Sherlock_Season_1
SHERLOCK SEASON 1
Sherlock is a crime drama television series based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes detective stories. Created by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, it stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes and Martin Freeman as Doctor John Watson. Thirteen episodes have been produced, with three-part series airing from 2010–2017, and a special episode airing on 1 January 2016. The series is set in the present day, while the one-off special features a Victorian period fantasy resembling the original Holmes stories. Sherlock is a co-production of the British network BBC and the American station WGBH Boston for its Masterpiece anthology series on PBS, along with Hartswood Films, with Moffat, Gatiss, Sue Vertue and Rebecca Eaton serving as executive producers. The series is primarily filmed in Cardiff, Wales, with North Gower Street in London used for exterior shots of Holmes and Watson's 221B Baker Street residence.Critical reception has been highly positive, with many reviews praising the quality of the writing, performances, and direction. Sherlock has been nominated for numerous awards including BAFTAs, Emmys, and a Golden Globe, winning several awards across a variety of categories. The show won in three categories at the 66th Primetime Emmy Awards including Outstanding Writing for a Miniseries, Movie or a Dramatic Special for Moffat, Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie for Cumberbatch, and Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie for Freeman. Two years later, it won Outstanding Television Movie. In addition, the show was also honoured with a Peabody Award in 2011. The third series has become the UK's most watched drama series since 2001 while interest in the fourth series appeared to slip by approximately twenty percent. Sherlock has been sold to 180 territories.
All of the series have been released on DVD and Blu-ray, alongside tie-in editions of selected original Conan Doyle stories and original soundtrack composed by David Arnold and Michael Price. In January 2014, the show launched its official mobile app called Sherlock: The Network.
Plot
The first episode, "A Study in Pink", loosely based upon the first Sherlock Holmes novel A Study in Scarlet, was written by Moffat and directed by Paul McGuigan. The story depicts the introduction of Sherlock to John, and them entering a flatshare at Baker Street in London, and then their investigation into a series of deaths, initially believed to be suicides. Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's older brother, played by Mark Gatiss, also appears for the first time. The episode was first broadcast simultaneously on BBC One and BBC HD on 25 July 2010.The second episode, "The Blind Banker", was first broadcast on 1 August 2010. Written by Stephen Thompson and directed by Euros Lyn, the episode depicts Holmes being hired by an old university acquaintance to investigate a mysterious break-in at a bank in the City of London.
The first series concluded with "The Great Game", first broadcast on 8 August 2010. The episode introduces the character of archenemy James Moriarty (played by Andrew Scott) to the series, who sets Holmes deadlines to solve a series of apparently unrelated cases. Written by Mark Gatiss and directed by McGuigan, "The Great Game" ends with a cliffhanger in which Sherlock and Moriarty reach a standoff involving a bomb attached to a vest removed moments earlier from Watson.
Episodes
Episode 1 - A Study In Pink Aired - 25 July 2010
The police investigate the deaths of a series of people who all appear to have committed suicide by taking a poisonous pill. They turn to their unofficial consultant, Sherlock Holmes, who deduces various elements pointing to a serial killer. Meanwhile, Holmes is introduced to John Watson, a former soldier who served in Afghanistan, and the pair immediately move into a flat in Baker Street. John Watson slowly gets to know and trust Sherlock despite police officer Sally Donovan (Vinette Robinson) warning him that Holmes is a psychopath and will one day be responsible for murder. Sherlock's brother Mycroft (Mark Gatiss), at first not revealing his identity, arranges a meeting with Watson and asks whether he'll spy on Sherlock for money, but John refuses. After a series of incidents, the person responsible for the deaths, a taxicab driver (Phil Davis), reveals that his victims took their own lives by playing a game of Russian roulette with two pills: one fatally poisonous, the other safe. Before Sherlock can play the cabbie's game, John shoots the cabbie from an opposite building. Before he dies, the taxicab driver reveals that "Moriarty" was his sponsor.Loosely based on the first Sherlock Holmes novel, A Study in Scarlet.Rating - 8.8./10.0
Episode 2 - The Blind Banker Aired - 1 August 2010
