Review: Sherlock

Frankly, I think it's disgusting that not one person pointed out to me how wonderful this programme was when it was actually airing last summer. I had to wait several months for my best friend's little sister to buy it, then several weeks for myself and said best friend to get bored enough to raid the DVD drawer and find something we haven't already watched a thousand times before. Because hell, was I missing out.

Sherlock Holmes is, in my opinion, one of the best characters ever written, but I'm always slightly hesitant to watch a film/TV adaptation, because it's very difficult to make a character so arrogant, intelligent, brutally honest and immodest likeable. But Benedict Cumberbatch has it nailed. There are many wonderful things about this man, which I could list all day, but here are my favourites: -
1. His name. Benedict Cumberbatch. You can't make it up.
2. His voice - he has that baritone huskiness that can make a detailed forensic analysis sound like an invitation to bed.
3. His cheekbones.
And that's all aside from his obvious talent as an actor. He plays the modern version of Sherlock with a Doctor-Who esque energy (not surprising when you consider the creators) and creates a character you couldn't stand in real life, but you still desperately want to be just like them.

One of the things I like the most about the character of Sherlock is that - unlike so many popular anti-heroes of modern times - he's not ruined by layers upon layers of angst. The writers haven't desperately thrown in a series of Freudian explanations for his rudeness, genius and sociopathy - he has no dark childhood secrets of abuse, bullying and molestation that account for his complete neglect of social skills. He just doesn't care. He is the way he is because he wants to be. It's shockingly refreshing.

Doctor John Watson - seemingly the only person who can put up with Sherlock's many, MANY idiosyncracies - is superably played by Martin Freeman as a world-weary, tolerant and intelligent Master of Sarcasm. People often go on about romantic chemistry on screen, but I honestly think that in buddy-films/series, the chemistry between two on-screen friends is equally important. It was particularly significant in this case, since 'Sherlock and Watson' is one of the greatest friendships of all time, and to translate that into a modern setting with a modern audience (whose mantra, with regards to male friendships and literature seems to be 'gay until proven straight') must have been difficult. But it's done fantastically. Freeman and Cumberbatch hit the perfect tone in their on-screen friendship, and the writers blatantly had fun playing around with the assumptions a contemporary audience would make of two men in their 30s living together (as their landlady so blithely points out, "Mrs Turner next door's got married ones.")

Basic Summary: The acting's brilliant, the writing's witty, the mysteries are clever, and the result is a fantastic, refreshingly original version of a story that has been adapted to death.

Rating: * * * * * (excellent)