Jessica tells the story of her new novel about a college student accused of killing his music professor, who plagiarized his compositions.

Season 3, Episode 14: Murder in a Minor Key (February 8, 1987)

This is the first of fourteen “bookend” episodes in which J.B. Fletcher tells us about the plot of her latest novel instead of actually wandering around Cabot Cove solving murders in person. We only see Jessica at the beginning and the end of the show — and maybe during a quick commercial bumper if you’re watching it the way the television gods intended: with advertisements for cough syrup and Ford Tauruses interrupting everything.

So if you tuned in hoping to see Jessica Fletcher snooping through drawers, asking polite questions that make killers sweat or making a surprised face, apologies. This one’s more like an episode of Murder, She Wrote Presents: The Stories Jessica Fletcher Is Writing While Everyone in Cabot Cove (and Everywhere Else) Is Temporarily Not Being Murdered.

Who’s in it, outside of Angela Lansbury (who is barely in it)?

Rene Auberjonois, whose name I can never say correctly, is Prof. Harry Papasian. You may recognize him as Odo from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Former teen star Shaun Cassidy is Chad Singer.

Paul Clemens plays Michael Prentice.

Herb Edelman, who was married to Dorothy on Golden Girls, is Max Hellinger.

Karen Grassle (best known from Little House on the Prairie) plays Christine Stoneham.

George Grizzard is Prof. Tyler Stoneham.

Tom Hallick (The Young and the Restless) is Vice Chancellor Simon.

Jennifer Holmes, one of The Misfits of Science, plays Reagan Miller.

Mario Podesta! I mean, Scott Jacoby! He plays Danny Young.

Tony Award-winning Dinah Manoff, who played Maggy in Child’s Play, is Jenny Coopersmith.

In smaller roles, Alex Henteloff is Raymond Parnell, Brenda Thomson is a pianist, Paris Vaughan is Pauline, William Hubbard Knight is Lt. Perkins, Hope Haves is a young woman, Alexander Folk is Hargrove, Stephen Swofford is Templeton, and Parkwer Stevenson is Michael Digby, despite being uncredited.

What happens?

The bookend episode format was created mainly to give Angela Lansbury a break from the relentless filming schedule that came with starring in Murder, She Wrote. The show was wildly popular, and Lansbury was in every scene of almost every episode. These bookend stories allowed producers to keep the show on the air while letting her rest her voice and maybe enjoy a weekend without discovering corpses in Cabot Cove.

In addition to being a friend of the Grim Reaper and often giving the older men of Cabot Cove boners they didn’t know they still could, Jessica writes books. Here’s one she’s proofreading, all about Michael Prentice, a college student and musician who finds himself in a nightmare situation when his music professor steals his compositions and claims them as his own. This professor — Harry Papasian — isn’t just borrowing a few notes either. He’s lifting entire musical pieces and presenting them as his own work. It’s academic plagiarism mixed with musical theft, which in the rarefied world of university composition departments might as well be grand larceny.

Michael knows he’s being robbed but has no proof. So he turns to his friends Chad and Jenny, and the three of them hatch a plan that is either incredibly brave or incredibly stupid. They’re going to break into the professor’s office and retrieve the original manuscripts.

Because nothing clears your name like committing a felony.

Their plan actually works — at least at first. They sneak into the office looking for Michael’s stolen music. But before they can leave, someone calls the police. And when everyone ends up back in the professor’s office, Professor Papasian is dead. He’s been stabbed with Michael’s tuning fork.

The evidence is overwhelming: motive, opportunity and a murder weapon that belongs to their friend. But Chad and Jenny know Michael didn’t do it. So the rest of the episode becomes a race to find the real killer before his life is destroyed. They start digging through the professor’s professional and personal life, uncovering secrets, grudges and the kind of academic rivalries that make high school drama look like kindergarten.

Meanwhile, the episode occasionally cuts back to Jessica Fletcher happily proofreading the story and making editorial tweaks, which creates a weird meta layer. We’re watching a mystery that exists inside another mystery writer’s imagination.