Sherlock is hired by an old friend to investigate a mysterious break-in at a bank in the City. He discovers that symbols spray-painted onto an office wall are a coded message intended for an employee of the bank, who is later discovered dead in his flat. The next day, a journalist is killed and the same symbols are found nearby. Sherlock and John follow a trail of clues that link the two dead men to a Chinese smuggling ring, who are trying to retrieve a valuable item that one of the dead men stole. Sherlock eventually cracks the coded message based on Suzhou numerals and a book cipher, but not before John and Sarah (John's date) are kidnapped by the criminals, who believe that John is Sherlock. Sherlock rescues John and Sarah, but the leader of the gang escapes. Later, the leader of the gang is in communication with her superior, who is identified by the initial "M". She is then shot by a sniper.Loosely based on the short story "The Adventure of the Dancing Men", the storyline also incorporates elements from other Sherlock Holmes stories; the concept of coded messages, the markings on the feet of the Black Lotus members and the plot of escaping a secret society, then being tracked to and killed in England all feature in The Valley of Fear. A murder victim being found inside a locked room, accessible only by climbing, alludes to The Sign of the Four.Rating - 8.7/10.0
Episode 3 - The Great Game Aired - 8 August 2010
Sherlock is commissioned by Mycroft to investigate the suspicious death of a government employee, who was working on a top-secret defence project: the Bruce-Partington Project. After rejecting the case and handing it over to John, Sherlock begins to be taunted by a criminal who puts his victims into explosive vests and sets Sherlock deadlines to solve the apparently unrelated cases, which include a twenty-year-old cold case involving the shoes of a drowned boy, the disappearance of a businessman, the death of a TV personality, and the assassination of a guard of an art gallery by the "Golem". As Sherlock solves the cases, he finds links between them. After clearing up the original case of the civil servant, Sherlock tries to force his unseen adversary to reveal himself. Near the end of the episode, Sherlock and "Jim Moriarty" reach a standoff, where Jim reveals that he is responsible for the crimes. In the final seconds, Sherlock Holmes points his gun at a bomb on the floor that had been strapped to John.The episode's storyline is somewhat derived from The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans and makes references to "The Five Orange Pips" at various points (as per the five bomb victims and electronic beeps on the phone) in addition to other works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.Rating - 9.0/10.0
Media
In the 2011 BAFTA awards, the show as a whole won the award for Best Drama Series, while Freeman (as Dr Watson) won the award for the Best Supporting Actor. Cumberbatch was nominated for Best Actor. Andrew Scott won 2012's Best Supporting Actor, beating Freeman, for his work in the second series, which was nominated in other categories.Following multiple nominations for the 63rd Primetime Emmy Awards (2011) and 64th Primetime Emmy Awards (2012), the show won multiple Emmys at the 66th Primetime Emmy Awards (2014), including Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie for Cumberbatch, Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie for Freeman and Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Miniseries, Movie or a Dramatic Special for Moffat. It subsequently won the Emmy for Best Television Film at the 68th Primetime Emmy Awards (2016).
The first series also won the Arqiva award for the "best terrestrial show" at the 2011 Edinburgh International Television Festival. "A Study in Pink" and "A Scandal in Belgravia" were nominated for Emmy Awards in a variety of categories. The series won several BAFTA Cymru awards: television drama, Director: Fiction (Euros Lyn), Director of Photography: Fiction (Steve Lawes), Production Design (Arwel Wyn Jones), and Make Up & Hair (Claire Pritchard-Jones). Charlie Phillips won the 'Editing: Fiction' category at the British Academy Television Craft Awards. The show was also nominated for the YouTube Audience Award.
Home release and merchandise
The first series was released on disc to entertain in the United Kingdom on 30 August 2010, in Australia on 4 November, and the United States on 9 November 2010. The release included the three episodes and several special features. "A Study in Pink" featured audio commentaries by Steven Moffat, Mark Gatiss and Sue Vertue, while Benedict Cumberbatch, Martin Freeman and Mark Gatiss comment on "The Great Game". The release included the pilot episode, a 60-minute version of "A Study in Pink" directed by Coky Giedroyc. Critic Mark Lawson called the decision to include the pilot "commendable and brave". The British Board of Film Classification rated the pilot and the three episodes as a 12 certificate for video and online exhibition. The release also contained a 32-minute documentary about the production called "Unlocking Sherlock". "Unlocking Sherlock" is also the name of a different, but related, documentary (2014, 56-minute) which premiered on PBS-TV on 12 January 2014 as a prelude to the third series episodes.The second series disc was released in the United Kingdom on 23 January 2012. The release included an audio commentary for "A Scandal in Belgravia" and "The Hounds of Baskerville" and a documentary called "Sherlock Uncovered". The soundtrack album for the first series was released by Silva Screen on 30 January 2012, and for the second series on 27 February 2012.
