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Sherlock

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Load of old nonsense or a return to form? I think it was (just) better than last year’s one off episode, but some way off the standard set in the first 2 series. I also think that that the exceptionally modern style regarding Skype calls. Texting etc is going to look very dated in a few years.

Would be nice if he solved more cases instead of running around like a superhero. And there was way too much gun fire.

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Comments

  1. Like of old nonsense, though not without some things to enjoy. Sherlock works on a domestic scale and all the Bond super villain cliches, so carefully worked into the words and action of the script, were surely from a completely different series.

    [Spolier] Oh, and if a bullet moves so slowly that ‘Mary’ could throw herself in front of it why couldn’t Sherlock just step out of the way, the silly sod?

  2. Enjoyed it. Rather episodic. Nature of Sherlock is that you dont know whether to believe the end. I Suspect there are things in there that will on,y make sense after the next two.

    • Is Moriarty really dead? Does anybody care? Will Sherlock appear to die and then will he really be dead? Too much of this sort of stuff makes the whole show something of a sham and an insult to the audience.

  3. It was alright, but proves that Gatiss and Moffat have no idea how to stop making Doctor Who even when making Sherlock.

    The GPS tracker pissed me off too.

    • I agree – too much Doctor, not enough deerstalker. Fortunately the BBC consider a season extends to only three episodes so I’ll probably stick with it. If it was longer I’d be checking out

  4. I quite enjoy Dai – I found it a real disappointment. (SPOILER ALERT as per Gaz above) It seemed an excessively long-winded way to lose a major character, and in such a “silly” fashion. I know there was the reference back to her having shot Sherlock previously (and I could never quite buy her as a “super-spy/assassin) but it just seemed such a humdrum way to lose her as a character.

    • She was a shite character though. Rendered Watson totally redundant. I dunno whose idea it was to introduce all the spy shit, but they need to have a word with themselves.

      • Agreed – she won’t be missed as a character but her leaving could have been much more dramatic having built her up as something “special” in the spy department.

        • And the Watsons wouldn’t be winning any parenting awards, baby disappeared halfway through, then babysitters appeared out of nowhere when it came back.

      • Just occurred to me, obviously the spy stuff must come from the fact that matey boy who writes the thing also plays, duh, a spymaster. Without all the James Bond stuff (Russ Abbott’s Basildon Bond more like), old League of Gentlemen would have nothing to do.

    • “seemed like a long winded way of getting rid of a character” – and perhaps that’s what you are supposed to think. As before the script is planted with little bombs that will detonate at a precise moment in the future to completely take the floor from under your feet.

      And you quite rightly could say “I don’t care, that doesn’t help me or make the story I’m trying to follow any clearer” and I get that and why its annoying. I also get that people want it to be Brett or Rathbone with the hat, pipe, violin and urchins but that’s all there on ITV2 if you need it. This doesn’t supercede that but its ot trying to cos frankly why bother. Those stories have been done that way – this takes those characters and runs with them.

      I thought the “death scene” was cliché ridden, terrible and couldn’t be saved by good acting alone. Unlike others I enjoy the visual flashes and such, I can cope with info overload which is built in to be freeze framed on second viewing. That stuff is there for the devotees and you don’t have to engage. Television has moved on infinitely since the Brett days – those episodes would appear glacial to a modern audience.

  5. Can’t get on with it. The modern technology is daft and BC is irritating. He plays smug twat rather too well. Mrs.T and Twang Jr are big fans but I avoid. Sherlock Holmes should have a deer stalker, magnifying glass and solve crimes by intuition not dicking about with technology. Probably a well made show but not for me I’m afraid.
    me

    • Couldn’t agree more. DFB says “Television has moved on infinitely since the Brett days – those episodes would appear glacial to a modern audience.”, but I’m afraid that’s just post-truth-speak for “These days we need a visual fix every seven seconds or we lose focus and our eyes roll back in our heads, ‘cos we is all havin’ attention deficit syndrome, innit.”.

      • I agree. I don’t think it’s some sort of evolutionary leap that we’re all missing. It just looks pony.

        Maybe Sherlock’s always been like this, but that’s not my recollection. I don’t think the early episodes were so hyperactive. They definitely weren’t so pleased with themselves.

        • I think the visual style has been there since day one. And it’s not about keeping attention it’s about appreciating that people do rewatch these things, pore over little details and try and find the values within the bigger mystery. Of course TV has changed the way it engages with snakes audience. Otherwise it dies and ends up as repeats.

          • Snakes audience? There have been many excellent shows over the last few years (mainly from Scandinavia and US) that rely on excellent scripting, character development and humour to engage the audience. These, I believe, will still be great in 10 years, Sherlock will look like what happens when a 6 year old is given a TV box of tricks. It’s fine to “modernise” it, but I am afraid that the baby is being thrown out with the bathwater. Maybe it was always like that and the gimmicks have worn thin?

