Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 3. The Reichenbach Fall (2012)

television

It is, of course, impossible to produce anything perfect. No really. Someone, somewhere, will always be perverse and assert dislike, or have the kind of mind that can see ways in which the “thing” could have been made better. Being wise after the event is the easy way to find fault. But when you’re the creator, you can only rely on your own sense of what works and what does not, what can be shown and what cannot. It’s a tightrope and, given the pressures of modern life, it’s very difficult to make a success. Although in some situations, it’s possible to leave an audience in a state of rapture. Some performances in live theatre and the food that emerges from some professional kitchens on to your table come to mind. Here everyone is in the moment with the freshness of the experience leading to a willing suspension of the normal cynicism and disbelief. For a brief moment, we all become believers in perfection and then, such is the embarrassment at the prospect of having to find fault, we all choose to remember it for all time as the greatest. In part, we’re allowed to do this because no-one else can go back to re-experience that moment when [insert name of celebrity actor or chef] outdid him/herself and produced the perfect [insert name of favourite role or dish]. In the case of the television programmes, I can tell you without fear of contradiction that the second live-action Quatermass which I watched in 1955 was an outstanding set of episodes and only rarely have they been topped. Far better, in my opinion, than the first and later Quatermass series although The Stone Tape runs it a close second. Curiously for a live-action series of that era, Quatermass II was recorded and still exists in the BBC archives. One day, perhaps, the powers-that-be will permit it to be shown again. But it wouldn’t be the same. We’ve moved on culturally. The acting styles would seem dated and mannered. The story would seem less original because it’s been copied so often.

Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman think about their predicament

Today, of course, we have everything recorded and made available for anyone to buy or watch whenever they want. This makes the experience more emotionally disposable. Since we can watch and rewatch if we think we missed anything, there’s far less attention paid. When you think this may be your only chance to see something, you focus your concentration. You don’t want anything to get by you. All of which brings me to Sherlock: The Reichenbach Fall (2012) which, in these ephemeral days, is as close to a perfect episode as we’re likely to see. So kudos to the team: director Toby Haynes, writers Steve Thompson and Mark Gatiss, and the cast. It was a memorable ninety minutes.

Andrew Scott hoping to avoid anyone noticing him in the Tower of London

So why is it so good? The answer lies in the inversion of expectation. The five previous episodes have maintained Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) as the proactive hero, stalking around the landscape being insufferable and being right about most things. Watson (Martin Freeman) has trailed in his wake, doing his best to steer the Holmes ship in the right social direction, but finding it difficult to plot a course into a safe port when a storm looms on the horizon. The arrogance of the man in believing there’s no need to court public approval is squarely in the mould created by Arthur Conan Doyle. In a way, we’re seduced into believing the man is invincible. And now a special word of praise for Andrew Scott as Jim Moriarty. We’ve seen him in passing as the nemesis-in-waiting, but he now steps up to the plate to throw a curve ball at our hero. To match the brilliant mind of Sherlock, Moriarty has to come from an oblique angle. It would be pointless to try routine tactics and too boring just to have Sherlock shot. It’s the old Batman syndrome best captured in the Adam West days. The villains line up with ever more eccentric ways of trying to kill our hero (and Robin), each doomed to fail as being overcomplicated. Here Moriarty really does come up with a devious plan to discredit the hero. It would require too many spoilers to explain and, in any event, you should enjoy without preconceptions. Simply wait for the wonderful moment on the roof when Moriarty considers the future prospect of only having ordinary people to contend with. I will only offer the following few thoughts.

The strength of the episode lies in the apparent passivity of Sherlock. He has to endure to discover the nature of the game being played. The fact he does care for others is also a welcome relief. The acceptance of guilt admitted by Mycroft is revealing. The frustration of Watson, Mrs Hudson (Una Stubbs) and Lestrade (Rupert Graves) is touching. And the probable role of Molly Hooper (Loo Brealey) is worth speculating on. Overall, Sherlock: The Reichenbach Fall is a remarkably sustained piece of intelligently-focused malevolence on a small screen. It will live in my memory for a long time.