BBC Books published some of Conan Doyle's original collections and novels as tie-in editions, with cover art featuring Cumberbatch and Freeman. A Study in Scarlet and The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes were released in Autumn 2011, with introductions by Moffat and Gatiss respectively. The Hound of the Baskervilles, The Sign of Four and The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes were released in March 2012, with introductions by Cumberbatch, Freeman and Thompson respectively. Two more books, The Return of Sherlock Holmes and His Last Bow, were released in December 2013, ahead of the premiere of the third series. They featured introductions by Gatiss and Moffat respectively. According to Radio Times, the popularity of Sherlock has led to a resurgence in the sales of the original Conan Doyle stories.
Sherlock: The Casebook, a companion book to the series written by Guy Adams, was published by BBC Books in the United Kingdom in October 2012. The book was republished in the United States under the title The Sherlock Files: The Official Companion to the Hit Television Series in July 2013.
In Japan, a manga adaptation of the series illustrated by Jay was serialised in Kadokawa's Young Ace magazine from 4 October 2012. The English translation of this manga series will be released by Titan Comics in the UK and US beginning on 8 June 2016. In October 2012, Winning Moves sold a Sherlock-themed edition of Cluedo.
Publishers and retailers reported a 180% rise in sales of Sherlock Holmes books during the first series' broadcast.
The show's popularity resulted in enquiries for coats similar to Sherlock's, reported retailer Debenhams. Garment manufacturer Belstaff put the wool trench coat worn by Benedict Cumberbatch back into production before the series had ended. The Independent reported, "designer Paul Costelloe moved to meet the demand, offering tailored coats and scarves based on the series, while Savile Row bespoke tailor John Pearse said many of his clients were inquiring about the actors' clothes." Journalist Alexis Petridis commented, "[Y]ou can see why men wanted to get the look. Perhaps they noted the effect Cumberbatch, by no means your standard telly hunk, had on lady viewers … and decided it must have something to do with the clobber. So it is that Britain's latest men's style icon is a fictional asexual sociopath first seen onscreen hitting a corpse with a horse whip. Surely not even the great detective himself could have deduced that was going to happen."
Speedy's, the sandwich shop below the flat used as Holmes' residence, reported a sharp rise in new customers who recognised it from the show.
Conception and development
Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, Sherlock Holmes fans with experience of adapting or using Victorian literature for television, devised the concept of the series. Moffat had previously adapted the Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde for the 2007 series Jekyll, while Gatiss had written the Dickensian Doctor Who episode "The Unquiet Dead". Moffat and Gatiss, both Doctor Who writers, discussed plans for a Holmes adaptation during their numerous train journeys to Cardiff where Doctor Who production is based. While they were in Monte Carlo for an awards ceremony, producer Sue Vertue, who is married to Moffat, encouraged Moffat and Gatiss to develop the project themselves before another creative team had the same idea. Moffat and Gatiss invited Stephen Thompson to write for the series in September 2008.Gatiss has criticised recent television adaptations of the Conan Doyle stories as "too reverential and too slow", aiming instead to be as irreverent to the canon as the 1930s and 1940s films starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce, which were mostly set in the then contemporary interwar era. Benedict Cumberbatch's Sherlock uses modern technology, such as texting, the internet and GPS to solve crimes. Paul McGuigan, who directed two episodes of Sherlock, says that this is in keeping with Conan Doyle's character, pointing out that "[i]n the books he would use any device possible and he was always in the lab doing experiments. It's just a modern day version of it. He will use the tools that are available to him today in order to find things out."
