the Motorist.The next time we see Scarlett, she and Mustard have reunited in the Conservatory where Mustard "finds" the secret passage to the lounge. He breaks character and volunteers to go first, knowing that there is no danger because he already killed the Motorist using the same passage. At no other point does Mustard display the willingness to risk himself into the unknown. The screaming of Ms. Scarlett brings the others back to the main level, Wadsworth tries to break down the door, Yvette ends up shooting the lock and the chandelier falls, shatters and the Off Duty Policeman arrives. The secret passage is revealed to all.

The logistics of the murder make some sense I suppose. Col. Mustard splitting from Scarlett should have been a huge red flag but then again, White and Wadsworth separated as well and didn't think it was odd so who knows. The only real question is whether or not Mustard had enough time to do all the things he did. When he claimed to go to the kitchen he actually returned to the study, gathered up the evidence, threw it in the fire, unlocked the cabinet, got a weapon, ran to the Conservatory to use the secret passage, enter the lounge, kill the Motorist, return to the conservatory and then go back down the hall to where Ms. Scarlett is, in such a way that looks convincingly like he is returning from the kitchen. During this whole time frame, Ms. Scarlett is . . . . . . looking behind a curtain. I don't think there is any way Mustard could have done all that in the appropriate time frame but a little leeway should be given I suppose for movie magic.

Wadsworth on the other hand has completely lost control of his master plan. He invited the motorist to the house but after that he was out of the picture entirely. Not only did the drawing of straws put him upstairs with another known killer (Ms. White), he himself has led the charge to lock up all the weapons in the cabinet. Maybe Wadsworth could have guessed that the former soldier in Col. Mustard would try and kill the Motorist but that doesn't explain why Wadsworth would actively make it harder to do so.

And finally we come to the Motorist himself. What exactly was the plan? Like the fake Mr. Boddy, the motorist was invited by Wadsworth and given the role of the Stranded Motorist to play. We know this is so because if he was in fact a stranded motorist, there would have been no reason to pretend he didn't recognize anyone who answered the door. He would have just asked his co-conspirator Wadsworth to use the phone. So we have to assume that everything that the Motorist did was under order from Wadsworth, which begs the question as to what he was doing. Why on earth did the Motorist call anybody and why was he still performing the confused stranger surrounded by weirdos routine on the phone? Wadsworth went to great lengths to make sure all his accomplices and victims were gathered under one roof. Why would Wadsworth have instructed the Motorist to involve an outsider in the operation? It makes no sense. As we shall see again, the only reason the Motorist needed to make a call was because the script needed to distract him from his own impending murder. There is no in-movie logic that explains it otherwise. The only guess I could come up with is that the Motorist came to the house as Wadsworth instructed but then quickly sussed out the fact that something was off. But if that was the case, he would have been calling for help to arrive quickly, not meandering around the fact that his old boss was at a weird dinner party. The Motorist, Like Mr. Boddy and later the Policeman, is caught in the loop of acting in such a way that their actions only make sense if they are in fact their characters and not accomplices putting on a show. Which is of course impossible. There was also no reason to actually wreck his car if Wadsworth simply invited him to the house. He could have pretended to be a Stranded Motorist without actually leaving a bunch of evidence on the road.

Aside from all that, the actual footage in the movie fails to address one last fact vital to this murder. How exactly did Col. Mustard know about the secret passage? We know that's how he killed the Motorist because we actually saw it in the third ending but we aren't given that bit of information. There are only two scenarios given that explains how people know about the passage. The first is from Wadsworth who says that the house is a friends and that he's known all along. There's no reason why Wadsworth would have told Col. Mustard about the passage. The second way is through Yvette. In the first ending Wadsworth explains that Yvette told Scarlett about the passage so she could kill people. That doesn't begin to answer why Yvette would know about the passage at all, she wasn't a full time maid at the house or anything, and it also doesn't explain why Yvette would tell Col. Mustard. Yvette is getting paid to inform on Col. Mustard, why would she help him destroy the evidence of their affair? That would upset both Mr. Boddy and Ms. Scarlett as they both have dirt on Mustard. The only reason I could think of is that Yvette wanted the photos destroyed as well because she was in them but Wadsworth made it seem like Yvette did that sort of thing regularly for Ms. Scarlett. Destroying one set of photos probably wouldn't matter much in the final analysis.

