Rachel James is shot through her kitchen window while having breakfast early one morning. She was having an affair with Dr. Julian Storrs, an Oxford professor who is a candidate for Master of Lonsdale College. When her next door neighbor is also killed however, Morse determines that the shooting of James may have been in error. Morse also suspects that he may have been a blackmailer. Both Storrs an his rival for the Masters position, Denis Cornford had secrets that would make them suspects. Morse determines that several others also had things to hide and any one of them could have committed the murders.

《探长薇拉》的主人公是一个精力旺盛沉迷于工作的狂人。虽然她很孤独但她从轻易不袒露，她凭借敏锐的智慧，策略和勇气来面对生活。剧中陪她出生入死彼此信任的同事名叫Sergeant Joe Ashworth（由David Leon饰演），也是她当成儿子来看待的得力助手。他们以火一样的热情和专业的素养联手处理着每一桩案件。by:yakubd.cc

A year after her murder, the police re-open the case of Yvonne Harrison when they receive an anonymous letter implicating a burglar, Harry Repp, who is about to be released from prison. Supt. Strange assigns the case to DS Lewis, who is chafing at the bit awaiting his promotion to Inspector. Morse has been ill and has only just returned to work. He steps on Lewis' toes by involving himself in the case, but as the body count rises, Morse finds himself in charge of investigating a woman who had many affairs with many different men. When he learns that the dead men were in possession of large amount of cash, he suspects they were blackmailing her murderer.

Morse is taken seriously ill at a museum reception and is hospitalized. In the hospital, Supt. Strange, visits Morse to push him to take early retirement, while Dr. Millicent 'Millie' Van Buren gives him her book on a 140 year-old court case known as the Oxford Canal Murders. The case involved the murder and rape of a young woman, Mrs Joanna Franks, traveling by canal boat from Coventry to London. The case resulted in three boatmen being sentenced to death and two of them hanged. Morse starts to read Millie's book and dreams about it. He soon has a number of problems with the case. 　　Why weren't the three men also charged with theft? Why did Mrs Franks take a boat instead of a train that was much faster and comfortable and only slightly more expensive? Why didn't she abandon the boat after she complained about lewd behavior of the crew at the shipping office in Banbury? Why did she then drink and 'socialise' with the crew? What happened to her 'carpet bag' with which she arrived on the boat but which was not mentioned in the court case, nor was it stored in the archives with her, almost empty, trunk? The trunk was marked with initials of her first husband who had died. How did it happen that her shoes were found on the boat but nobody saw her return to the boat from the forest? 　　PC Adrian Kershaw does some brilliant leg work for Morse. He studied history and has invaluable background knowledge. For instance, he mentions that the boatmen had bad reputation because they worked on Sundays and did not attend church. Later a chapel was built for them in Oxford. 　　The dead woman's clothes and the shoes found on the boat are submitted to modern forensic investigation. The result is that the shoes did not belong to the dead woman found in the water because she was much taller.The shoes were never used in the forest. 　　Only Mrs Franks' husband, Charles Franks, was called to identify the body of the dead woman. He claimed that, while her face was darkened and disfigured, he found a birth mark behind her ear. The prosecutor welcomed that information "that only a husband or a lover would know". The accused were not shown the body. The defense attorney merely claimed that the guilt of the three men was not proved. All three accused claimed to the end that they were innocent. One of them was not executed because he embraced Christianity in prison. 　　Morse instructs Kershaw to investigate if Charles Franks benefited from his wife's death and, indeed, he pocketed 300 pounds insurance money. Case closed: Charles Franks murdered a tall women and dropped her in the canal after meeting Joanna in the forest. If Joanna Franks jumped off the boat at the same time as the dead body hit the water, she swam to the bank and joined her husband. The couple changed their names, in the case of 'Charles Franks' a second time after he 'died' as Joanna's first husband. The fourth boatman, a youngster who was not charged, was probably paid by Joanna to give false testimony. 　　Morse travels to Ireland and has a grave of Joanna's first husband exhumed. The coffin contains bags of sand and some stones.

改编自经典的侦探形象——摩斯探长，而饰演摩斯探长的肖恩·埃文斯的表演，也为这部电视剧添了不少光，他将摩斯探长的个性表现的非常丰富，有点忧郁，有点张狂，有时又有点可爱。

《摩斯探长前传》第二季预计于2014年3月30日在英国独立电视台播出，新一季共由《宝藏》、《夜曲》、《摇摆》、《永无乡》四个故事组成，单集片长为90分钟…

《摩斯探长前传》第四季于2017年1月回归ITV，本季共四集，标题分别为《游戏》、《圣歌》、《检疫》、《丰收》。剧情以1967年为背景，承接第三季结尾，由Shaun Evans和Roger Allam主演，Russell Lewis担任编剧，摩斯探长系列小说作者Colin Dexter担任顾问。

《摩斯探长前传》第五季共6集，剧情以1968年为背景，于2018年2月在英国独立电视台播出。

《摩斯探长前传》第六季共4集，剧情以1969年为背景，于2019年2月在英国独立电视台播出。

《摩斯探长前传》第七季共3集，剧情以1970年为背景，于2020年2月在英国独立电视台播出。