For reviews of the earlier episodes, see:
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 1. A Study in Pink (2010)
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 2. The Blind Banker (2010)
Sherlock: Season 1, Episode 3. The Great Game (2010)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 1. A Scandal in Belgravia (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 2. The Hounds of Baskerville (2012)

Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 2. The Hounds of Baskerville (2012)

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Well, I know what I think of this episode which as the title suggests, Sherlock: The Hounds of Baskerville (2012), is an adaptation/modernisation of the novel by Arthur Conan Doyle, but I’ll delay announcing the conclusion a little. This time around, we’ve lost the spooky old manorial hall, home of the Baskerville family, and we’ve substituted a “secret” military base where potentially dangerous research is being undertaken (in secret). You know it’s a secret base that no-one should ever go near because a part of the off-road approach is protected by a mine field. Yes, that’s right! It’s so damn secret that anyone trying to sneak up on it from the rear (or side, for that matter), should be blown to bits in one of those explosions so beloved of the SFX people who work for the BBC. So goodbye Great Grimpen Mire which can suck a body down into oblivion, and welcome to a fantasy version of England in which we have live mines plus an entire area kitted out with pressure switches that will release all kinds of interesting stuff in aerosol form. It was never like this when I went walking across Dartmoor as a young’un.

Martin Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch avoiding the Mire

So where are we with this story? Well, it all starts when Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) gets this email from a young lady who reports that her bunny glowed green in the dark and then disappeared. This curious message is closely followed by the arrival of Henry Knight (Russell Tovey) who looks the same colour throughout. He’s recently featured in a television documentary which retells his horrific experience as a small boy when his father disappeared. Now he’s affected by dreams and a therapist is trying to help him remember what actually happened. Naturally, he remembers a “hound” killed his father. And, of course, before you can say anything to stop them, Sherlock and John Watson (Martin Freeman) have jumped into a train taking them into the deep south-west. Our heroes book into a pub run by a gay couple and, of course, are themselves assumed to be gay. Neither seem particularly put out by having to share a room so it’s official. It then turns out that Sherlock has borrowed the go-anywhere swipe card belonging to Mycroft (Mark Gatiss). Using this, the couple drive into the secret research base and bluff their way into a quick guided tour where they meet Dr Stapleton (Amelia Bullmore) and Dr Frankland (Clive Mantle).

It’s at this point the story stepped off the path followed in all the previous updatings of past works by Arthur Conan Doyle. The consistent virtue of the original stories and, to some extent, these modern recreations, is that they are rooted in their own times. There’s a reasonable level of credibility from the context in which the action is to take place. Yes, we’re dealing with a human mind that works in a unique way, but there’s a rational explanation for almost everything that happens. So the guards at the gates of this secret installation should be able to see that the photograph on the swipe card looks nothing like Sherlock. The fact someone is carrying a token that permits entry does not prove the carrier to be entitled to enter. If our nation’s security depended solely on people carrying the right card, our nation would have no secrets left. Second, even if the guards decide to let in the one carrying the card on an unannounced inspection, there’s no reason to admit the sidekick who has no card authorising entry. Imagine that these are two foreign agents. They have kidnapped or killed the real cardholder and now seek entry. Are there any guards who will just let them walk in? It’s completely nuts! Even Sherlock is counting down the minutes before someone makes the key telephone call to establish the real Mycroft is sitting in his club and not making a snap inspection. Worse, when they leave, we’re not shown Sherlock and Mycroft discussing this abuse of his card.

Russell Tovey thinking there may be a hound nearby

For once, I’m not going to engage in a detailed spoiler review to demonstrate just why the episode sinks without trace in the Great Scriptwriter’s Mire. Let’s just say that what happens shows Sherlock in a bad light, performing an experiment on John Watson with the approval of the officer in charge of the base. In fact, there’s not enough time for the experiment to be set up in real time, e.g. removing the animals and bending the bars of the cage. Worse, it’s outrageous the plot failed to react to events in any way. If I was that officer and saw the outcome of the experiment, I would be shutting everything down until the matter was resolved. Formal reports would be made. Investigators would be crawling over everything. But what we actually see is the base commander disappears, leaving Sherlock to guess his password so he can access a Top Secret database on research projects. Ludicrous! I could go on but you will understand that this episode is insultingly bad with even Sherlock’s manic analyses coming across as annoying. Fortunately Martin Freeman keeps his dignity and Lestrade (Rupert Graves) is slightly more than a token presence, coming out of it looking modestly competent.

