Review:
I can’t remember the last time I fell this head over heels in love with a TV show. Sherlock, the latest adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous detective, is just ridiculously good.
Hailing from Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, two Doctor Who veterans and self professed Sherlock Holmes geeks, Sherlock is everything you could ever want in a TV show – intelligent, well executed, and sublimely cast. Putting the classic detective into a modern setting feels perfectly natural, a seamless blend of Holmes’ forensic genius with modern crime solving techniques. Sherlock also employs a clever visual style to show us, in rapid cuts, exactly what clues Holmes is seeing.
Even better, seeing Holmes in all his glory through a modern prism is fascinatingly revealing – in today’s world, people have a very different frame of reference for dealing with this complicated, melancholy genius, and seeing the modern attitudes and responses to him is fantastic.
Of course, the heart and soul of this show is the complex relationship between Sherlock and Watson, and the writing and acting do it full justice. The casting is nothing short of genius – Benedict Cumberbatch brings Sherlock to life in all his manic, egocentric glory, but in my opinion it’s Martin Freeman who steals the show as the steadfast, underrated Watson. These two deliver nuanced performances that are devastatingly good. Honestly, we just don’t see this kind of quality character work on TV that often, and it’s likely going to ruin you for the vast majority of U.S. crime fare. Both as actors and as characters, these two are the perfect foils for each other, and their chemistry is utterly brilliant. It is truly a treat to watch them work.
Not to mention, the casting of other notables such as Mycroft and Moriarty is equally good, and the choices Moffat and Gatiss made for Moriarty honestly blew me away. This Moriarty is now my all time favorite take on the character.
Season one consists of three episodes, all very good (though the first and third are perhaps a tad better):
“A Study in Pink” introduces us to Holmes and Watson, and takes us from their first meeting to their first case together, a string of seemingly unrelated suicides that turn out to be serial murders.
“The Blind Banker” has the duo on the trail of a mysterious killer who leaves obscure messages to warn his victims before he kills them.
“The Great Game” locks Sherlock into a deadly game of cat and mouse with an unseen opponent who challenges Sherlock to solve the unsolvable – and if Sherlock fails, people will die.
Sadly there are only three, but I’ll take quality over quantity any day – and never fear, the BBC has already ordered a second season, so we’ll have three more episodes to enjoy next fall.
You can’t miss Sherlock, which premieres this Sunday on Masterpiece Mystery (or, depending on your PBS affiliate, it could be airing next Thursday at 9 PM – make sure you check!).
And now I’m going to go watch all three episodes again, because they’re just that good.
These were fantastic. I think Steve Moffat has a genius imagination to rival Neil Gaiman.