Conclusion:

The logistics of the murder work fine but the timing in its execution are suspect, as are the behaviors of the Stranded Motorist and Wadsworth. By this point, the movie is relying on the novelty of the multiple endings plus the manic energy of Wadsworth's explanations to conceal the nonsensical parts of the plot that become apparent on repeat viewings. And for the most part its effective. By the time you get to the final ending you kind of confuse whats happened in which ending and whats actually real. It makes the proposed solution seem logical.

Up Next:

Murder #5, the Off-Duty Policeman. One of the funnier scenes in the movie and again, some of its least logical.

Recap:
Wadsworth: 0 murders
Peacock: 1 murder
Green: 0 murders
White: 0 murders
Mustard: 1 murders
Scarlett: 0 murders
Plum: 1 murder

Mr. Boddy: dead
The Cook: dead
Yvette: alive
Stranded Motorist: dead
Off Duty Cop: investigating the Stranded Motorist's car
Singing Telegram Girl: not arrived

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 4)

THE THIRD MURDER - MR. BODDY REDUX

The Situation:
The successful attempt on Mr. Boddy occurs when the group runs to the kitchen to check on the Cook. At this point the Cook is already dead, stabbed by Mrs. Peacock, but the group doesn't know it yet. They only think to check on her after returning to the study and discussing who is in the house and what could possibly be going on.

The Murder:
It's at this point in the movie where the multiple endings and edits starts to cause trouble with the on-screen logic of these murders. It's important to remember just how the three endings are presented. The first fake ending (Scarlett ending) shows every killing, start to finish. The Second fake ending and the Third True ending don't rehash the the murder of Mr. Boddy or the Cook, they simply start with the series of murders that commenced with the Stranded Motorist. The problem though is that the stated explanation for this murder doesn't match up with the film.

There are three scenarios presented as to who killed Mr. Boddy the second time. In the first ending it was Yvette, who hid in the study, waited for the group to leave, then killed Mr. Boddy as he tried to escape. The second ending shows Mrs. Peacock going from the kitchen to the study via secret passage in the commotion surrounding the cooks death to finish off Mr. Boddy. The supposed true ending though only states that Prof. Plum did the killing without showing it. The only clue as to how he did it is when someone else exclaims that Plum "Wasn't in the kitchen when the cook was found!" This is the smoking gun that implicates Prof. Plum and he readily admits that he did it after Wadsworth exposes himself as the real Mr. Boddy. "Then who did I kill? My butler. Aw shucks!"

The video we are shown though supports all three versions of the killing and by doing so, undercuts them all. When the gang runs to the kitchen, Yvette does not go with them. She never appears in the kitchen and no mention of her is ever made. Presumably she is sitting in the study with the faking death Mr. Boddy the entire time. Yet we know she didn't do the killing. Professor Plum and Mrs. Peacock on the other hand, do run with the group to the kitchen. When the group is looking for the cook, who is about to fall out of the freezer, Plum and Peacock are clearly behind Wadsworth, fully in the kitchen looking around for the cook. Oddly enough, once the dead cook falls, Plum and Peacock disappear from the scene. They have no lines during the whole thing, they simply vanish. That is, until Wadsworth declares that they should bring the cook to the study to keep the kitchen tidy, then Plum and Peacock reappear to the scene, behind Wadsworth again where they were at the beginning of the scene. This positioning is problematic. We are presented with two possible ways the killer was able to get the drop on Mr. Boddy the second time. The first one is that someone stayed in the study, hid, and killed Boddy when he got up. The second is that someone used the secret passage when everyone had their backs to the freezer when the cook fell. This is a problem though because we can see that angle for the duration of the cook falling scene. Plum and Peacock never go near the freezer and therefore couldn't have used the secret passage. Its conceivable that Prof. Plum simply backed out of the kitchen, as he was close to the door in the shots where we can see him, and ran back to the study to kill Mr. Boddy. The problem with that scenario, and really the secret passage scenario as well, is that if Plum returned to the study either way, he would've found Yvette there waiting in the study. Are we really to believe that Prof. Plum would've murdered Mr. Boddy right in front of Yvette? We know from the rest of the movie the Yvette was eventually murdered by Ms. White and that Prof. Plum had no interaction with Yvette during the movie. Had Plum killed Mr. Boddy and then attacked Yvette to remove a witness, that might make some sense but Plum doesn't even try to kill the Singing Telegram Girl, who is informing on him, so it seems unlikely that he would kill in front of witnesses with the idea that he could just kill that person later.

