Survival in the Polar Vortex -- ABC Murders

     . . . . Whatever the ABC Murders is (2018; ITV > amazon prime), it is not Agatha Christie. 

It lacks charm and wit, warmth and satisfaction. The storytelling is poor. There is little detection. 

Therefore this three-episoder has nothing to do with Christie's famous Poirot novel of the same title. Worst of all, Poirot's character was given an entirely different backstory to that Christie had given him.  None of the other characters were what they were in Christie's novel either.

So, the question is, why bother calling it Poirot at all?

I ask, because, so changing up Christie's book and characters interfered with experiencing the ABC Murders and Malkovich's performance as the aging Belgian detective still living in England after seeking asylum from WWI so long ago, in any fair and objective manner.

As a viewer I'm attracted to watch this because of Agatha Christie and her character, Poirot.  Whether that is fair of me as a viewer or not, is beside the point because "Christie" and "Poirot" are how the production is advertised and presented, so thus we viewers are going to have some expectations derived from both-- none of which are met. 

This is most unfair to Malkovich, one thinks, who is giving his best to be the best Poirot he can be, but he's never Poirot as many generations of readers and watchers of the very many adaptations of his detecting have come to know him.

The John Mslkovich Poirot is so dark that he might as well be Tom Hardy's James Keziah Delaney, in BBCI's Taboo (2017).

Malkovich faced a very difficult proposition taking on the role of Poirot in the first place.  But changing up the plot, the characters and Poirot's character itself gave him a nearly insurmountable challenge to engage the viewer.  That Poirot has aged, become sad, without optimism, and again fearful of a future overrun by Germans and racism is understandable and certainly can be, and has been, done -- notably the David Suchet Poirot of The Orient Express, in which his recognition of the global anti-semitism flowing out of Germany enrages and terrifies him. 

The flag of the British Union of Fascists, known as the "Union Banner"

This aspect of this production of The ABC Murders is the best element.  This is 1933; we see posters everywhere demanding 'aliens' be expelled; casual bigotry is expressed by many of the characters; Poirot himself is harassed by a gang of kids for being a foreigner; various figures are shown wearing the flash and circle pins in support of the Brits' fascist parties.  This also addresses current conditions in Britain today.

Here, the focus is on the psychology of everyone, including Poirot, not on the plot of detecting, which is not Christie's way.  So Malkovich is reduced to playing Poirot as sad and pathetic, mourning his lost glory days of  hosting "Murder Games" in the homes of decadent aristocrats -- anyone who knows Poirot knows that the very idea of the "Murder Game" outraged him.  Poirot has always taken murder of anyone as a sin as well as a crime, that he must put as right as can be by revealing the identity of the murderer.

So yes.  Everything about this Poirot is wrong, beginning with Poirot. Evidently the entire point of the murders in this tale is to rejuvenate Poirot as a man and as a reputation -- not to balance the scales of justice that have been put out by the shedding of blood.

I would not recommend watching this unless thoroughly unacquainted with either Christie's novels or any other interpretation of Poirot on screen (and there are many). 

David Suchet as Poirot in the ITV adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express (2010) This is toward the end of the series, when Poirot's and the whole world's milieu was getting darker.  Yet, see? there is still some sun.

But of all the screen, and doubtless stage too, adaptations and portrayals of Poirot, the greatest, without question, is that of David Suchet in the long-running (1989 - 2013) British ITV  series, Agatha Christie's Poirot.  It was a brilliant series, in every way, from design to cinematography to location and casting.  There was ample blood and detection, ample grief and outrage, but there was always sunshine too.