            • “There have been many excellent shows over the last few years (mainly from Scandinavia and US)”

              Blighty not doing too bad neither. Happy Valley, The Missing, The Night Manager, Black Mirror and Fleabag were as good as any imports I’ve seen. And National Treasure, The Crown and Rillington Place were none too shabby. (I didn’t see last night’s Sherlock).

              • Happy Valley is superb. Sarah Lancashire is a long way from Curly and Raquel and James Norton genuinely scary as the “villain”. Sally Wainwright surely is writing some of the very best British TV drama right now. Sherlock sort of overshot itself with episode one. I’m hoping for improvement in the remaining couple but seeing as they were written and shot around the same time i’m not really holding out much hope. It’s too bad because it really has been a great series

                    • It’s possibly the most gruelling (as well as gripping) thing I’ve ever seen on TV, so you may be right. But the show is written by a woman, stars a woman who is pretty choosy about what she does, and is directed by at least one woman, so I gave myself a pass.

                    • I guess that’s right, but it’s still hard to watch. And there’s been a succession of these TV programmes showing women being brutalised, kidnapped, murdered etc. I’m thinking of “Luther” and the like.

                    • Another vote for Happy Valley which is one of the best things I’ve seen on TV this year. I agree with you, JC ,about the number of shows portraying brutal violence. Almost every series one watches these days seems to be preceded by a warning about upsetting scenes. But I also agree with Mike that due to the superb acting and intelligent scriptwriting and the portrayal of very believable, very fallible characters, Happy Valley rises above most of the current output.

                    • Have you seen The Missing, @Kaisfatdad? My order of quality would be:
                      1. Happy Valley season 1
                      2. The Missing season 2
                      3. The Missing season 1
                      4. Happy Valley season 2

                      All of them unimissable viewing though.

                      Broadchurch was another winner in a similar vein.

                    • We stopped watching Luther precisely for that reason – it was the episode where the bad guy had a woman locked in a freezer and drained off some of her blood every day before taping over one of the air holes. This proved too much for Mrs. T and me too if I’m honest.

                    • I agree with Mike re Happy Valley. For the most part all the female characters were stronger than the men.

                      But Luther – yes. And The Fall too. And then there’s Poldark ….

              • Happy Valley has been renamed chez Digit as Miserable Sh*thole.

                Can’t doubt that it is a superb piece of writing and televisual entertainment (is that the right description?).
                In my world, most dramas can “do one” – but there was something intriguing, engaging and eminently watchable about the last 2 series

          • Elements of the style have been there, but not to this extent.

            If they want to serve the hardcore who watch every episode with a finger on the pause button, then fair dos. But that ain’t me babe, no no no – I’ll go watch something else instead. From the reaction I’m seeing online, I’d guess I’m not alone.

            • The online POV is always skewed to the negative as its easier to say “crap – rubbish – jumped shark” and think that’s an opinion worth sharing than it is to offer a detailed critique. If you praise you are a fanboy\girl but if you trash you are a realist.

              No-one can just not “like” or “hate” a Tv show anymore – fault has to be placed at someone’s door. Whether it’s the smugness of the creators, the smugness of the audience member pointing out that smugness, a sense of it all being too complicated for single viewer being extrapolated to the audience en masse. Like any piece of creative art you have a pretty basic response to it which is uniquely personal and not the responsibility of the creator.

              Or alternatively – you don’t have to like everything – go watch something else

              • I dunno, DFB. I just think it’s a show that was great and has now become a bit irritating to a proportion of its audience – probably largely as a consequence of an overabundance of the things that initially appealed.

                I agree that it’s all just opinions though, it’s not like it’s empirically good or bad. I suspect there’s a segment of the audience who love the show’s trajectory. I can only say what I see.

                That said, I never understand why people bang on about how much they dislike stuff, and I usually avoid doing it on here, so I’ll shut up now rather than risk harshing anyone’s mellow.

                • In mitigation the OP was whether it was good or a load of old pony so saying it was a load of old pony is OK. I don’t like it where people pop in to rain on someone’s parade in an enthusing thread, just to strike a pose or be a dick. Boring.

  7. Really wanted to like it, but thought it was a load of old shite, for many of the reasons expressed above.

    Far too pleased with itself, the spy stuff is complete pish and the villain was crap. Prefer Cumberbatch when he’s being cold and aloof – all the rock star posturing is just annoying. Also: Sherlock going hand to hand with a trained special forces killer. Oh, and the busy style of the show, with text bubbles, dog cams and god knows what else. It’s like watching someone do a wheelie for 90 minutes.

    Think I’m checking out at this stage.

  11. It’s the traditional new year Afterword slag-off of Sherlock.

    We enjoyed it, thought it was fun, silly, clever, well written, well acted, well made nonsense. They stand up well to repeated viewing. And I’ve ordered the Blu-Ray already.