Conclusion:
As presented, this murder doesn't make sense. Prof. Plum simply could not have killed Mr. Boddy at that time in the manner explained. He was in the kitchen with the rest of the group, didn't use the secret passage and there was a witness in the study anyway. I suspect that when editing this movie, there was three shots of the scene where the Cook was found dead. One where each of the three proposed killers (Yvette, Peacock and Plum) was missing. The problem is that they showed us the "Yvette was missing" ending in the first fake ending but then didn't ever show us the scene where Plum was missing from (and Yvette and Peacock were present in) the kitchen. Without showing us that scene they're simply too many killers in the study when the murder happens and it can't be reconciled. A bad edit as opposed to a a bad plot though.

Up Next:
After Mr. Boddy is really killed, we enter into the logic stretching string of informant murders that begins with Murder #4 - the Stranded Motorist. We again have to delve into the murky waters of character motivation and behavior.

Recap:
Wadsworth: 0 murders
Peacock: 1 murder
Green: 0 murders
White: 0 murders
Mustard: 0 murders
Scarlett: 0 murders
Plum: 1 murder

Mr. Boddy: dead
The Cook: dead
Yvette: alive
Stranded Motorist: not arrived
Off Duty Cop: not arrived
Singing Telegram Girl: not arrived

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 3)

THE SECOND MURDER - THE COOK

The Situation:
The series of events that lead to the murder of the cook begin towards the end of the hijinks following the supposed death of Mr. Boddy in murder #1. The investigation into what killed Mr. Boddy eventually focused on the cognac and the possibility that it was poisoned. Mrs. Peacock, hysterical from fear due to her also drinking the cognac, begins screaming and is laid out by Mr. Green. Yvette then begins to scream in the billiard room, having perhaps drunk the poison cognac she learned about listening to and recording the conversation in the study.

The Murder:
When Yvette begins to scream the full cast races out of the study and into the billiards room where Yvette is. Mrs. Peacock is the last person to leave the study and has disappeared by the time the gang arrives at the billiard room. When the gang returns with to the study with Yvette, Mrs. Peacock is back with the group and is actually the first one to return to the study. To have enough time to commit the murder Mrs. Peacock must have already grabbed the knife when the whole gang left the study to go to Yvette. She then continued on to the kitchen while the main group was knocking on the billiard room door and stabbed the cook and stuffed her in the freezer. She must have been moving quick though. We get the explanation that the reason nobody heard the cook scream was that Yvettes screaming covered it up. Yvette quit screaming though pretty much as soon as the group got there and we actually see Mrs. Peacock slide behind everyone as they approach the billiard room door so there isn't much time to get further down the hall and do some stabbing. Once the killing was done though, Peacock would have plenty of time to get back to the group because they spent quite a bit of time in the billiard room talking to Yvette. The first ending suggests that the killer returned to the study using the secret passage but there is no evidence of that and there was also no need. Once the murder was over she could just get back to the group, there was time for that. We also see what appears to be Mrs. Peacock entering the study at the front of the group coming in, not already there having gone through the secret passage.

