<p> The man who would became the curmudgeonly Inspector Morse, among the most popular of recent British television detectives, is a troubled 20something in the new PBS Masterpiece Mystery, “Endeavour.” The somewhat gangly youth is in his first days with the Oxfordshire Constabulary, uncertain of himself in many situations and squeamish when looking death in the eye. But a teenage girl has been murdered, and a college youth is an apparent suicide, and while veterans follow the well-rutted paths of investigation, Morse lights off in new directions. </p> <p>He had only recently dropped out of Oxford, but learned enough to navigate the obscure poetic references and crossword vocabulary as well as the peculiar mentality of the queen of universities, whose professors are trained to modulate seriousness and engagement with irony, wit and a carefully calibrated nonchalance. </p> <p>Young Morse is played by Shaun Evans and surrounded by a cast familiar to Anglophile PBS fans. “You were never Oxford materialtoo decent by half,” a former colleague says with a supercilious tone. Morse\'s background emerges slightly from the shadow of the story and we gather he came from the bleak ends of the lower middle class and went up to Oxford on merit before being disenchanted by snobbery or flummery. In his youth he discovered opera, and the emotional transports of this music were for him the reminder that beauty can flower amid the grayness of this world. Wisely, screenwriter Russell Lewis and director Colm McCarthy chose not to go the easy route of showcasing the Swinging \'60s. We don\'t hear the Rolling Stones blaring from the radio, but see only band posters tacked to the walls of student flats. Popular culture may be subsuming all else, but Morse is focused on the classicsand the pursuit of truth. </p> <p>Longtime fans of the “Inspector Morse” series will notice many origin story points in “Endeavour,” including his discovery of the red Jaguar in the lot of a corrupt car dealer and his introduction to strong drink at the behest of his mentor, Inspector Thursday (Roger Allan), a somewhat urbane and unusually honest cop amid a department rife with corruption and compromise. Let\'s hope “Endeavour” blossoms into a series of its own. Who knows? Would Morse have a chance to investigate the mysterious death of Brian Jones? Would he trade verses of Shelley with Mick Jagger? </p> <p> Endeavour debuts Sunday, July 1, 8 p.m. on Milwaukee Public Television <br /></p>