Who did it?

It’s the professor’s wife.

Who made it?

Nick Havinga made tons of TV shows and movies, including The Girl Who Saved the World. This was written by Arthur Marks, who directed J.D.’s Revenge and Friday Foster. Oh yeah! He wrote The Centerfold Girls, which might be the sleaziest credit connected to the otherwise polite world of Jessica Fletcher.

Does Jessica dress up and act stupid? Does she get some?

Nope. She doesn’t dress up, she doesn’t trick anyone, and she definitely doesn’t get any romantic subplot. She barely appears.

Was it any good?

The mystery itself is decent enough, but the absence of Jessica wandering around politely dismantling people’s alibis makes the whole thing feel a little off. Watching other characters solve the case inside one of her fictional stories just isn’t as fun. Part of the magic of Murder, She Wrote is watching Lansbury gently interrogate suspects while pretending she’s just asking innocent questions. Without that, the episode feels like a regular 1980s TV mystery with a cameo introduction.

Any trivia?

Four of the actors would appear on The Golden Girls: Herb Edelman was Stan, Dorothy’s ex-husband; George Grizzard was Blanche’s ex-husband George, as well as George’s brother Jamie; Scott Jacoby was Dorothy and Stan’s son Michael and Dinah Manoff was next-door neighbor Carol, who spun off to Empty Nest. 

There is a real-life Murder. She Wrote book with the same title. Set in New Orleans during a jazz festival, Jessica is part of the investigation into the death of arts critic Wayne Copely, found dead near the grave of a voodoo queen. 

Give me a reasonable quote:

Jessica Fletcher: Did you ever try to argue with a computer? It is impossible. It’s like trying to talk sense to Amos Tupper once he’s made up his mind about something.

What’s next?

A sensationalist TV presenter is killed, and suspicion falls on one of the clients whose products he maligned. George Takei and Adrienne Barbeau? Let’s do it!

Kate Collins (Susan Strasberg) is afraid to paint over her old canvases. Yet after receiving a batch of bizarre paintings from her friend David (Ben Marley), she decides to whitewash one of the canvases and reuse it. Kate’s decision to whitewash David’s canvas isn’t just an artistic choice; it’s a symbolic erasure of the past. By painting over what already exists, she inadvertently hits the reset button on the linear flow of time.

Shortly after, she experiences a series of bizarre events, including falling down the stairs just as paramedics arrive at her door. She has somehow reversed cause and effect, allowing her to change reality. 

The episode delves into the concept of karma and the unpredictable nature of reality. Kate’s newfound ability comes with unforeseen consequences, as her chaotic lifestyle and whimsical decisions lead to increasingly dangerous situations. Kate tries to use her ability for minor conveniences, but because the “Effect” happens first, she is forced to commit the “Cause” to satisfy the loop. She becomes a slave to her own future. As she loses control of her abilities, the episode builds to a chaotic, explosive climax.

Directed by Mark Jean (who went from TV series directing to Hallmark movies) and written by Michael Kube-McDowell, this has Kate as a hippy who did acid in college, suddenly learning that there does need to be some order to the world, or things just fall to pieces. Yet this is another episode of Tales from the Darkside where things just happen. There’s no moral lesson; no one escapes. It just happens, and people die. We move on. I wonder if that’s what keeps this show from being considered in the upper echelon of TV horror anthologies? 

In The Twilight Zone, a character like Kate would be punished for her hubris. In Tales from the Darkside, she’s just… there.

The phone wires get crossed during a storm and Jessica can’t convince anyone that what she heard was really a murder plot.

Season 3, Episode 13: Crossed Up (February 1, 1987)

Even when Jessica is sick in bed, people still die, and she’s in the midst of it all.

Who’s in it, outside of Angela Lansbury?

William Windom and Tom Bosley are back as Dr. Seth and Sheriff Amos.

Michael Horton? Oh no. Grady is in this.

