Poirot : Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer or the culprit in any of the Agatha Christie books and short stories (or in the show)?

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Only once, I guess. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (book). There are some very obvious hints to the murderer.

Jessica Rabbit
"I'm not bad. I'm just drawn that way."

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Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Only once, in a novel which original title I forget (something about 'elephants'?. Quite early in there was a line about the victim having had a twin sister who 'looked very much like her' and I was able to deduce just about everything else right there and then. I couldn't believe it'd really be this simple, so I skipped to the end and sure enough, I was spot on.
I was so _disappointed_ I actually stopped reading and never picked it up since! :/


====
"Never finish what you can't start!" ;)

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

^ Ah yes, that'd be Elephants Can Remember, one of Christie's last novels with a solution so unsurprising it should've been a short story at best. Hopefully the new adaptation keeps it from being a dead giveaway.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I guessed Peril at End House before I'd finished reading the book's description.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Same here! I have suspected the actual culprit in a few other books but that was the only one I can remember being certain about right from the start.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

The Mysterious Affair at Styles
The Murder at the Vicarage
Death on the Nile

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I had my suspicions about Death on the Nile, but I wasn't sure how it was done. Someone once said: beware of ex-lovers, and they were right.

~~
💕 JimHutton (1934-79) and ElleryQueen 👍

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I guessed correctly once (if you include the whole scenario of how the murder came about and not merely the "I feel this guy might have done it because he's fishy" sort of thing). It was "The Third Girl". I actually made myself write it down to make sure, once I reached the end, that it wasn't a figment of my imagination that I'd guessed it beforehand.

I also guessed "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd", but that was solely due to the fact that I'd read "Endless Night" years before, so I was already aware that Dame Agatha was not unfamiliar or unwilling to go down the sinister narrator / sinister lead route. I'd also read blurbs from the cover of the book, which I normally refrain from doing, and as most have characterized the conclusion as "the most shocking one yet" and as "Agatha Christie rewriting the rules of detective fiction", it hinted strongly at the conclusion that in the end proved accurate. So I don't really take credit for that one. Had I been reading Christie in chronological order and refrained from the blurbs, I'd have been just as shocked as people were at the time it came out.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I think the most obvious of all is DUMB WITNESS - the initials on the dressing gown give the whole thing away.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Quiet a few of them-


Three Act Tragedy
Nemesis
Towards Zero
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side


Among others...

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

You who got "Ackroyd", I salute you. When I read it, I was lucky enough to have heard nothing about it, or the controversy; it was just 'oh, an old book, let's dip into it'. At the end I thought ' ..hey, hey! You can't *do* that!' Later I found it had got just the same response in the 1920's, with critics crying 'foul'! Except Dorothy Sayers, who cried 'Fair! And fooled you!'.

"I did what little had to be done". Urk. I think it was this story that lead Father Knox to write Rule One of his famous (somewhat joking) Ten Rules of Detective Fiction.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Murder in Mesopotamia.

My general rule when read/watching murder mysteries is "who is the least likely culprit and why?" and Murder in Mesopotamia fitted quite nicely into that theory.

But, statistically, considering the volume of work you're bound to guess at least one.

”Do the stars gaze back?" Now *that's* a question.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Just watched it and I don't know if I'd say I guessed it, he was my chief suspect.

The story, as a whole there, is completely ridiculous.

On what planet can a woman marry the same man twice without noticing that it's the same man?

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

My biggest success was After the Funeral, guessed the murderer and pretty much worked out the motive as well :)

The more you read/ watch of Christie, the better you get at working out the killer. For me, the more impressive challenge is working out motives and how it was done. I think I also correctly guessed The Clocks and Peril at End House. Have been totally clueless for many - Appointment with Death and Halloween Party left me particularly brain dead, had no idea who the killer was.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

A small handful of times. One of the fun little traditions with my family was to pause the show just before the denouement and give our predictions. Some of the short stories were a little obvious, and Death in the Clouds was one of my proudest deductions.

We're police officers! We're not trained to handle this kind of violence!