Conclusion:
This murder is actually wrapped up pretty nicely. The cook has almost no speaking lines or memorable actions in the entire film so we don't have to worry about the issue of character motivation that is going to plague so many of the other minor characters. The only questionable issue is whether or not it's believable that Mrs. Peacock could have committed the murder quickly enough to mask the screams but we don't actually have any evidence the cook did any screaming so ultimately, who cares. Mrs. Peacock's reasoning and calculations are spot on though. To the best of her knowledge, Mr. Boddy has just been murdered by one of the other guests. She correctly realizes that the Cook is the last one left that can affirmatively incriminate her for taking bribes. The other guests and Wadsworth know about it of course but they only have hearsay knowledge so that isn't much of a threat. They also have their own secrets and problems being implicated in the murder of Mr. Boddy and the Cook, so exposing Peacocks secrets probably aren't high on their list of priorities. Had Mr. Boddy actually been Mr. Boddy, Mrs. Peacock could've solved all her problems in the first 30 minutes of the movie.

This is another example of dumb luck for Wadsworth. He did nothing to instigate the actions that led to the cooks death. The fortuitous murder was simply the result of Mrs. Peacock being a murderer and the coincidence that she happened to be drinking cognac when Professor Plum opined that the death of Mr. Boddy could be poison by cognac. Without both things happening simultaneously with the covering noise of Yvette screaming and its difficult to see Mrs. Peacock getting a chance to murder The Cook, a woman quite a bit younger and more physically imposing than our Senators wife. We are now up to 2 murders that were executed simply because Wadsworth apparently has a galaxy level brain understanding of the true nature of his guests and their morals. It should be noted though that as the group went to see Yvette, Wadsworth was the last one to reach the billiards room, aside from Mrs. Peacock. When Peacock actually slides past the group to continue on to the kitchen, she actually brushes past Wadsworth who kind of glances around before going into the billiard room. It's entirely probably that Wadsworth knew at the time what exactly was going on.

The only interesting thing to consider here is whether or not Yvette screaming was an intentional distraction ordered by Wadsworth. She doesn't seem to react to the commotion surrounding the gunshot attempt on Mr. Boddy but does for the possibly poisoned cognac? We do see her drinking the cognac at one point but we also see her serve all of the cognac being drunk at the time. If Mr. Boddy had been poisoned either she would have been the one to do it or the poison would have been added to his drink after it had been served. There's no real way Yvette could have been affected by a poisoned bottle of cognac since she was in more control of it than anyone. Additionally, she seemed to be drinking the cognac from the billiards room, not the study. Either way, if Wadsworth told her to scream to create chaos and some kind of opening for Mr. Boddy to escape and/or give someone else an opportunity to kill, he didn't take it and it was only dumb luck that another guest decided to kill someone. Neither scenario makes much sense but the whole screaming episode allowed there to be a time gap for somebody to commit a murder, to keep the plot moving, and it reminded all of us that Yvette was in the movie and was going to become a more major character than the cook or Mr. Boddy.

Up Next:
Murder #3, the actual murder of Mr. Boddy which happens nearly simultaneously with the murder of The Cook. This is also where the editing or the plotting starts to get off the rails a little bit.

Recap:
Wadsworth: 0 murders
Peacock: 1 murder
Green: 0 murders
White: 0 murders
Mustard: 0 murders
Scarlett: 0 murders
Plum: 1 attempted murder

Mr. Boddy: faking death
The Cook: dead
Yvette: alive
Stranded Motorist: not arrived
Off Duty Cop: not arrived
Singing Telegram Girl: not arrived

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 2)

THE FIRST MURDER - MR. BODDY

The Situation:
The first murder is the one most under the control of Wadsworth, aside from the Singing Telegram Girl. The guests have all come to the house and the tension is rising as they start to interact with each other, some recognizing each other, some just nervous to be there. All the while Wadsworth hides the details of the dinners supposed mystery host until after dinner. During that dinner, where everyone realizes that they have much in common, Mr. Boddy finally arrives, suitcase in hand. He is immediately presented as a scumbag and set apart from the other guests. At this point the audience is forced to assume that Wadsworth and the game pieces are the "heroes" of the movie with Mr. Boddy the "villain" whose murder will set off the mystery of the movie.