Perhaps I feel so aggrieved because the first episode in this new season was outstanding. If this had been the pilot episode I might not have felt so frustrated. But, as it is, Sherlock: The Hounds of Baskerville goes way beyond silly and into territory usually reserved for canned American shows (sorry to admit my prejudice but there are so many really bad shows from US networks, they have become my yardstick of plot idiocy).

For reviews of the earlier episodes, see:
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 1. A Study in Pink (2010)
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 2. The Blind Banker (2010)
Sherlock: Season 1, Episode 3. The Great Game (2010)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 1. A Scandal in Belgravia (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 3. The Reichenbach Fall (2012)

Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 1. A Scandal in Belgravia (2012)

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Ah ha! As Sherlock: A Scandal in Belgravia (2012) starts off, we discover how to get out of a Mexican stand-off. Jim Moriarty (Andrew Scott) is just weighing up the options when a really annoying ringtone signals the arrival of a really annoying call from someone who may have an interest in saving Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch). That would be Irene Adler (Lara Pulver), of course, but our heroes don’t know that yet. So then we have a delightful game of clients, wannabe and accepted, playing with the names of the more famous Arthur Conan Doyle stories as the increasingly popular blog postings by John Watson (Martin Freeman) about their investigations begin to get serious traffic. In this, it’s good to see Lestrade (Rupert Graves) more actively involved in promoting Sherlock’s career even if his marriage is breaking down. The reason for Sherlock finally sporting a deerstalker is nicely organised as is the headline, accompanying photograph and subtitle, Hatman and Robin. The death by the river walks the thin line between a magnificently stupid idea and an inspired case for the ace detective to crack based on a few salient facts. After some thought, I incline to the view the solution is sufficiently hilarious to fall on the right side. Indeed, the entire tenor of the episode nicely balances humour and the more serious side of the action.

Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman as wallflowers

The palace sequence does not overplay the joke and the theft of the ashtray has the right level of childishness about it. When she appears, Irene Adler is wonderful as she literally resists giving away any clues about herself by just being herself. The Christmas party at 221B Baker Street also shows the aching loneliness of everyone in Sherlock’s circle (except for Watson’s current girl friend who loses out to Sherlock in the “love” stakes but will go her own way to find more reliable men in her life). The backfiring of Sherlock’s analysis of the present brought by Molly (Loo Brealey) says it all. It’s interesting to see Mycroft (Mark Gatiss) might actually care about his brother for all they both claim to see no advantage in the sentimentality of attachments. Yet there’s the hint of something more when Mycroft later says that his brother, who has the brain of a top scientists or philosopher, always wanted to be a pirate. Those men who swing from the rigging, a cutlass between their teeth, have a girl in every port — for violin lessons and other purely recreational purposes, of course.

Lara Pulver hides everything important

We then come to the core of the episode which has, from the outset, been about the Coventry problem. For those of you who have yet to watch this episode, take care to remember the opening sequence of clients who walk in through his door. Some of them are highly relevant to the final solution. Although this theme is not something that ever appears in an Arthur Conan Doyle story, it has exactly the right qualities about it. Indeed, it reminds me of story elements that are used in Anthony Price novels where there are levels within levels of deception, usually in a Cold War context but sometimes not. More generally, I’m not convinced the CIA would be quite so crass on British soil. There’s an appalling lack of subtlety about they way they go about their work — a kind of cowboy approach to exceptionalism that lacks credibility. After the first failure in Belgravia, I seriously doubt they would beat up Mrs Hudson (Una Stubbs) in this way. Mycroft would have had words with Langley and sent them all home long before they could embarrass themselves again. That said, Sherlock has the right approach to punishing their temerity in threatening Mrs Hudson. Throwing them out with the rubbish seems appropriate.

