Sherlock: Series 2

In some circumstances, this series surpasses the first and others...well, don't.

Now I love this series of Sherlock, quite possibly more than the first even though it has one of the most uneventful and dull episodes I have ever witnessed in my life AND is so far the worst episode of the whole show that I have seen so far, but even then it's not horrible. It has one of the best written, edited, and acted scenes in the entire show's run, and this episode is The Hound Of The Baskerville. You know what's really weird? Almost every example of Sherlock Holmes that I have seen in over 15 years has strangely been "The Hound Of The Baskerville", not any other story written by Doyle has ever been brought to my attention. Not "A Study In Pink", not "The Reichenbach Fall", not even "The Final Problem". Always "The Hound". How peculiar is that? But whatever disappointment that story gives me, is immediately rectified with The Reichenbach Fall. It surpasses tenfold whatever stakes were in previous episodes, it's still the best in my opinion. Also really strange how my favorite, and in my humble opinion, best episodes have Andrew Scott in them, he just entertains me so. Now every aspect of the previous series has improved, and it does the correct thing with building upon previous stories and still giving us plenty of fresh and new things we have not seen before. The acting, stories, editing, mysteries, and action have really stood high for me. True the first series was great, but just because of the final episode this is my favorite series of the show so far. Will series 3 surpass it, or will it just be another really good string of episodes? Well, I might be cheating a bit but since my school schedule is so jam packed tomorrow and there is no ample time to review a whole nother series, I will be looking at the Christmas special that premiered last year for the review of that day which air date wise came out after the end of series 3. So stay on the look out for that, and tell me if you figured out the solution to the final problem before Thursday. See you then.

Sherlock: Series 1

The game is on.

For those of you who have not watched the BBC series Sherlock, I....it's pure pity I feel for you. This show is amazing! You know the basic iconography of Sherlock Holmes, absurdly brilliant detective solves crimes the police cannot with his friend and colleague Dr. John Watson. Now take that concept out of Victorian England and put it into 21st century London. It works better than one might expect. Although I'm pretty sure every single episode, which is an hour and a half long by the way, goes exactly like the short stories Arthur Conan Doyle wrote. I watched all the series up to one point and then picked up one of the compilation Sherlock Holmes books which is the only way you can read them nowadays, and scene for scene, sometimes even line for line, follows the stories. And the casting could not ever, ever, ever be done any other way besides Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock, and Martin Freeman as John Watson. They play it beyond perfection. I mean if you think about these characters, in modern day, they act perfectly how they would really behave in this day and age. I love it! The whole show harbors on these two actors, although supporting cast can never be excluded, they are quite lovely too especially Mrs. Hudson and Molly, they never cease to make me smile. But...I would almost argue Andrew Scott as Jim Moriarty steals the whole first series and do you know how long he is on screen for? Maybe 5 minutes. In four and a half hours of total run time for the entire first series, it takes him 5 minutes to pull the rug out from under your feet and utterly wow you. He terrifies me and yet makes me giggle like a girl at the same time. Somehow. But anyway! I never once heard of this show until maybe either my second or third year of high school, it was recommended to me by a friend who said I reminded him too much of Sherlock, I eventually watched the series (At that point series 1 and 2 were on Netflix) and was really took by it. And I do hate it takes over a year for every new series to come out. I am so not even kidding you now. It really does take a year and a half for one series to come out. But fear not, just recently they released the fourth series on home video and I will cover each series this week. So stay tuned, enjoy, and I will see you tomorrow.

Sherlock Holmes

Best way to start December!

Yes, I liked reviewing a Sherlock Holmes movie so much in December I am doing it again. I have always greatly enjoyed this movie and I couldn't think of anyone better as playing the world famous detective than Robert Downey Jr. he is just brilliant as him! Okay story time, our partners in crime solving Sherlock and Watson are hip deep in a case that arised from quite peculiar circumstances, a grand mystery with no clear answers in sight until the very end involving conspiracies, cults, and a much bigger plot behind it all. But of course we all know who's behind it. If you have a passing knowledge of Sherlock Holmes you know who orchestrated this whole scheme. Major brownie points for the setting, fitting the time period the books were written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, I mean spot on. The cast is wonderful in our three main characters, and quite decent in supporting. Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law have excellent chemistry together as friends, just their witty banter between each other never fails to amuse me. Rachel McAdams is an interesting choice as Irene Adler, but she gets the character down very well although I don't recall Irene being very open with how much she loved Sherlock. It also has pretty terrific music, I just can't explain it any other way than being well...Sherlockian, I hear it and I immediately think Sherlock Holmes. With one exception, just had a great and intense scene, Irene nearly escaped death, Watson runs out and Holmes follows, tripwire goes off, Watson yells Holmes' name, film goes slow-mo, big chain of explosions going off everywhere, and what do I hear? Bizzare, dischordant violin music. I don't hate the music, it fits in the world potrayed perfectly, but not that scene. Would have been way more effective if you barely heard anything, perhaps ever so faint sound effects of explosions or just dead silence! It would have created a better scene. And I really hate to say this but, you don't know what all has transpired until 30 minutes before the film ends. You constantly see things, ever so subtle hints, clues, minute details but never any explanation of it. Half the fun of a mystery movie is trying to piece it together yourself. This never happens in this movie. You're just left to wait until all is explained, now some people can argue that is a good thing, only Holmes can pick up on these things and no one else so it makes sense. Other people like me can argue it never hurts to actually leave clues for the audience to pick up on. Participation in movies is rare, this is where the mystery genre comes in. It encourages you to become part of the movie, not an observer but a actor. I love the exanation, taking what seems to be pure malicious magic into hard scientific facts. That is awesome. Now beyond all that, I still like the movie, I would definitely recommend it to people, and I think it would be sort of a fun competition to see how much people can pick up on throughout the film. Give it a watch and put those detective skills to work.