The update maintains some traditional elements of the stories, such as the Baker Street address and Holmes's adversary Moriarty. Although the events of the books are transferred to the present day, some elements are incorporated into the story. For example, Martin Freeman's Watson has returned from military service in Afghanistan. While discussing the fact that the original Watson was invalided home after serving in the Second Anglo-Afghan War (1878–80), Gatiss realised that "[i]t is the same war now, I thought. The same unwinnable war."
Sherlock was announced as a single 60-minute drama production at the Edinburgh International Television Festival in August 2008, with broadcast set for mid to late 2009. The intention was to produce a series of six 60-minute episodes should the pilot prove to be successful. The first version of the pilot—reported by The Guardian to have cost £800,000—led to rumours within the BBC and wider media that Sherlock was a potential disaster. The BBC decided not to transmit the pilot, requesting a reshoot and a total of three 90 minute episodes. The original pilot was included on the DVD of the first series. During the audio commentary, the creative team said that the BBC were "very happy" with the pilot but asked them to change the format. Critic Mark Lawson observes that when the pilot was released on DVD, it was "substantially expanded and rewritten, and completely reimagined in look, pace and sound". In July 2009, the BBC drama department announced plans for three 90-minute episodes, to be broadcast in 2010.Moffat had previously announced that if a series of Sherlock was commissioned, Gatiss would take over the duties of executive producer so that he could concentrate on producing Doctor Who.
Cast and characters
Moffat and Vertue became interested in casting Cumberbatch as the title character after watching his performance in the 2007 film Atonement. The actor was cast after reading the script for the creative team. "Cumberbatch", says The Guardian, "has a reputation for playing odd, brilliant men very well, and his Holmes is cold, techie, slightly Aspergerish". Cumberbatch said, "There's a great charge you get from playing him, because of the volume of words in your head and the speed of thought—you really have to make your connections incredibly fast. He is one step ahead of the audience and of anyone around him with normal intellect. They can't quite fathom where his leaps are taking him." Piers Wenger, head of drama at BBC Cymru Wales, described the series' rendering of Sherlock as "a dynamic superhero in a modern world, an arrogant, genius sleuth driven by a desire to prove himself cleverer than the perpetrator and the police—everyone in fact". Addressing changing social attitudes and broadcasting regulations, Cumberbatch's Holmes replaced the pipe with multiple nicotine patches.The writers believed that Sherlock should not talk like "a completely modern person", says Moffat, but were initially intent that "he never sounded like he's giving a lecture". Moffat turned the character "more Victorian" in the second series, capitalising more on Cumberbatch's "beautiful voice" to make it sound like "he's giving a lecture".Moffat and Vertue became interested in casting Cumberbatch as the title character after watching his performance in the 2007 film Atonement. The actor was cast after reading the script for the creative team. "Cumberbatch", says The Guardian, "has a reputation for playing odd, brilliant men very well, and his Holmes is cold, techie, slightly Aspergerish". Cumberbatch said, "There's a great charge you get from playing him, because of the volume of words in your head and the speed of thought—you really have to make your connections incredibly fast. He is one step ahead of the audience and of anyone around him with normal intellect. They can't quite fathom where his leaps are taking him." Piers Wenger, head of drama at BBC Cymru Wales, described the series' rendering of Sherlock as "a dynamic superhero in a modern world, an arrogant, genius sleuth driven by a desire to prove himself cleverer than the perpetrator and the police—everyone in fact". Addressing changing social attitudes and broadcasting regulations, Cumberbatch's Holmes replaced the pipe with multiple nicotine patches.The writers believed that Sherlock should not talk like "a completely modern person", says Moffat, but were initially intent that "he never sounded like he's giving a lecture". Moffat turned the character "more Victorian" in the second series, capitalising more on Cumberbatch's "beautiful voice" to make it sound like "he's giving a lecture".
The writers said that Freeman's casting developed the way in which Cumberbatch played Holmes. The theme of friendship appealed to both Gatiss and Moffat. Gatiss asserted the importance of achieving the correct tone for the character. "Watson is not an idiot, although it's true that Conan Doyle always took the piss out of him," said Gatiss. "But only an idiot would surround himself with idiots." Moffat said that Freeman is "the sort of opposite of Benedict in everything except the amount of talent... Martin finds a sort of poetry in the ordinary man. I love the fastidious realism of everything he does."Freeman describes his character as a "moral compass" for Sherlock, who does not always consider the morality and ethics of his actions.