Andrew Scott looking threatening

The sexual chemistry between Benedict Cumberbatch and Lara Pulver is nicely understated. That, at least, does play rather more credibly than the earlier television version of the story with Jeremy Brett and Gayle Hunnicutt. In the original story, it’s clear Sherlock is impressed by the lady but Brett seems too much of a cold fish for such dalliances. Insofar as this episode is about relationships, it’s interesting to see how much everyone misjudges everyone else. Watson seems to think Mrs Hudson is a shrinking violet, while Watson and Mycroft misunderstand Holmes’ failure to react to Irene Adler’s flirting. Holmes finally chooses to “see” Molly, but does see Irene Adler for who she is. Without a doubt, A Scandal in Belgravia (2012) is the best in this series so far. It’s a great story, well acted all round and, were it not for the ringtone at the end, it would be perfect. Ah yes, the final scenes. Shame about that. It’s overegging the pudding because everyone would have noticed and commented upon it if Holmes had left Baker Street for any length of time without a declared class 8 crime to solve.

For reviews of the earlier episodes, see:
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 1. A Study in Pink (2010)
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 2. The Blind Banker (2010)
Sherlock: Season 1, Episode 3. The Great Game (2010)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 2. The Hounds of Baskerville (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 3. The Reichenbach Fall (2012)

Sherlock: Season 1, Episode 3. The Great Game (2010)

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Well, The Great Game (2010) is a major improvement on The Blind Banker! Thankfully for the neighbours, our bored hero is distracted from his scientific experiment to see how many bullets will pass through the party wall by the timely arrival of Mycroft (Mark Gatiss). Said brother requests Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) to track down a missing data stick carrying the plans of a Top Secret missile system. Well perhaps that’s slightly less than accurate as descriptions go because Sherlock evinces absolutely no interest in preventing the nation’s defence plans from being leaked to our enemies (whoever they are and as if they should care). Instead he lies through his teeth that he’s up to his eyeballs in work and can’t tear himself away. With the impeccable timing that only BBC scriptwriters can command, his windows are then blown in by a massive explosion in the house across the road — notice how considerate the bombers are in waiting until Sherlock is standing in a position where he will not be injured by flying glass. This care to ensure his safety hints the game’s afoot with our hero given challenges (five on a scale of pips) against the clock. Fail and more bombs will go off — this is an intellectual challenge only because there’s no sign Sherlock gives a hoot whether people are disassembled by explosives. He’s using the additional time allocated to him to investigate who’s playing the titular game and, when no-one’s looking, get back the data stick. If he had any shred of decency in him, he would have these victims released from their torment within minutes rather than hours, but that wouldn’t fit the new sociopathic stereotype the scriptwriters have given him. Everyone must suffer while he thinks.

Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) sings, “Have you seen, it’s in the stars, it’s a fake!”

Even the The Study in Pink was running out of steam towards the end, but the first four cases given to him in the episode are sufficiently interesting to maintain momentum over the full length of the show with Detective Inspector Lestrade (Rupert Graves) back in the saddle as the hapless police stooge. The first involves a cold case with a swimmer poisoned through his feet — that’s why Sherlock is given the young man’s shoes — what other reason could there be? The second involves what seems to be a murder with blood found in a rented car abandoned by the docks. The third is a woman who may have been killed by accident — a cut on the hand received while in the garden being contaminated by tetanus, cf The Adventure of the Retired Colourman. The fourth is a body found on the Thames mudflats at low tide. This last crime is the least satisfactory because, having declared absolutely no knowledge of the solar system or anything connected to astronomy, he’s expected to recall a momentary image flashed on to the roof of the Planetarium while fighting a Jaws lookalike (that’s not Spielberg’s great white, you understand, but the Bond version). Almost all the other examples of deductive reasoning are vaguely plausible. This resolution is silly in a poor melodramatic way.

Jim Moriarty (Andrew Scott) working himself up to look threatening

In the midst of all this excitement, Dr. John Watson (Martin Freeman) strolls around trying to solve the case of the missing data stick. Taken overall, this element is a good version of The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans, including the appearance of Mycroft as in the original story. The actual identity of the killer is rather more prosaic being the solution in The Adventure of the Naval Treaty but, in a sense, that’s less important than the overarching game being played with Jim Moriarty (Andrew Scott) which is the fifth pip case. When we finally get to meet him for a chat next to the fatal swimming pool — I hope the chlorine in the water has killed the foot poison — this man actually proves quite interesting as antagonists go.