Colleen Camp plays Dody Rogers. She’s been in everything from Battle for the Planet of the Apes to Clue, Sliver, Death Game, Police Academy 2 and 4, Smile, and so much more.

Tony Dow plays Gordon Rogers. He’s Beaver’s brother!

Stephanie Dunnam plays Leslie Cameron. She was in Silent Rage and Play Dead.

James Carroll Jordan plays Adam Rogers, Gisele Mackenzie is Mona, Sandy McPeak is Morgan Rogers, Henry Brandon is Abel Gorcey, James McIntire is Deputy Wells, and Yolanda Nava is a TV announcer.

What happens?

Jessica has hurt her back putting in new windows, so she’s stuck in bed. Dr. Seth says that she needs at least a week more bed rest and gives her a Life Alert bracelet in case she falls and can’t get up. So she’s stuck with Grady making every tuna fish recipe he knows, and if you’ve seen the horrible women Grady has dated on this show, you know that he loves the smell of tuna.

She picks up the phone to call someone and overhears a voice hiring someone to kill an old man. She begs Grady to go tell the news to Sheriff Amos, and he runs out on his bike, nearly getting run over, which makes me sad because I’d love to watch Grady get run down, have the van back up and then roll over his fecund corpse again.

Anyway, everyone acts like J.B. is an idiot, not someone who has already solved two seasons’ worth of murders. Amos just wanted to eat at Mona’s Diner, which means that, from what I’ve seen so far on this show, a small town like Cabot Cove has at least five diners, so nearly one diner per hundred people who live there. No wonder the tourist trade is so important.

The murder Jessica was trying to stop happens, and it’s lumber industrialist Jedediah Rogers, who has three boys — Adam, Gordon and Morgan — who are all about to get rich. Except, well, his journal and will are missing. He also has a granddaughter, Leslie, whom Grady bones up over. She tells him that her grandfather was changing the will to give her all the money and that she has his journal.

Meanwhile, Jessica is solving the case from her Serta. Abel Gorcey, the man who would be the killer, died hours before the actual murder. Amos ends up interrogating everyone while wearing a tape recorder so he can play it for Jessica, who suddenly hears an allergic Gordon on TV and realizes — that’s the killer.

Then this goes all giallo, and a masked killer breaks into J.B.’s place to knife her. Lucky for her, Seth gave her the bracelet, and she called the fire trucks just in time to save her life.

Who did it?

Dody is working with Gordon.

Who made it?

This was directed by the last episode’s bad guy, David Hemings, and written by Steven Long Mitchell and Craig W. Van Sickle, who created the TV shows Cobra and The Pretender.

Does Jessica dress up and act stupid? Does she get some?

No, she’s too busy being in pain and under the covers.

Was it any good?

Yes! It’s Rear Window, but still fun.

Any trivia?

The lightning bolt during the storm is the same one that the U.S.S. Minnow sailed past in the opening of Gilligan’s Island. They flipped the shot, so you don’t recognize it.

Give me a reasonable quote:

Jessica Fletcher: Do you ever get the feeling that you’ve overlooked something obvious? That you’ve done something wrong?

Dr. Seth Hazlitt: Yeah. Every time I vote for Amos.

What’s next?

Jessica tells the story of her new novel about a college student accused of killing his music professor, who plagiarized his compositions.

Will I ever get over the fact that Theodore Gershuny, who directed and wrote this episode, was married to Mary Woronov? Am I really that jealous of a person? Yes.

Based on a story by John Sladek, a former tech writer who was also the author of The New Apocrypha: A Guide to Strange Science and Occult Beliefs, in which he examined the supernatural from a materialist lens, this is the story of Susie (Jamie Ohar), who gets a stuffed bear from her parents (Marilyn Jones and Timothy Carhart). But is it just a teddy bear, or is it something more?

