I’ve just finished watching BBC’s 3 part series, ‘Sherlock’ – a modern day telling of the classic Conan-Doyle adventure stories. I will admit that I watched with some trepidation, I’d first heard about this programme a few weeks back and had heard it was written by some guy who “wrote for Dr. Who” - immediately I discounted it because I’m really not a fan of the Time Lord for many reasons; 1) I really don’t like the writing, 2) I don’t like the acting and 3) I’m not a child.
It is only after some research did I find that the creators are actually Steven Moffat and Mark Gatis. Moffat has written some Dr. Who stuff but wasn’t the writer I was thinking about, turns out he was responsible for the awesome teen TV series Press Gang and of course, Mark Gatis is one of the genial/deranged minds behind A League of Gentlemen.
My other reservation about this programme was that it was set in the present and not in the glorious darkness of 19th century London, this means Holmes and Watson are placed among a world of mobile phones, laptops and modern motor vehicles – as someone who has enjoyed the Conan-Doyle texts I thought this might diminish the adventure somewhat. It has been pointed out to me that period scenery is rather much more expensive than filming in the present and no one wants a heavy set based programme, especially when so much of the story is based in and around a busy Central London.
Some of the use of 21st Century items I found a little bit heavy, the pushing of Watson to write his ‘blog‘ made me cringe. The more than once referrals to Holmes’ website (www.thescienceofdeduction.co.uk), and an early scene showing a press conference all receiving text messages at the same time but writing the words ‘wrong’ next to each character in the audience also seemed somewhat unnecessary.
Holmes appears to have lost his deerstalker hat, which is a shame but more shamefully he appears to have lost his trademark pipe, for Holmes is now reliant on Nicotine patches; “It’s a three patch problem” he says. What I cannot be sure of is that the writers intended this to be the case or pressure was applied to not have the leading character smoke, even this I don’t understand because the broadcast time and some of the writing clearly shows this programme wasn’t aimed at Children or family viewing. It’s a three pipe/patch problem perhaps?
The programme started with a part dream/flashback of Watson, played by Martin Freeman. Martin Freeman to me and to many others will always be Tim from The Office, I loved him then and I love him now, he’s still Tim but he’s now an ex Army doctor with a limp. We later meet Holmes who is played wonderfully by Benedict Cumberbatch, someone I seem to recognise but can’t quite remember where from. Cumberbatch has the face, the posture and the attitude of the Holmes that I’d always imagined from reading the text or listening to audio books; he and Freeman certainly make a good team.
The story was well written, and well executed. Dialogue and timing was very good, if not a bit hammy at times – but Conan-Doyle never really shy’d away from the ham himself. Overall I think it was a success, the character development was good, the acting fine and the writing clever and funny, a good tribute to a great story.
I’m looking forward to part II.
The first part of Sherlock is available on BBC iplayer until 15th August 2010.
p.s. the music throughout also really reminded me of the Dexter opening theme.
It looked pretty good, but I didn’t watch it. I’ve never read any of the stories either. I have seen Hound of the Baskervilles with Peter Cushing. Which wasn’t great. Tim from the Office seemed good in the 15 minutes I watched and Benedict thingy struck me as a passable Holmes (perhaps the most Doctor Who-ish about the program). I read someone complaining that the lack of gas-lamps and London fog made it feel a bit sanitised and not really scary or edgy. I thought the modern rewriting worked well for the most part. Although some of the “modern” touches were a little jarring and the current fondness for this kind of shoe-horned zeitgeist isn’t half gonna date it when it’s repeated on Dave 3D+1 in 20 years time (“what’s a blog Uncle Stav?”). I will try and watch it in it’s entirety though, especially as it’s only a 3-parter (there’s bound to be a Christmas spesh though eh?).