At this point it is important to remember that Mr. Boddy is actually just a butler, playing a role given to him by Wadsworth. We have no reason to believe that Mr. Boddy is informing on anyone at the gathering or that he is deserving in any way. After watching the movie we can only assume that Wadsworth wants him gone for unstated reasons.

The real question is why does Mr. Boddy continue to participate? Once the group returns to the study, Wadsworth identifies Mr. Boddy as the blackmailer. Mr. Boddy helpfully informs the audience that "This is a hoax!" but sadly for him, the other guests attack him, believing Mr. Boddy to be their blackmailer. Once the commotion has died down, Mr. Boddy produces the various weapons and tries to get the guests to kill Wadsworth for orchestrating the nights events. We can only assume again that these actions by Mr. Boddy were part of the role given to him by Wadsworth. However, Mr. Boddy was just attacked by the guests. Under what logic could Mr. Boddy be operating under where he assumes that giving the people who just attacked him deadly weapons will somehow turn out alright for him? A reasonable person, knowing Wadsworth to be the real villain, should have assumed by now that Wadsworth was setting them up for a fall. Wadsworth even ups the tension by announcing that the police are coming yet Mr. Boddy continues playing his part, hands out the weapons and turns off the light. Perhaps Mr. Boddy expected something else to happen with the lights off but its difficult to imagine what Wadsworth could have told him the plan was that would have left Mr. Boddy so outwardly confident.

The Murder:
The murder, or should I say attempted murder, happens when the lights go out. There is some rustling, a deep gasp and a gunshot. When the lights come back on. Mr. Boddy is on the ground. Professor Plum declares him dead from unknown causes as the bullet missed its target.

We know now that Professor Plum did indeed try to shoot Mr. Boddy in an attempt to end the blackmail. Arguably this makes Plum the most scrupulous person in the movie aside from Mr. Green. While the others killed for personal vendettas, Plum tried to kill the villain. I guess that makes him the hero?

At this point though we have to wonder why Prof. Plum declared him dead. Was it simply so that he could ensure that he could have another shot at him later? Seems unlikely to assume that could occur. The shot was fired in the dark, Prof. Plum could have announced that Mr. Boddy was faking death (I assume the gasp was a deep breath by Mr. Boddy so he could hold his breath to fake death) and feigned ignorance of the shot. Pure incompetence is the reason given as to why Prof. Plum mistakenly thought him dead but that doesn't make any sense.

At this point Wadsworth has actually lost control of the narrative. When the lights go off, Wadsworth himself apparently does nothing. In that situation someone could easily have killed Wadsworth for knowing too many secrets. They could also kill Mr. Boddy for blackmailing them, or, like sensible people, nobody could have done anything since most people don't murder. The only thing I can think of that explains both Wadsworth's inaction and Mr. Boddy's continuing willingness to play the role of the target/villain, is that the plan from the start was for Mr. Boddy to fake his death and then try to sneak out when Yvette starts screaming, presumably in on the plan. This would get the murder ball rolling for the night and allow Mr. Boddy to escape into the night, or into some dark corner of the mansion. Otherwise, Mr. Boddy would have to know he was marked for death and would have schemed like hell to escape. There is no evidence to suggest he did though and as we will see in Murder #3, Yvette's future actions cast doubt on this possibility.