Rupert Graves was cast as DI Greg Lestrade. The writers referred to the character as "Inspector Lestrade" during development until Gatiss realised that in contemporary England the character would have the title "Detective Inspector". Moffat and Gatiss pointed out that Lestrade does not appear often in the stories and is quite inconsistently portrayed in them. They decided to go with the version that appeared in "The Adventure of the Six Napoleons": a man who is frustrated by Holmes but admires him, and whom Holmes considers as the best person at Scotland Yard. Several candidates took a comedic tack in their auditions, but the creative team preferred the gravitas that Graves brought to the role. His first name is revealed to be Greg in "The Hounds of Baskerville".
Andrew Scott made his first appearance as Jim Moriarty in "The Great Game". Moffat said, "We knew what we wanted to do with Moriarty from the very beginning. Moriarty is usually a rather dull, rather posh villain so we thought someone who was genuinely properly frightening. Someone who's an absolute psycho." Moffat and Gatiss were originally not going to put a confrontation between Moriarty and Holmes into these three episodes, but realised that they "just had to do a confrontation scene. We had to do a version of the scene in 'The Final Problem' in which the two archenemies meet each other."
The remainder of the regular cast includes Una Stubbs (who has known Cumberbatch since he was four years old, as she had worked with his mother Wanda Ventham) as Mrs Hudson and co-creator Mark Gatiss as Mycroft Holmes. Vinette Robinson, Jonathan Aris and Louise Brealey play the recurring roles of Sergeant Sally Donovan, Philip Anderson and Molly Hooper, respectively.
Amanda Abbington, Freeman's then-real life partner, plays Mary Morstan, Watson's girlfriend and eventual wife. In Series 3, Wanda Ventham and Timothy Carlton, Cumberbatch's actual parents, are introduced as Sherlock and Mycroft's parents.
Guest appearances included Phil Davis as Jefferson Hope, Paul Chequer as DI Dimmock, Zoe Telford as Sarah, Gemma Chan as Soo Lin Yao, John Sessions as Kenny Prince, Haydn Gwynne as Miss Wenceslas,Deborah Moore as one of Moriarty's victims and Peter Davison as the voice-over in the planetarium.Series two's "A Scandal in Belgravia" featured Lara Pulver as Irene Adler,while "The Hounds of Baskerville" featured Russell Tovey as Henry Knight.In the final episode of series 2, the role of Rufus Bruhl was played by Edward Holtom, while Katherine Parkinson played journalist Kitty Riley. The first episode of series 3 featured Derren Brown.
Production design and filming
The show was produced by Hartswood Films for BBC Wales, while BBC Worldwide also provided co-production funding. Production was also co-produced by PBS, a network of public-service broadcasters in the United States, for WGBH-TV's Masterpiece Mystery! strand. Filming of the pilot episode, written by Moffat and directed by Coky Giedroyc, commenced in January 2009. The following January (2010), the first set of three episodes entered production. Paul McGuigan directed the first and third episodes and Euros Lyn directed the second.The three episodes were filmed in reverse order of their broadcast. |
| 221B Baker Street |
Costumes for the pilot were designed by BAFTA Cymru award-winning costume designer Ray Holman.Cumberbatch wore a £1,000 Belstaff coat in the series.Sarah Arthur, the series' costume designer, explained how she achieved the detective's look. "Holmes wouldn't have any interest in fashion so I went for classic suits with a modern twist: narrow-leg trousers and a two-button, slim-cut jacket. I also went for slim-cut shirts and a sweeping coat for all the action scenes—it looks great against the London skyline."
The writers say that they did not want to force modernity onto the story.There were some creative challenges, such as the decision to include the sign "221B" on Holmes' front door. Gatiss and Moffat reflect that in the modern world the door would only display the number of the house, and there would be doorbells for each flat. The full house number is so iconic that they felt unable to change it.The writers also decided that the lead characters would address each other by their first names, rather than the traditional Holmes and Watson. This was also reflected in the title of the series. Director Paul McGuigan came up with the idea of putting text messages on the screen instead of having cut-away shots of a hand holding the phone.
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