Thoroughly enjoyed!

ladybug2535

I was highly entertained by this program. While the episodes weren't particularly difficult brain teasers, the mysteries were adequately engaging and intriguing while the characters well drawn with logical motives (generally explained at the end). I liked that the show avoided obvious red herrings, and didn't try to "trick" the viewers with hidden clues; though sometimes the guilty party was a bit too easy to figure out (and sometimes too early which can spoil the progress of the story line), while our amateur sleuths were still stumbling about--nonetheless a fun exercise for us armchair detectives.

I really enjoyed the main characters. I thought they were well-matched and eccentric enough to be interesting without being too annoying. The guest characters were all pretty well fleshed out as well, which helped the show a great deal. I thought the fact that they were gardeners was a unique hook that gave them reasonable access to the nooks and crannies of the parks and residences they were investigating, as well as a somewhat plausible excuse for stumbling over so many bodies. If you dig deep enough, wide enough and in enough places, you're bound to come up with something....

I was lucky enough to be able to binge watch all three seasons--which offers both pros and cons. The unlikelihood of these two women constantly becoming embroiled in a new murder mystery each week becomes much less plausible when you watch the shows back to back like I did, but then that's the case with any program of this nature. The bickering between the two main characters also became a bit more annoying than if the episodes had been watched a week apart--but I can hardly fault the program for the way I decided to devour three seasons in one go.

The fact that the program managed to keep me involved and guessing right along with the cast for the full three seasons is a compliment to the writers. It can't be easy to come up with unique murder mysteries for that many episodes, yet they did manage to avoid feeling repetitious for the most part. I even managed to learn a bit about plants and gardening that I hadn't known. Good job! In all honesty, while I understand why many people would be disappointed by the cancellation of this program, after 3 seasons it had started to feel a bit stale. Again, though, if I was watching it as it had aired weekly with summer breaks or whatever, I may not have felt that way at all, so take this opinion for what it deserves. Overall an entertaining program worth a go!

score 7/10

ladybug2535 26 March 2015

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw3208599/