Detective Inspector Lestrade (Rupert Graves) taking command of the situation

I suppose we will get to see how the Mexican stand-off is resolved next time, but I’ve always been a bit suspicious of this as a plot device. For those of you who like redundant information with your reviews, this has become a staple of the Western film with Clint Eastwood and others eyeing each other and trying to work out who should shoot whom first while Ennio Morricone practises mournful riffs on the harmonica. But it’s actually derived from nineteenth century politics and the Mexican-American War — you know that thing with the shooting at the Alamo Rent A Car branch in Texas.

Anyway, with multiple snipers all aiming for Sherlock’s head, are we supposed to believe they can’t bring him down before he shoots the bomb and blows everyone up? I remember all the fuss about the police shooting Jean Charles de Menezes in the head, wrongly thinking he was a terrorist. This was justified because multiple bullets entering the brain reduces the chance a suicide bomber can press the trigger. And thinking about bombs wrapped round people like a poultice, was that guy supposed to stand in Piccadilly Circus for hours with no-one noticing he had a bomb strapped to his chest while a laser targeting beam played over the flashing lights on his chest? He must have had amazing bladder control. And that opening sequence in Belarus was just a time-filler, wasn’t it? A few jokes at the expenses of the slightly thick English twit who’d offed his girlfriend to prove he still had the butchering skills passed on by his father. Who would pay the airfare and expenses to go all that way for that response? Perhaps Mycroft commissioned an RAF jet to take Sherlock there as part of the Legal Aid Scheme’s Outreach — a person charged with a crime is always entitled to free advice while in police custody, even if it’s only advice about grammar. It’s nuts! But it’s nuts in a more constructive vein than in The Blind Banker. For all its faults, and there are many, The Great Game is very entertaining and probably the best of the episodes so far which, in no small way, is due to having Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat back as the writing team.

For reviews of the other episodes, see:
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 1. A Study in Pink (2010)
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 2. The Blind Banker (2010)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 1. A Scandal in Belgravia (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 2. The Hounds of Baskerville (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 3. The Reichenbach Fall (2012)

Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 2. The Blind Banker (2010)

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Having started well, the series whose title is updated and truncated to Sherlock dropped off the cliff with The Blind Banker (2010). I still like the concept of bringing the sense of the original stories into a modern context, but there has to be something more than just the scenery and attitude shown by the actors. This would just about have been bearable as an “hour” show, i.e. about 50 minutes running time to allow for the ads. At the actual running time, it’s just grinding the viewers to dust. OK so the first fifteen minutes promises much. We’re in a museum where Soo Lin Yao (Gemma Chan) is demonstrating a version of the tea ceremony and later seeing spooky things in the stacks. As proof of my cultural ignorance, I was sceptical the Chinese have such tea ceremonies until I checked Wikipedia as confirmation of its status in Chinese culture, but I always associated this kind of ritual with Japan and, to a lesser extent, Korea. Silly me to be diverted by such trivial concerns. The minutes in the supermarket as Dr. John Watson (Martin Freeman) falls foul of the self-service exit counter also resonate, but this is time-wasting until the failure to buy creates an excuse for Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) to give his credit card to John Watson. The presentation of the spray painting in the bank building is also intriguing, but Sherlock’s antics go on too long. Fortunately John Watson has the chance to pick up the cheque — let the plot elements always look forward to the pay-off, no matter how long it takes to get there. We see Sherlock bluff his way into the block of flats where the target banker lives. Remarkably, he also seems reckless enough to drop down from one balcony to the matching balcony on the floor below. Who needs Chinese acrobats while he’s around.

Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) and Watson (Martin Freeman) meet a live banker

The second murder is thrown away and it’s only when the second spray painting is found that we vaguely establish ourselves in The Adventure of the Dancing Men now inexplicably translated into a Chinese numbers cypher used by a tong specialising in the smuggling of ancient Chinese artifacts for sale in the London auction houses. It seems one of the their carriers has been less than honest — what a surprise. Since the tong does not know who to blame, it decides to kill them all. Even for mad tong people from China, this is hardly rational. Although the individual item lost has a potential sale value of nine million sterling, it’s not worth sacrificing all the couriers and having to wait until a new set can be recruited. Worse, it makes no sense to leave public messages unless the point is somehow to pique Sherlock’s curiosity and induce him to recover the jade pin for them. There’s no guarantee Sherlock will be invited to investigate nor that he will be able to crack the code from the small sample to work out what has been stolen, let alone find it. Since the tong has the ultimate cat burglar on call, he can search all the couriers’ accommodation as the first step. Moving immediately to kill people on the off chance Sherlock will inadvertently help is a nonsense (no matter what the still MIA Moriarty may be promised to the contrary). Then we get into the detail of the tong itself. The unit sent to London is led by one of these Rosa Klebb characters (as portrayed by Lotte Lenya in the film version of From Russia With Love), i.e. no-one would take her seriously as a villain. Worse, how can she possibly think John Watson is Sherlock? A criminal mastermind at least knows how to Google a photo of our heroes — assuming Moriarty did not also supply an artist’s impression.