Conclusion:
The first murder of the movie was ultimately a failure. Wadsworth's plan is fairly sound. Misidentify the blackmailer, raise tension with the threat of police intervention, provide ample weapons and then provide the opportunity. The whole plan falls apart though when you try and identify one compelling reason the butler acting as Mr. Boddy would continue to play along in the role when it was becoming crystal clear that he would ultimately be the victim. Knowing he was being groomed as the target, and after surviving an attack by the guests already, Mr. Boddy injects the idea of murder into the guests minds by trying to get them to kill Wadsworth for no reason, provides them with numerous weapons and then himself turns the lights off to give everyone a nice blanket of deniability for the impending murder. While entertaining, this scenario makes no sense upon further review.

Up Next:
This murder scene ends when Yvette begins screaming in the lounge. The guests leave Mr. Boddy on the floor and leave the study. The conversation with Yvette leads into Murder #2, The Cook.

Recap:
Wadsworth: 0 murders
Peacock: 0 murder
Green: 0 murders
White: 0 murders
Mustard: 0 murders
Scarlett: 0 murders
Plum: 1 attempted murder

Mr. Boddy: dead
The Cook: alive
Yvette: alive
Stranded Motorist: not arrived
Off Duty Cop: not arrived
Singing Telegram Girl: not arrived

The Red Herring Exposed - A Clue Analysis (PART 1)

Clue, the movie, is going to turn 35 years old next year. Aside from making me feel incredibly old, its also been on a couple of the free streaming services lately (Kanopy and IMDB Tv, I believe) so I've been watching it in the background while I was doing other things. While thoroughly enjoyable, upon rewatching it, I'm not completely sure that the third ending, supposedly the real one, makes any sense. Therefore I will watch it again from the beginning with that ending in mind to see how it holds up. Part one: the characters and scheme, as revealed in the final ending.

THE MASTERMIND:
Wadsworth: The true villain of the movie hiding out as the butler of Hill House. Claims to be another one of Mr. Boddy's victims but is in reality Mr. Boddy himself.

THE GAME CHARACTERS:
Col. Mustard: A soldier being blackmailed by Mr. Boddy for his illegal war profiteering; selling american military radio parts on the black market. This movie takes place in 1954 so presumably Col. Mustard was stealing/selling parts during WW2 and not Korea. Also a patron of Ms. Scarletts brothel.

Ms. Scarlett: Being blackmailed for running a brothel in Washington D.C. Employed Yvette at some point.

Professor Plum: Psychiatrist being blackmailed for having sexual relationships with his female patients. Works for the U.N.

Mrs. White: Being blackmailed for the suspicious murder of her husband. Suspected of cutting off his head and member. Husband had an affair with Yvette.

Mrs. Peacock: Being blackmailed for taking bribes on behalf of her Senator husband in exchange for votes in Congress.

THE MOLE:
Mr. Green: Undercover FBI agent posing as a closeted gay man who is being blackmailed by Mr. Boddy so he won't be fired from the State Department. On a mission to bring down Mr. Boddy.

THE VICTIMS:
Mr. Boddy: Presented as the main villain but is in reality the real Mr. Boddy's (Wadsworth) butler. Was twice killed by Professor Plum. Importantly, Mr. Boddy did not appear to be informing on anyone. A must see for fans of Fear or just Lee Ving in general.

The Cook: The cook was killed by Mrs. Peacock for informing on her accepting bribes.

The Stranded Motorist: Killed by Col. Mustard for informing on his war profiteering.

Yvette: Killed by Mrs. White for having an affair with her late husband. Also Colleen Camp doing some outstanding accent work. Except for when she forgets.

The Policeman: Killed by Mrs. Scarlett for informing on her brothel.

The Singing Telegram Girl: Killed by Wadsworth for . . . . . . reasons. Presumably to tie up loose ends. Small but memorable role the Go-Go's Jane Wiedlin. See PLAN below.

