‘Death In Paradise’ Season 7 Starts This Week Without Kris Marshall As Det. Humphrey Goodman

The biggest change in the show, Death In Paradise, is the cast lead, as long-serving Detective Humphrey Goodman, played by Kris Marshall of Love Actually fame, has left Saint Marie and is being replaced by Irish actor Ardal O’ Hanlon as Detective Jack Mooney on Paradise.

Death In Paradise season 7 will premiere this Thursday at 9 p.m. local time on BBC, but so far, there is no date for the new season on PBS stations in the United States. Death In Paradise also streams on Netflix, but only five seasons are available at this time.

Kris Marshall Has Departed Death In Paradise

Death In Paradise fans learned that Kris Marshall was leaving the mystery series, which is shot on the island of Guadeloupe (posing as the fictional Saint Marie in Paradise) back in the spring, but it was unclear as to why. Several sources suggested that Marshall had been offered a better role back in the U.K. as the new Dr. Who; even claiming that Marshall was already shooting Dr. Who. This has now been refuted, and the new Dr. Who is a woman.

Fans on Twitter were sad that Marshall was leaving, but excited that a new Death In Paradise was coming up with Ardal O’Hanlon, who was introduced at the end of Paradise season 6.

“Cracking #deathinparadise episode. Thanks#KrisMarshall you’ve been great. Welcome, #ArdalOHanlon Looking forward to this week.”

If Death In Paradise goes belly up blame the BBC and not me, says Ardal O’Hanlon https://t.co/OMZPakfquh

— The Sun Showbiz (@TheSunShowbiz) December 28, 2017

Marshall Explains That Shooting Death In Paradise In The Caribbean Was Hard On Family

Kris Marshall has finally explained to fans why he left Death In Paradise. Radio Times reported that Marshall explained that it was impractical to be so far away from his growing family for six months of the year. Kris Marshall lives with his wife and two children in Somerset, but they traveled together to Guadeloupe as a family to shoot Death In Paradise until his wife got pregnant with their daughter, Elsie. Kris Marshall added that the big consideration about leaving Death In Paradise was his son, Thomas, who has finally reached school age, and the Marshall family decided they needed to be back in the U.K.

“Every year except last year we took Thomas out with us. The only reason they didn’t come out last year was because my daughter was born and she was only three months old when filming started. Thomas has basically spent half his life in the Caribbean. Every year he went to the same nursery in Guadeloupe. But now it’s time for him to put on scholastic shackles and toe the line.”

Kris Marshall added that while fans of Death In Paradise were surprised that he was leaving the show, the production team of Paradise knew about the plan from the start.

“We decided I would do Death in Paradise for a few years until it became impractical. It was always quite a finite thing. I certainly didn’t hide it from anyone I work with.”

Fans who have not watched the end of Death In Paradise season 6 might not know how Kris Marshall’s character, Humphrey Goodman, departs, but it’s safe to say that the Paradise writers have not killed off Humphrey Goodman the way they did the first Death In Paradise detective played by Ben Miller.

End the year right with a serving of sun, sea and sand in #DeathinParadise.
Binge all day, on alibi ????? pic.twitter.com/DPuq86By2F

— Alibi Channel (@alibi_channel) December 31, 2017

Ardal O’Hanlon Will Be The Third Death In Paradise Detective

Actor, writer, and comedian Ardal O’Hanlon admits to being a bit nervous stepping into the big shoes left behind by Kris Marshall on Death In Paradise, says Radio Times. O’Hanlon’s character, Detective Jack Mooney, is making the move to Saint Marie to start a new chapter in the Caribbean after the death of his wife. Mooney was miserable back at the Met and is hoping that a change of scenery and some sunshine will improve things.

O’Hanlon says the appeal of Death In Paradise is that the police aren’t generally in danger (tell that to Detective Richard Poole), but instead, they are part of a caper, trying to solve a puzzle.

“There’s no real jeopardy in the plots. No real peril for the detectives, but that is part of its appeal. It’s light, fluffy drama, meant to entertain people in the cold nights of winter. The murders aren’t gruesome, there’s no gore-splattered screen. The attraction really is in the puzzles – the ingenious mystery at the heart of it.”

For fans of Death In Paradise, this new chapter with Detective Jack Mooney will once again change the way that murders are solved because O’Hanlon’s character is not a cookie-cutter of Poole or Goodman.

“Ben’s character was uptight. Kris’s was more clumsy and, I suppose, with me, they’re going for something a little bit quirky on the island.”

Ardal O’Hanlon has decided to leave his family back in Dublin for now as to not uproot their three children.