Soo Lin Yao (Gemma Chan) loves her tea pots

Then we get more delaying bits of business in the smallest show on Earth as we see the escapologist and the acrobat playing to ten paying punters. At this point I was thoroughly confused. Once Sherlock finds the spray cans why doesn’t he speed-dial his tame police squad to come and arrest everyone? Worse, after the trio of Sherlock, John Watson and Sarah (Zoe Telford) Watson’s new love interest, have battered the Chinese martial arts experts into insensibility, why do they run away? It’s all incomprehensible. Similarly, I tried to understand how Sherlock knows where to find John Watson and his girlfriend when they had been kidnapped. There seemed no clue in the message as to the precise point in the miles of underground passages. I was also fascinated these Chinese villains would go to all the trouble of relocating their stage act into this underground hideaway, including installing the pulley system into the roof so the bag of sand would travel the right distance. You would think they would just take a portable electric drill with them and start off the entertainment for the evening by putting rawl plugs into painful places.

Sarah (Zoe Telford) has one of those once-in-a-lifetime dates

Once battle was joined, I lost track of how Sherlock managed to dispose of the two heavies. Worse, how does Sherlock explain the one dead body — was the other heavy also killed? — when the police finally turn up. I can’t understand why the tame Detective Inspector Dimmock (Paul Chequer) is grateful at this point. All he has is a dead body and some stage equipment from an escapology show gone wrong. There’s no indication of how anything could be proved until the jade pin is finally recovered later in the episode. I could go on for several hundred more words but you get the message. It seems the creators Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat who did so well the first time round, handed over writing duties to Steve Thompson with catastrophic results. All we have is a slight plot which is puffed up to enormous length by the addition of mistaken identity jokes and cod melodrama not even worthy of Doctor Who.

For reviews of the other episodes, see:
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 1. A Study in Pink (2010)
Sherlock: Season 1, Episode 3. The Great Game (2010)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 1. A Scandal in Belgravia (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 2. The Hounds of Baskerville (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 3. The Reichenbach Fall (2012).

Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 1. A Study in Pink (2010)

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You can imagine how the pitch to the BBC went. “Well, we all know about the adaptations of the Conan Doyle stories. They’re very reverential and, in many cases, rather dull by modern standards. We want to bring Sherlock up-to-date! That and the fact we don’t want to be beaten by Guy Ritchie who’s just picked up a shed-load of money for directing a new old-school Sherlock Holmes story.” No doubt, they also referred to Ritchie’s slow-motion convention to break down Sherlock’s thinking processes into digestible chunks. Having little arrows and subtitles appear on the screen to tell us where we should be looking and explaining what we should see is always useful to those of us in the slow lane of the intellectual motorway.

Benedict Cumberbatch makes an interestingly different Sherlock

So A Study in Pink (2010) starts off as in A Study in Scarlet with Dr John Watson (Martin Freeman) recently returned from Afghanistan and looking for somewhere to stay in London. A mutual friend introduces him to Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) who’s looking for someone to share the rooms he already occupies at 221B Baker Street, complete with a new Mrs Hudson (Una Stubbs). We beautifully recapture the spirit of Holmes’ analysis of John Watson’s watch in The Sign of Four by having the new Sherlock deduce John Watson’s “brother” is recently separated and often drunk by looking at the cellphone he carries. There’s also a very nice rewriting of John Watson’s background. The suggestion he has post-traumatic stress disorder and needs to rest, in part because of his leg injury, is cleverly inverted, first by Sherlock who accuses him of a psychosomatic disorder, and then by Mycroft (Mark Gatiss) who suggests the good doctor should fire Ella (Tanya Moodie) his therapist for diagnosing PTSD. Mycroft suggests the cause of the stress is that our soldier cum doctor is suffering acute war deprivation syndrome. All he needs for a cure is a little excitement in his life. Needless to say, within hours of not actually agreeing to move in with Sherlock, John Watson is jumping across rooftops and running through the streets as if his life depended on it. Not a bad way of shaking off a psychosomatic war injury.