    And now for Ghost Story with Fred Astaire, John Houseman and Douglas Fairbanks Jr.

    • Parts of it were great for sure, but it all added up to very little to me. I also wonder why people order Blu-rays of a show that they have a) just seen b) can be easily recorded (or downloaded) and c) is available on iPlayer for a month. How many times do you plan to watch it?

  12. I wasn’t disappointed but, then, I lowered my level of expectation to frivolous fun ever since the fall from a very high building. My first ‘cuh’ came at the revelation that a young man had died of ‘some kind of seizure’, my deepest sigh was at the mention of a secretary and my most profound shake of the head was during the death scene. I felt no sense of tension and no surprise. Oh dear. Now, I won’t be sorry when this Sherlock team ends.

    • I was only half-watching, but was it a coincidence that the death of the car-seat kid led to Sherlock becoming involved in the smashed Thatcher statues? I was expecting a reveal that the kid’s death was a way of luring him into this bigger case, but it didn’t seem to pan out that way.

  13. I like crime/espionage dramas and I’m fairly undemanding. I don’t look for profundity in my TV viewing (but appreciate it when it’s there).
    This Sherlock wasn’t anywhere near the best thing I’ve seen, but it was also nowhere near the worst. I’ll be watching the rest of it.

    Well-filmed/produced/directed but somewhat lacking in the plot department, I suppose. The death scene was a real cheeseboard experience and, as mentioned above, if Mary had time to dive in front of the bullet then Sherlock must have had enough time to step aside. Death scene apart, she got a pretty good sendoff, though.

    I did wonder if Mary’s character being written out had anything to do with the in-real-life partnership between the actors who play the Watsons having recently ended.

  14. Maybe the style and content of the show is meant to reflect the OCD and autistic savant* character of the main character, but I’ve always found it very much in love with its own cleverness and speed to the point that there are no sympathetic or drawn-out characters in it at all. It’s a bit like a live action cartoon, which is OK, but I think Bingo said it best with the 90 minute wheelie analogy. It looks impressive, but there’s a feeling it might collapse at any minute and it takes a lot of energy not traveling very far. Halfway through I looked at my watch and silently urged them to hurry up with the Spooks derring do.

    Having done my duty as a huff’n’puff AW armchair critic, I will probably watch the rest, just to tick off the ‘…and with one leap he was free’ moments that DFB seems to allude to.
    ____________
    * an observation drawn from my detailed medical knowledge, of course

    • Oh my insider knowledge is minimal but I do know that what might seem like loose ends or throwaway moments aka bad plotting come back to bite harder than expected. But exactly how, well I’ll be finding out with the rest of the world

  15. It feels like it’s run its course, to me. Miranda Hart knew when her comedy show ‘Miranda’ should call it quits and tied everything up nicely, going out on a high. I watched this latest Sherlock and – while always appreciating Gatiss’ imagination and the style of it and the new ideas and the metatextual fun, albeit thinking that, for all that, it was still pretty overrated/over-hyped since day one – it just felt all the way through like dead horse. There was no ‘ensemble’ feeling as there had been in previous episodes, just a lot of the-butler-did-it spy crap but nobody to really give a damn about. Personally, I don’t really care about any of these characters any more.

    It’s been a sensational reboot/experiment but they’ve played all the best hands and possibly used up all the best plot ideas. In every sense other than a no doubt salable-to-X-territories BBC ‘brand’ it’s time to end it, and let Gatiss get on with something more interesting.

  16. Adding Mary made sense at the time, and seemed to be quite a refreshing acknowledgement that it would have been a bit much to have expected Watson not to have moved on at all in the two years and could just start on another set of adventures as if nothing had happened

    Unfortunately Moffat and Gatiss rather painted themselves into a corner with ‘His last Vow’ – if Mary has all the skills to make a more effective assistant for Sherlock then it makes Watson redundant.

    I wonder if they realized this, and the episode at New Year was a semi ‘reboot’ to set things back up for Sherlock and Watson to take on the remaining cases in the (potentially) final series?

  18. Given what DFB says, I’m going to theorise that it wasn’t mere coincidence that Sherlock found himself investigating the Thatcher statues. The dead kid was murdered in order to bring him into the case. Why? Because Moriarty is engineering everything, including Watson’s dalliance and the killing of Mary, in order to bring Holmes and Watson into conflict, with poor old Watson coming to believe that Holmes is the author of all his misfortune. The series will end with Watson holding a gun on Sherlock, the screen going black when he pulls the trigger.

    • If Moriarty is in any way involved after his demise (though I can’t remember how that happened, which possibly shows the amount my subconscious cares about this series compared to the original Conan Doyle stories, of which I’m a huge fan), it will simply be Dirty Den or that guy from Dallas all over again – an unforgiveable, ludicrous posthumous comeback.

