Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery (2025)

About this episode

The episode discusses the themes and cinematography of 'Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery'.

Surprise! A bonus episode! We watched the recently released Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery , the third film in the Benoit Blanc detective franchise written and directed by Rian Johnson and starring Daniel Craig. We get right into themes explored throughout the movie - the juxtaposition of Blanc and Father Jud and their differing views on faith, the temptation of power and wealth and how it preys on humanity, the many ways in which we tell stories about ourselves and each other, and the inherent power of collective judgement and shame. We delve deep into the complicated relationship between the Catholic Church and how it views and treats women, make parallels between Blanc and Poirot’s view of justice and how room time as public shaming can be utilized (or not), praise the incredible lighting and cinematography multiple times, and debate whether this could have been made with a different religion at the core. We also talk about the many twists and turns the mystery takes throughout and realize the mastermind essentially accomplished their goal. Katy was influenced by The Murder of Roger Ackroyd too much, Carrie threw her notebook into the air, Maddy was thinking about Cats…

People in this episode

Hosts: Katy, Carrie, Maddy, Mack

Topics covered

• Benoit Blanc detective franchise
• faith and power
• storytelling
• collective judgement
• Catholic Church and women
• justice
• cinematography

Keywords

• Knives Out
• Benoit Blanc
• Rian Johnson
• faith
• power
• Catholic Church
• justice
• cinematography
• Josh O’Connor
• Bridget Everett

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Cats

More episodes of Mostly Murder (But Sometimes Not)

• Osmosis Jones (2001) · June 3, 2026 · 1h 38m
• The Loch, "Episode 1" · May 13, 2026 · 1h 16m
• Sherlock Holmes, "The Blue Carbuncle" · April 22, 2026 · 1h 21m
• Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency, "Horizons" · April 1, 2026 · 1h 10m
• Shardlake (2024) · March 11, 2026 · 1h 38m
• Murder by Death (1976) · February 18, 2026 · 1h 23m