Martin Freeman and Una Stubbs enjoy a moment of peace before Sherlock appears

We then get into the meat of the story which poses the question “Can a sequence of suicides be the work of a serial killer?” We also get into the same game played by other authors like G K Chesterton in the Father Brown stories who eventually identifies “The Invisible Man” that can walk through the streets unnoticed. When we get to the fourth suicide, Detective Inspector Lestrade (Rupert Graves) recognises his own talents are insufficient and calls in Sherlock. I note that, in the original story, Holmes knows that Rache is German for revenge whereas our modern Sherlock thinks the victim was going to complete Rachel for reasons which become clear later on. You have to pity this Detective Inspector Lestrade if he’s read the original or the Lovecratian pastiche “A Study in Emerald” by Neil Gaiman. There are many different versions of this same scenario in the Holmes canon. Keeping them all straight in his mind and then trying to second-guess this new Sherlock will drive any self-respecting Lestrade nuts. Sergeant Sally Donovan (Vinette Robinson) casually calls Sherlock the “Freak”, a view shared by local crime scene investigator Anderson (Jonathan Aris) with whom she’s apparently sleeping when respective spouses are away from home. They represent the “official” resentment of the police that an outsider should be allowed to interfere and, worse, steal their thunder.

Mark Gatiss as the suitably distant Mycroft

Anyway, this new set of stories is going to play between the lines of the original stories and one line, in particular, has already been highlighted. In the “Final Problem”, Homes is described as having engaged in a private war against Moriarty. So in this first episode, he first learns he has a fan who has “taken out a hit on him” and, at the end, learns the name of the fan is Moriarty. This immediately takes us out of the original framework which, chronologically, does not introduce the arch-enemy until The Valley of Fear. Given this is to be a complete reinterpretation of the originals, the writing team of Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat are free to begin and run with the rivalry between the two men of genius, not counting Mycroft who’s somewhat less proactive.

Robert Graves as a modestly competent Lestrade

It seems Benedict Cumberbatch is playing Sherlock as somewhat sociopathic. Looking for something to relieve the boredom of existence, he disassembles crimes out of curiosity. He’s a detective only as an unintended consequence of his need for mental stimulation. If we assume he’s going to be confronted by equally brilliant antagonists like Jeff (Philip Davis), the main issue in each case will be the way in which each genius seeks to occupy his or her mind. The debate with Jeff is a masterpiece. If ever you had wondered how someone might persuade Sherlock to commit suicide, this is the answer. It magnificently plays on Sherlock’s inherent arrogance in believing there’s no problem he can’t solve. In other words, Jeff likes the challenge of analysing people and working out how to persuade them to commit suicide. In all probability, he’s using similar deductive techniques to Sherlock but for expressly destructive purposes. Martin Freeman has also started off well in the difficult role as John Watson. It’s a thankless task to stand with your mouth permanently open in wonder at the brilliance of the man beside you (except in the delightful Without a Clue, of course). Hopefully, this Watson will stop saying, “That’s amazing!” and just get on with running, jumping and, if the situation calls for it, shooting. So far, it’s not that he’s stupid. He just hasn’t had time to adjust to the new reality.

When you put all this together, A Study in Pink is an impressive first outing. There are one or two periods where the pace dropped but, to make up for it, there are also some nice jokes, e.g. this first crime is a three nicotine patch problem. So whether judged as entertainment or a reinvention of the Sherlock Holmes canon, this series starts auspiciously.

For reviews of the other episodes, see:
Sherlock. Season 1, Episode 2. The Blind Banker (2010)
Sherlock: Season 1, Episode 3. The Great Game (2010)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 1. A Scandal in Belgravia (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 2. The Hounds of Baskerville (2012)
Sherlock: Season 2, Episode 3. The Reichenbach Fall (2012)