      • As much as I like Andrew Scott I do hope that he stays dead as Moriarty was a wonderful turn but in that Reichenbach Falls episode he showed all his cards to try and kill Holmes. Don’t think he’s got any tricks left and being a ghost to Sherlock is far more frightening

  19. I’m losing interest after this episode as well. First time I’ve started checking my watch less than halfway through an episode.

    It was handy of the writers to put an actual shark in the story to signal that the series has now jumped one.

    I hated the ninja fighting stuff. Leave that to Robert Downey Jr and Guy Ritchie. I always thought this Sherlock was more elegant than that, using his wits more than his fists.

    I agree with the comments above about how poor it was to make his whole involvement in the spy mystery thing coincidental. But even if it turns out to be NOT coincidental, even that’s bad writing because why wouldn’t Sherlock question the coincidence?

    The overall feeling I’m getting is that the show is nowhere near as clever as it thinks it is. For too long now it’s been all buildup and tease with no payoff. I still don’t even really know why Sherlock faked his own death. Or why Moriarty faked his either. If he even did.

    And to those people who say it rewards rewatching and has Easter eggs and plot points that only make sense further down the line – Can you give me a concrete example of this? I’m starting to think I’ve been brainwashed into THINKING this is what the show is doing, when really they’re just making it all up as they go.

    My favourite episode? The Hound of the Baskervilles one in series two.

    • I could tell you but I’d have to kill you (and I’d be killed myself)

      In the books Holmes wasn’t averse to fisticuffs if the situation desired. And it wasn’t just punching he was using particular pressure points to cause maximum effect

      Holmes faked his death so that Moriarty’s henchmen would think he was so they would not kill his friends as they were poised to do.

      • Including the first series when it still fresh. As I recall it involved a young Chinese woman who was on the run from Triads and made the decision to hide in Chinatown, which at least at least had the virtue of being walking distance from her job as an expert in Chinese antiquities at the British Museum.

  20. Here is a critic who says with low blow
    Sherlock’s no brain-box but become double-O.
    Says the Baker St boy is no man of action –
    whilst ignoring the stories that could have put him in traction.

    The Solitary Cyclist sees boxing on show,
    The Gloria Scott and The Sign of the Fo’
    The Empty House too sees a mention, in time, of Mathews,
    who knocked out poor Sherlock’s canine.

    As for arts martial, there’s surely a clue
    in the misspelled wrestle Doyle called baritsu.
    In hurling Moriarty over the torrent
    did Sherlock find violence strange and abhorrent?

    In shooting down pygmies and Hounds from hell
    Did Sherlock on Victorian niceties dwell?
    When Gruner’s men got him was Holmes quite compliant
    Or did he give good account for The Illustrious Client?

    There’s no need to invoke in yarns that still thrill,
    Her Majesty’s Secret Servant with licence to kill
    From Rathbone through Brett to Cumberbatch dandy
    With his fists Mr Holmes has always been handy.

    Mark Gatiss
    London

  21. There’s a writer who’s writhing over critical matters
    His ‘Sherlock’ is creaking and us chewing the fat is
    Not always as fawning as liked by Mark Gatiss
    Cos the public like stories and wit on their platters
    With disbelief suspended but not thrown out with the cat – is
    that what the problem is, matey?

    • I rather like the post-post-modern ending. But yes, I was throwing down track in front of the train (writing as I typed). Mark G, however, is a man upon whose words people hang!*

      (*There’s a cunning plot idea for your next Sherlock, Mark: somebody hanged by words – the page boy will have dunnit, or maybe the book-keeper, or [disappears in a fug of clever-cleverness]… Oh, and the corpse will have to have been partially nibbled by feral creatures before didscovery, that way it’ll have been slightly foxed…)

  23. I enjoyed it but i also listened to a masterpiece podcast about the episode with Amanda abbington and it was interesting hearing behinds the scenes things about the filming / writing .
    She was charming and obviously enjoyed being part of the show. I don’t imagine there will be many more episodes though which is probably for the best as I was beginning to lose interest in the show .
    Also Found some fan fiction with a female Lestrad which is surprisingly good .

  24. Well that was a vast improvement on last week’s! The John and Mary stuff was pretty weak, but overall it was a highly enjoyable, twisty-turny ride.

  26. Written by Stephen Moffat which helped so had proper plot n that. Toby Jones was magnificent as an unsubtle Jimmy Savile type and Una Stubbs effortlessly stole the scenes she was in.

    The Tootsie reveal at the end was bit naff and felt the drug trip scenes were taken direct from the Trainspotting playbook but all in all a very entertaining ep.

  27. Agree. Excellent. I was actually getting quite involved. Could have done without Mary being in almost every seen, but overall it worked.

    (Glad I gave it another chance)

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