Sherlock Series Two Review

Sherlock is fantastic. By Sherlock, I mean the BBC television reimagining of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s detective Sherlock Holmes created by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss (who also plays Sherlock's brother). The show is set in modern day with Sherlock Holmes, played by Benedict Cumberbatch, as a private investigator with incredible talents of observation and deduction. His friend and accomplice Dr. Watson, played by Martin Freeeman, is an Afghan War veteran and medical doctor who lives at 221B Baker Street with Holmes.

The show first aired in 2010 with a three episode first series that is currently available via Netflix streaming (go catch up). Each 90-minute of Sherlock focuses on a specific case and is more of a movie than a television show. The second series, which just aired in the United Kingdom and was released on DVD on January 23, 2012 also includes three episodes. The episodes in series two are: "A Scandal in Belgravia", a retelling of the original Holmes story A Scandal in Bohemia, The Hound of the Baskervilles (if you know anything about Sherlock Holmes, you have heard of this story), and "The Reichenbach Fall", which refers to the Holmes story The Final Problem.

There are several things that are great about this show. The acting is superb with Cumberbatch playing a very believable Sherlock Holmes and Martin Freeman is very good as his suffering sidekick (it’s hard to be Sherlock Holmes’ associate). The writing team translates the Holmes stories into modern times well and the twists and turns in each episode leave you guessing until the very end. They have even figured out a way to visually give you an idea of what Sherlock is seeing and how his brain works that don’t jar you out of the show, but enhance it.

Sherlock series two will be coming to America in May on PBS Masterpiece starting on May 6. Be sure to find it, this is great television – not to be missed. Sherlock earns 5 Mick Happies.

On a side note, I purchased series 2 of Sherlock on DVD and had it shipped from the UK to watch on a region-free DVD player. To rant a little, I am perfectly happy to pay for shows that I want to see, but I am often annoyed that good shows aren’t available because of distribution rights and nonsense that should have been resolved by now in our globally connected world. To content producers and providers: if you can stream or digitally distribute shows over the internet, do it. We will pay for it and don’t want to wait months for you to figure out how to distribute it in another region. Rant over.