But did her parents even buy it? Neither of them remembers, and soon, bear marks are all over the house and anything that goes wrong is blamed on the bear. Basically: Kids are insane people who live in your house who are ready to kill you at any time. That’s what I learned from this. That and the fact that evil can be inside very small things, and perhaps you should just leave it alone unless you want to end up holding your child as a big bear breaks its way through a door.

The parents spend half the episode debating the logic of the bear’s existence. That’s because in Sladek’s world, the bear isn’t necessarily a demon; it’s a physical object that is simply wrong. The horror isn’t spiritual. It’s a failure of the physical world to behave in the way we want it to.

Plus, the bear acts as a surrogate for Susie’s own burgeoning agency and perhaps her resentment. More than her blaming the bear and trying to get away with it, she’s also in a psychodrama with her parents, as they are actually terrified of the idea that their daughter might be the one marking the house. The bear is just the medium for the chaos kids naturally bring into a sanitized adult world.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Joseph Perry writes for the film websites Gruesome Magazine, The Scariest Things, Horror Fuel, The Good, the Bad and the Verdict and Diabolique Magazine; for the film magazines Phantom of the Movies’ VideoScope and Drive-In Asylum; and for the pop culture websites When It Was Cool and Uphill Both Ways. He is also one of the hosts of When It Was Cool’s exclusive Uphill Both Ways podcast and can occasionally be heard as a cohost on Gruesome Magazine’s Decades of Horror: The Classic Era podcast.

Official synopsis: Marine Cargo Insurance Claims Adjuster William J. Sterbenz, a creature of habit worn down by the daily grind and lonely suburban living, feels helpless against his fate of climbing the corporate ladder. But when a sudden brush with death lights a fire under his ass, Will realizes that he has free will and decides to finally use it, charting a new course for himself as he meanders through new experiences, from Bigfoot hunting to out-of-body time travel – and even coming face to face with his personal guardian angel.

 Writer/director/editor Edward Bursch’s episodic dramedy series The Human, Will is a gentle, philosophical, quirky character study of everyman Will (William J. Sterbenz), who asks for a job demotion and tries to get the most out of life after the sudden unexpected death of his pet fish. He is guided on his journey by his guardian angel (slow-talking comedian Joe Pera, perfectly cast in a mostly narration performance).

The pacing is leisurely, and even unanticipated from-out-of-nowhere occurrences startle in a subtle manner. The comedy is often whimsical, and goes for knowing nods with a smile rather than for belly-laughs. 

The emotional factor is high, though. An episode in which a young Will confronts the adult Will hit me where it counts and caused a pensive trip down nostalgia lane. Another episode involving the hunt for a skunk ape appealed to my cryptozoology interests in a decidedly more fun manner.

Bursch and company deliver a fine series with The Human, Will. Go along with Will on his existential journey and you’ll be treated to an offbeat exploration of what some might consider normalcy.

The first episode of The Human, Will screened at Slamdance, which ran February 24–March 6, 2026 in Los Angeles. 

While on a flight to London, a wealthy woman’s chauffeur dies suddenly, and when the priceless necklace he was carrying turns up missing, it becomes a case of murder.

Season 3, Episode 12: The Corpse Flew First Class (January 18, 1987)

JB is headed to London to research some dusty old Victorian slaying, because apparently, Cabot Cove doesn’t have enough corpses to keep her busy this week. But before she can even touch her complimentary peanuts, the guy in 4B, Leon Bigard, decides to kick the bucket right there in coach.

Who’s in it, outside of Angela Lansbury?

Mary Jo Catlett plays Mrs. Metcalf. She was Rosemary in Serial Mom. 

Robin Dearden is Kay Davis.

Pat Harrington Jr., Schneider from One Day at a Time, is Gunnar Globle.

David Hemings is investigator Errol Pogson. He was in so much, but Deep Red is the one.

Kate Mulgrew is Sonny Greer. Captain Janeaway!

Gene Nelson is Louis Metcalf, Andrew Parks is Fred Jenkins, Vince Howard is Blanton, Robert Walker Jr. (Star Trek’s Charlie X) is Otto Hardwick, Charles Hoyes is Carney, John S. Ragin is Dr. Clint Strayhorn, and Chris Robinson is Capt. Whetsel. 