THE PLAN:
The first sign of trouble comes early in the review. What exactly was Wadsworths ultimate plan and how exactly did he think it would go down? Taking the dialogue at face value we can see the broad stroke outline of the plan. Basically, Wadsworth has been blackmailing the guests for so long that they have all run out of money. As blackmail has no use if the victims are broke, Wadsworth's plan is twofold. Get the guests to become his new team of informants using the information they gain due to their positions in government jobs. Second, get the guests to kill off his current team of informants, as they are no longer useful and can only be used against him. This explanation is actually given during the "A" ending and is attributed to Ms. Scarlett but I think it's also Wadsworth's plan. At the end of the movie Wadsworth comments that he is going to continue the blackmail but all his informers are dead and all the proof against the game pieces was burned in the fire. All Wadsworth has left to blackmail them with is the murders he was involved in as well and all they have to give him is information they get from their jobs.

I think that makes sense though. Wadworth wants to keep in the blackmail game but he wants his current informants gone and he wants the current victims to become the new informants. Easy. How he intends to do that however is suspiciously lacking in details. As we will see when we examine all the murders; Wadsworths has no real control over the outcome. He himself kills nobody until the very last victim and that action seems odd in the context. His goal up until then seemed to be to get everyone else to do the killing so his hands would be clean. The only proactive thing Wadsworth did to provoke the nights activities were to call dinner, invite the guests and provide weapons. For the first 2/3 of the movie, Wadsworth is preaching a non-violent end to the confrontation with Mr. Boddy. The calculation seems to be that just by creating a scenario with the stress of victims confronting their abuser combined with weapons and the threat of time running out (45 minutes until the police arrive) is enough to provoke a violent outcome. Not just violence but a specific set of violent actions. Col. Mustard, Mrs. Peacock and Ms. Scarlett all killed the people informing on them so maybe that was foreseeable but Ms. White killed for personal reasons; Prof. Plum only tried to kill Mr. Boddy in an attempt to end the blackmail and nobody was in a position to kill the Singing Telegram Girl at all. Predicting that outcome is a real stretch.

Which brings us to the tricky problem of the gay, bumbling FBI agent Mr. Green. At the end of the movie Wadsworth reveals that he knew Mr. Green was there to expose him as the real Mr. Boddy. While that reveal gives Col. Mustard an opportunity to use the "Please, there are ladies present!" line, it also confuses Wadsworths plan. There are two scenarios, both of them not really plausible. The first one is that Wadsworth knew the entire time that Green was there to bust him. If thats so, then why allow Green to live through the entire plan?  Had Wadsworth not killed the Singing Telegram Girl and admitted his whole plan, Mr. Green would've had little to work with. Unless Green had prior knowledge of Mr. Boddys true identity, Wadsworth might have just gotten away with it. In this scenario, its difficult to see why Green was invited at all. None of the people involved was informing on Green, assuming there was a real Mr. Green, State Department employee being blackmailed. The second scenario is that Wadsworth didn't know Green was undercover until J. Edgar Hoover inexplicably called the house. At that point the Motorist and Cop have already entered the scene which complicates things but again Wadsworth has done nothing wrong up to that point. Other people have done all the killing, the blackmail evidence has been burned in the fire, and the most useful witnesses against him are being killed of according to plan. Why kill the Telegram Girl and admit to the plan? Very odd indeed. If his plan was to then gun down Mr. Green, why go through the trouble of getting other people to kill the Cook, Yvette, Butler, Motorist and Cop? Killing seven people isn't that much worse legally than killing two, especially if one was a federal agent. It's possible that Wadsworth simply lost his nerve at the end of plan that was being executed to well to be believed. To believe this scenario you would also have to believe that Mr. Green has been undercover, Donnie Brasco style for years, being blackmailed by Mr. Boddy. Otherwise Wadsworth wouldn't have invited him or Wadsworth would've known that the Mr. Green that showed up wasn't the person he had been blackmailing.

OTHER CAST:
The Police Chief-Evangelist: Working with Mr. Green to take down Mr. Boddy. Played by DJ Dr. Johnny Fever from WKRP in Cincinnati.

UP NEXT IN PART 2:
We shall begin to examine the murders to see if the proposed solution makes sense.