Agatha Christie’s Unknown Murder Mystery Deserves an Adaptation 82 Years Later

The screen has always been enamored with Agatha Christie. One would imagine nothing less than a rapturous reception for the trailblazer whose 55-year career spanned over 70 novels, short stories, plays, and not one, but two of the world’s most famous amateur detectives. Only four of Christie’s fiction books have yet to make the jump to film or television: Death Comes as the End, Destination Unknown, Passenger to Frankfurt, and Postern of Fate. In 2019, the BBC announced an upcoming Death Comes as the End miniseries helmed by award-winning screenwriter Gwyneth Hughes. They described the project as “a very different proposition from the recent BBC Agatha Christie adaptations,” like the channel’s acclaimed And Then There Were None miniseries from 2015. Although the BBC never officially cancelled their plans, seven years without an update isn’t an encouraging sign.

The Queen of Crime’s prolific oeuvre isn’t just confined to the mystery genre, but Death Comes as the End would indeed be unexpected for anyone unfamiliar with her deep cuts. For one, it’s the only Christie title not set in the 20th century. Generally considered to be literature’s first historical mystery, the standalone takes place around 2000 BC in the Egyptian city of Thebes. Death Comes as the End‘s fully Egyptian ensemble — no quirky Belgium-born investigators here — also makes it an outlier within the Christie canon. With these eye-catching selling points in its favor, why hasn’t this overlooked gem gotten the adaptation it deserves?

What Is ‘Death Comes as the End’ About?

Renisenb, the recently widowed daughter of a wealthy Ka-priest, returns to her family home and reunites with her brothers, sisters-in-law, grandmother, and other close ties. Her father’s welcome isn’t as congenial, since Imhotep unexpectedly brings a young, beautiful concubine named Nofret back with him. Nofret’s power-play manipulations swiftly become the catalyst for the household’s undoing; their guaranteed inheritances, their routines, and their masks of civility slip in her presence. When her corpse is found at the bottom of a cliff, anyone could’ve done the deed — except the suspects also die one by one. Renisenb and her loved ones aren’t cursed by the gods or haunted by Nofret’s vengeful ghost, but at the mercy of a serial killer’s human hands.

Although the setting and timeframe differentiate Death Comes as the End from the rest of her catalog, Christie shifting from contemporary to historical isn’t out of left field. Death Comes at the End was published in 1944, 14 years after Christie married archeologist Sir Max Mallowan. She frequently accompanied her husband on his expeditions and derived inspiration from their experiences, “real Egyptian letters from a man named Heqanakhte,” and extensive research consultations with her Egyptologist friend, Stephen Glanville.

Death Comes as the End‘s unique framework never once feels like an inauthentic gimmick plastered atop Christie’s hallmarks. This is a seamless union. It’s as top-notch as readers expect from a writer with a piercingly thorough understanding of narrative structure, reader expectations, and human psychology — a psychological thriller rife with blood-curdling claustrophobia and vicious moral deviancy by way of organic character studies. Christie’s prevailing thematic thread posits that anyone, no matter their good intentions, class standing, or formative circumstances, is capable of violence. Death Comes as the End doubles down by implying that time doesn’t matter. Human nature’s insecurities, fears, jealousies, vendettas, and corrupting desires are the same, even 4,000 years apart.

Accordingly, Christie dissects Renisenb’s dysfunctional relatives to their bones. Although no one is fully evil, Nofret included, the family’s repressed spite melts away their pleasant exteriors like acid once she disrupts their equilibrium. Christie’s heroine feels less textured in comparison, but Renisenb’s naivety does emphasize her situation’s horrifying tension. She’s an unconventional investigator because she takes it upon herself to understand why her family keeps dropping like flies, and avoid the same lethal fate. She must also go without the reassuring conveniences of an experienced detective or forensic evidence. Renisenb only has her instincts and her insightful allies.

‘Death Comes as the End’ Deserves the Same Prestige Adaptation Treatment as Agatha Christie’s Most Famous Titles

Since the numerous murders rival Christie’s brutal masterpiece And Then There Were None, Renisenb discovers the culprit more through a process of elimination than by assembling decipherable-in-retrospect clues and formulating theories. Depending on who you ask, that distinction either makes Death Comes as the End an enjoyable change of pace or a less effective misdirection than the Christie default. It’s still a tightly paced and emotionally satisfying novel buoyed by a descriptive exploration — albeit one penned by an Englishwoman — of Egyptian history, mythology, and culture, specifically the 11th dynasty’s perspective on death.

Take one glance at how many recent and upcoming Christie adaptations exist, and it’s clear her name carries enough singular prestige to intrigue audiences. Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple grab extra eyeballs, but they aren’t necessary. This reception alone justifies investing in adaptations of Christie’s lesser-known projects. Where Death Comes as the End is concerned, the budget required to either mimic or film on location may have given executives pause. The Egyptian characters might’ve caused the same reaction, although there’s no direct evidence to support this specific speculation.

Even though Western viewers have mostly engaged with Hollywood’s versions of Egyptian stories, the general public’s consistent interest indicates they might be quite receptive to a Christie tale that’s divorced from the cozy, 1930s-era English village aesthetic. As long as it’s presented accurately and without exotification, bringing Death Comes as the End to the screen is long overdue.