James Shigeta, Takagi from Die Hard, is John Sukahara.

The dead person, Leon Bigard, is played by Mark Venturini, who was Suicide in Return of the Living Dead. 

Lia Sargent is Elizabeth Welch. She’s done a ton of animated voices.

In smaller roles, Charles Davis is Mr. Stegmeyer, Don Maharry is Mr. Miley, Crystal Jenious is Mrs. Miley, Ron Barker is British Chief, Ian Howard is a security man, Ron Southart is Bobby, Jim Malinda is a photographer, Curtis Hood is a porter, John Straightley is a customs man, Gerald York is a man on the phone, and Robert Bakanic, Dotty Ertel, Buddy Gates and Walter Spear are passengers.

What happens?

Leon was the bodyguard (read: boy-toy) for heiress Sonny Greer. He was also carrying the Empress Carlotta necklace, a bauble worth more than a mid-sized European country. When Leon expires, the necklace vanishes, and J.B. Fletcher has to solve a locked-cabin mystery at 30,000 feet.

Enter Inspector Pogson of Scotland Yard. Usually, the local heat wants to throw J.B. Fletcher in jail, interfering, but Pogson realizes pretty quickly that he’s outmatched by a woman who writes mystery novels and has a 100% conviction rate. What follows is a high-altitude whodunit where everyone on the flight is a suspect, the motive is pure greed, and the only thing more dangerous than the killer is the airline food.

The craziest thing is that Gunnar Globle is based on Roger Corman. He’d like Jessica to touch up the script for Off-road Aliens 2, and I’d like her to take on that project. He could also be a reference to the Cannon Go Go Boys, Golan and Globus.

Sonny Greer turns out to have poisoned Mr. Bigard. Jessica finds out that they were in a situationship and he’s been moving on, ready to break up with her when they get to London. She kills him before that.

There’s also the matter of the Empress Carlotta necklace, which Mr. Hardwick was planning to steal. Maybe he had some help. We’ll see. When it’s switched out for a fake, John Sukahara turns out to be a gem expert and calls it out as fake.

Between a necklace and a murder, that’s a lot on one plane. But when you let Jessica fly, I’m shocked no one died.

Who did it?

The real enemy is Pogson, who planned to switch out the necklace and retire.

Who made it?

This was directed by Walter Grauman and written by Donald Ross, who also wrote Hamburger: The Motion Picture.

Does Jessica dress up and act stupid? Does she get some?

No. It seemed like she was going to bang it out with the inspector, but once he’s bad, she can’t get with him.

Was it any good?

Yes. A great cast!

Any trivia?

The Blues Brothers is the in-flight movie.

Twelve of the characters have the last names of musicians, singers or arrangers who worked for Duke Ellington.

This was made on the set of Airport 1975.

Give me a reasonable quote:

Jessica Fletcher: Mr. Globle… Here’s your script. You know, I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed the sophisticated imagery and the poetic wit. I see it as a cross between cinema verite…

Gunnar Globle: Imagery and cinema verite?

Jessica Fletcher: I think if you change the title, it might do very well in those quaint little, uh, art theaters.

Customs Man: Anything to declare, sir?

Gunnar Globle: Yes. This is a dud.

What’s next?

The phone lines get crossed during a storm, and Jessica can’t convince anyone that what she heard was a real murder plot. It’s directed by David Hemings, who was in this episode!

Desperate to save her granddaughter, Mary Jane, from an encroaching supernatural rot, the wealthy Mrs. Nugent turns to the only experts she can find: Nora (Phyllis Diller) and Jack Mills (Lawrence Tierney). Nora is a wisecracking, flamboyant medium, while Jack is a hard-nosed cynic. They are career con artists used to fleecing pockets and putting on dim-lit seances, but Mrs. Nugent’s $50,000 bounty is enough to make them ignore the smell of sulfur.

