Sherlock

As mentioned a while back, Sherlock is one of only a handful of programmes that I actually watch on TV. For those not in the know; Sherlock is a television series about Sherlock Holmes, a detective living at 221B Baker Street and solving crimes together with John Watson. If that all sounds familiar, that is kind of the point. The episodes are 1.5 hours and three a season, after which we have to wait two years for the next season. Why so long? The main characters are played by Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman, and they have been quite busy over the past few years, traipsing around New Zealand pretending to be hobbits and dragons, for one thing.

So it is rather a long wait. But it is worth it. The makers (Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss) have really brought the nineteenth century Sherlock Holmes to life, with all his weird habits and personality, but in a very modern coat. Watson's diary has become a blog, where the old war veteran (still Afghanistan, ironically) gives his accounts of Sherlock's work (who likes to communicate more by mobile phone). The opium addiction is still there, in a modern sense, as is the ignorant police detective and the busy landlady, with a sharp feminist touch. The episode titles refer to Arthur Conan Doyle's short stories, but often with a twist. A Study in Scarlet becomes A Study in Pink, The Sign of Four becomes The Sign of Three, etcetera. Plot-wise the episodes are only very losely based on the originals, but that's fine. We have the proper characters in a modern-day setting, it wouldn't do to keep everything else the same.
There are many Sherlock Holmes adaptations around these days, so what makes this one special? The big obvious thing is the Cumberbatch-Freeman connection. They have an undeniable chemistry, not just in character, but they clearly get along very well (the Internet has found enough material for slash fiction to last us at least a decade). But the rest of the cast is well-picked too. Gatiss himself plays an elitist, arrogant Mycroft, while Martin Freeman's real-life girlfriend plays Mary, his kick-ass wife in the series. They just work together. Apart from the great cast, the storylines are just brilliant. It is one of those series that takes its viewers extremely seriously. The cases are difficult and mysterious (and we only get the difficult and mysterious ones, because all the mundane ones are waved aside with a 'boring!' by Sherlock), and there are several plot lines spanning multiple seasons, so characters keep resurfacing where you don't expect them. The images are grey and dark and a bit gritty, but not in an overdone way. This is still very much modern day London.

Now all of this sounds great. And all of it is true, for the first three seasons. The fourth season came out on the first of January, and I am sad to say that episode 4.01 was the worst I have ever seen. It didn't grip me in any way, even with the harrow plot twist at the end. I won't spoil too much, as this is a series easily spoiled, and you won't see what is coming until it is right in front of you.
But what went wrong? In my opinion, the BBC fell into the trap it set for itself when it marketed Sherlock, amongst many other series, as "Real drama". The BBC has been producing a lot of drama series over the past few years, and now they've thrown them all (costume drama, Dr Who, Eastenders and the rest) on one big piled and marketed themselves as the drama channel. But Sherlock has been wonderfully drama-free so far. Sherlock can be an absolute ass to Watson, but he doesn't go moping about that to someone else. He just lets it slide, or has a good comeback. But in the fourth series, everything became very soap seriesy. Including 'I never want to see you again!' shout-outs in the middle of dark streets. Luckily, in the second and third episodes, things got back to normal a bit, but still; somehow it doesn't feel the same anymore. It is as if the world of television has creeped into this nice little cocoon that Sherlock has always been, as if the laws of drama series have imposed themselves upon the script.
Moffat and Gatiss have announced that the fourth season will be the last for now, but that they keep the possibility of a fifth season open. I hope they take a nice long break, generate new ideas for the fantastic characters they have created, and bring back the old Sherlock in style; drama-free, intelligent detective work. Until then; the first seasons are on Netflix, ready for (re)watching!