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?


Maybe not the most time but almost half of them, the last one was the Mousetrap play in London.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

i correctly guessed the murderer in "They came to Baghdad" (my favourite of all Agatha Chrisites books). "Death comes as the end" well not many people were left at the end anymore so that was rather easy to guess also i think. Although i have read "The Big Four" two times i still do not understand who is the murderer - hopefully this will become clear to me when the poirot episode is made. Also "Postern of Fate" i know who was the murderer of the later crime, but who was the murderer of the original crime that Tuppence discovered the letter of in the book?

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

miss mullins (posed as a gardener) who was the great niece of the granddaughter of the original doctor who killed mary jordan


Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I think The Mousetrap is where the old saw the butler did it originally came from.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?SPOILERS!

As a rule, if a person survives a murder attempt, I suspect her/him..

That being said, I salute anyone who guessed the killer in After the funeral. That one came as a shock to me.

I guessed the murderer in Peril at End house, A murder is announced and Crooked house. The latter was obvious to me almost from the beginning.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?SPOILERS!

Same here - I guessed 'Crooked House', 'Peril at End House' and 'Death on the Nile' and 'Murder on the Orient Express'. But Dame Agatha has defeated me more times than I can remember. Re-reading is fun because then you can see exactly which clues she was waving under your nose all the time.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?SPOILERS!

I guessed the solution in "After the funeral". It was the first Christie I ever could guess, in my late teens I think. It was the bending of the head i front of the mirror and the "She always tells inconvenient truths" thing that made me suspicious.

I also got "Peril at End House" right. You're right: If someone survives a murder attempt in which "wrong" person is killed, the allegedly intended victim is almost certainly the culprit.

I think I guessed "Crooked House" too, but I'm not sure...

In "A murder is announced" I might have guessed who was the culprit (see above), but I certainly didn't figure out the solution, it was a surprise to me.

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Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

A couple of times.

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Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Only one, "The Mystery of the Blue Train." At first, I was pleased that I had finally "figured out" one of her books, but I also found that I prefer to have Poirot address a drawing room full of suspects, and let us all know at the same time.

I'm a sucker for assigning great meaning to the "throw away" clues, so I usually am onto the wrong person.

Many years ago, I read "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd." It was so amazing that I tried to get members of my family to read it (with mixed success).

FYI: Then, a few years ago, [former] Chief Justice William Rehnquist was being interviewed by Brian Lamb, on C-Span, and one of the topics covered was "favorite books." When Lamb asked the Chief Justice about "reading for pleasure" . . . William Rehnquist said, "for mysteries" his favorite book was "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd!"

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I'd hesitantly say 'yes' but only because by the time I have gotten to the reveal I have already suspected every Tom, Dick and Hercule

"He likes a nice skinny one, without much fluff!

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I've found that as I've gone along, I've gotten much better at guessing the killers. This last series, I knew the killer in THE BIG FOUR the second he was introduced, and guessed the killer right away in LABOURS OF HERCULES. Saying I knew the killers in the others of the series would be cheating because I'd read the books beforehand.

I feel like it's something of a formula that they rely upon, but I can't put my finger on exactly what it is. For example, I usually always suspect the doctor, or the person with the interesting quirk, or the person they're attempting to sweep under the rug.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I guessed Death on the Nile because I'm a hopeless romantic and I refused to believe that the main couples love wasn't real.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I correctly guessed the murderer in "The Hollow" but I think that that was only because by the law of averages I was bound to be right eventually.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Lots of times. I figured out The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim within the first few minutes of the episode. There are lots of others, but that was the one I solved the quickest.

Sometimes the murderer is really obvious just because of casting. When a "big name" actor appears in the program, but is not shown on screen very much for the first 2/3 of the episode, it's obvious s/he will be the killer/culprit.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I used to quite often on Murder She Wrote. Does that count?

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I haven't read any of the books. Would like to sometime. I've only watched the movies and programs.

One of the most startling for me was Sparkling Cyanide, with Peter Ustinov. I couldn't believe a series of events played out like that.