Mary Jane claims to be Aisha Candisha, a Moroccan demon of legendary malice. To prove her pedigree, she doesn’t just growl. She casually unhinges her jaw and consumes a silver spoon like it’s a communion wafer. Nora, realizing they are wildly out of their depth, tries to bow out, admitting they are merely fortune tellers. Jack, fueled by greed and a stubborn refusal to be intimidated, doubles down. He wants to try a transfer ritual, removing the entity from Mary Jane and trapping it inside a live pig.

Directed by T.J. Castronovo and written by Edithe Swensen, this ends with both Aisha and Gad finding new bodies to live in. As the demons argue over their prize, the con artists realize that playing at being the Warrens has invited a darkness that doesn’t care about their bank accounts.

Accused of murdering his own bully, soft-spoken poet Dorian Beecher relies on Jessica’s assistance to prove his innocence.

Season 3, Episode 11:  Night of the Headless Horseman (January 4, 1987)

What begins as a humorous deception ends in a murder investigation; now, Jessica must clear Dorian’s name after his elaborate lies make him the perfect suspect for Nate Findley’s death.

Who’s in it, outside of Angela Lansbury?

Dorian Beecher, who is behind all of this, is played by Thom Bray, who was in Prince of Darkness and The Prowler.

Brady kid Barry Williams plays the victim, Nate Findley.

Sarah Dupont is played by Karlene Crockett, who was in Eyes of Fire. 

Bobbie is Judy Landers, who was in Dr. Alien and so many other movies. Her sister, Audrey, was in two episodes of the show.

Sheriff Sam Rankin, the law around here, is Doug McClure from The Land That Time Forgot. 

Hope Lange plays Charlotte Newcastle. She was Bronson’s wife in Death Wish. 

Dentist Penn Doc Walker is played by Charles Siebert.

Dorn Van Stotter is Guy Stockwell from It’s Alive. 

Fritz Weaver from Creepshow is Edwin Dupont.

In smaller roles, Brandon Douglas plays Todd Carrier, Donald Thompson is Robert, Adam Ferries is Brendan, Sanford Clark is a man, Gary Pagett is a deputy, Tom Ohmer is a cop, John England is another guy, Bill Baker is a young blonde guy in a car, and Forry Smith is a man. 

What happens?

After that beginning, with Dorian being accused of murder, he then gets harassed by a figure dressed like the Headless Horseman. He thinks it’s Nate Findley who wants to steal his girlfriend, Sarah. But no, it’s just a kid at first, then Doc Walker, who has stolen Nick’s horse. 

But Doc, well, poor Doc has been going through it too. Nate killed his fiancée, Gretchen, and then basically told Doc that he did it. 

Lots of death for such a new small town.

Who did it?

Doc Walker isn’t your typical villain. He’s a sympathetic figure driven by grief, which makes the episode’s ending hit much harder.

By the end of this, Nate is dead, the groundskeeper is under arrest for embezzlement, the dentist is under arrest for murder, Gretchen is also dead, and Sarah has broken up with Dorian. Dorian is not guilty, at least.

The fact that Nate killed Gretchen before the episode even started suggests that this quiet town has been harboring a monster for a long time. Jessica doesn’t just solve a murder; she lances a boil that has been festering in the community.

Who made it?

This was directed by Walter Grauman and written by R. Barker Price, who also wrote David Schmoeller’s Catacombs.

Does Jessica dress up and act stupid? Does she get some?

No! Come on!

Was it any good?

I liked it. I really liked it.

Any trivia?

McClure, Lange, Crockett, Siebert and Weaver have all been in multiple episodes of this show.

Give me a reasonable quote:

Jessica Fletcher: You’re up for a murder charge. Murder! Twenty years to life. Maybe more!

What’s next?

While on a flight to London, a wealthy woman’s chauffeur dies suddenly, and when the priceless necklace he was carrying turns up missing, it becomes a case of murder.