I think that gave me the mindset I'd never be able to solve any of these.

I even go back and watch them and I'll have completely forgotten who the killer was.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I guessed And Then There Were None, solely on the Hollywood setup of movies.

Barry Fitzgerald had just won his Oscar, so he was the 'culprit' at the end, I deduced. The 'bigger star' had to be the center of attention and the only other one managing to stand out was Richard Haydn, obviously.

When Fitz was killed, I was stumped once more, but then he returned.

Other than that, I have NEVER guessed the killer in any of the movies or shows. Never read the books.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I wish somebody would actually do And Then There Were None based on the book. The movies were based on the play, which has a very different, and in my opinion, bad ending.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I guessed in this most recent Poirot "Dead Man's Folly". Seemed obvious from the beginning who the murderer and/or his cohort was. But the motive and execution of the murders were really brilliant.


Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Yes, I knew from the opening scene that they had switched identities. It all seemed a bit too convenient.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

A couple of times. In those cases I had not worked it out though. I just noticed something odd about the character. For instance, in Elephants Can Remember I caught that she was Canadian. I was guessing she was the daughter of the sister. However, I was thinking that she had been a patient at the institute and that she had somehow killed her mother and her aunt's husband when she was a child. It was not adding up but I knew it had to be her.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was the only one I guess correctly.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I've never guessed the murderer correctly but I often find myself asking the question (whatever it may be) that ultimately traps the killer, a considerable time before the detective does. And I often wonder why if the question occurs so obviously to me, why doesn't the detective see it?

If I can't save you, I swear to God, I am gonna stop you!

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

When I was a little girl - well, about 10 or 11 - watching Poirot on A&E was a tradition for my family. Most of the time I had no idea yet my brother, David, almost always got it right. But then I saw Lord Edgware Dies and there was one moment when I knew it was the wife. I turned to my mom and said, "She did it."

My proudest moment.


Also Yellow Iris, though I'm still baffled as to why he would bring everyone back together again like that. Two women poisoned (well, one) and the husband was away both times? Not a coincidence. He could have done in the other one easily enough without that charade.




Edit: I finally was able to see the last few seasons and in Labors of Hercules, the second the daughter came on screen I knew she was it. She just looked so beautifully villainous that it was impossible for her not to be.



Make him do it again - Ilithyia
The voice says I'm almost out of minutes - Cas

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Guessed the killer in the very beginning of Lord Edgeware Dies. When lady Edgeware asks Poirot to talk to her husband about a divorce when she only just met him made no sense at all. She even had a sly look about her. I immediately said she did it. A few others that I can't recall but that one was so obvious to me.

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I think that Lord Edgware Dies is one of those where the solution is so obvious that maybe that's why Poirot overlooked it. The killer in this case is the only one who really had a motive, but then, Poirot still had to prove HOW it was done.

~~
💕 JimHutton (1934-79) and ElleryQueen 👍

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I've always thought Lord Edgware Dies would have worked better as an open-ended mystery (i.e. Columbo) than a whodunit, it was so obvious from the get-go.

Veni, vidi, vermicelli
I came, I saw, I had pasta

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I actually have. Two times to be more specific.
'And then there were none' was kind of obvious at least in my opinion. While reading 'Murder at the Orient Express' which is my all time favourite, I thought at some point: 'Sounds like all of them did it.' And in the end it was just like that. :D

Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

I'm afraid I almost always figure it out, of course, I cut my teeth on the Sherlock Holmes stories when I was 7.
I also figured who killed Jessica Fletcher's friends or their enemies by the first commercial.
Personally, I wouldn't want to be in the same city with her, Hercule and Perry Mason together. Talk about a death wish. It would be like in "Love at First Bite", the waiter just crumples while they're trying to hypnotize each other, (Van Helsing, and Dracula).

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Re: Have you ever correctly guessed the murderer?

Lord Edgware dies! Once the murder happened, I guessed who did it and how they did it. IMO, it was very obvious and I got annoyed with Poirot, that he didn't consider the possibility at once.
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