Sherlock_Season_2
SHERLOCK SEASON 2
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.
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
After the high ratings for "A Study in Pink", the BBC was reportedly eager to produce more episodes. On 10 August 2010, it was confirmed that Sherlock had been renewed for a second series. At the 2011 convention, Gatiss confirmed which stories would be adapted, and that the writers of the first series would each write an episode for series two. Acknowledging that "A Scandal in Bohemia", "The Hound of the Baskervilles" and "The Final Problem" are amongst the best-known Holmes stories, Gatiss explained, "We knew after having a successful first run that the natural order would be to do three of the most famous [stories]." "There's the question of how to go out on a cliffhanger and then the thematic things of the three stories, where we were trying to get to and what Sherlock and John's relationship is a little further on. You can't just go back to: 'You have no emotions.' 'I don't care.' You've got to move on somewhere and make sure the other characters have something of a journey too." Paul McGuigan directed the first two episodes,and Doctor Who director Toby Haynes handled the last one. The second series of three 90-minute episodes was initially planned to air in late 2011, but was delayed until early January 2012."A Scandal in Belgravia", written by Steven Moffat and directed by Paul McGuigan, was first broadcast on 1 January 2012. Loosely based on "A Scandal in Bohemia", the episode depicts Holmes's quest to retrieve compromising photos of a minor royal held on the camera phone of Irene Adler (Lara Pulver), a ruthless and brilliant dominatrix who also trades in classified information extracted from her rich and powerful clients.
The second series concluded with "The Reichenbach Fall". Steve Thompson wrote the episode, which was directed by Toby Haynes, who had previously directed many of Moffat's Doctor Who episodes. First broadcast on 15 January 2012, the episode follows Moriarty's plot to discredit and kill Sherlock Holmes, concluding with Holmes faking his suicide. It was based upon Conan Doyle's story "The Final Problem", in which Sherlock and Moriarty are presumed to have fallen to their deaths from the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland. Moffat felt that he and co-creator Gatiss had outdone Conan Doyle in their version of Holmes' fall and Moffat added that, in that much-discussed sequence, there was still "a clue everybody's missed".
EPISODES
Episode 1 - A Scandal in Belgravia Aired - 1 January 2012
Based on the short story "A Scandal in Bohemia".
Mycroft hires Sherlock and John to retrieve compromising photos of a
minor royal, which are held on the camera phone of Irene Adler (Lara Pulver), a ruthless and brilliant dominatrix
who also trades in classified information extracted from her rich and
powerful clients. Sherlock obtains Adler's phone, but discovers it is booby-trapped
and requires a code to disarm it. When Adler discovers that the CIA are
on her trail, she disappears and is then apparently killed, only to
reappear to ask John to get her camera phone back from Sherlock. Weeks
later when the coast is clear, Adler tricks Sherlock into deciphering a
coded message on her phone which she obtained from another
well-connected client. She sends the message to Moriarty, who in turn
uses it to foil a British counter-terror
operation. She almost succeeds in blackmailing Mycroft, but Sherlock
finally cracks the password for the phone, leaving Adler without the
protection she needs to survive. The episode concludes as Mycroft tells
John that she has been killed by a terrorist group in Pakistan, while in fact she was secretly rescued by Sherlock.
Rating -9.0/10.0
Episode 2 - The Hounds of Baskerville Aired - 8 January 2012
Based on the novel The Hound of the Baskervilles.
Sherlock and John are contacted by Henry Knight (Russell Tovey), a man traumatised by the death of his father by a monstrous hound on Dartmoor years before. Investigating Dewer's Hollow, a local spot where the beast was allegedly seen, as well as the nearby Ministry of Defence testing site Baskerville, Sherlock and John uncover a conspiracy wherein one of the Baskerville scientists, Dr. Frankland (Clive Mantle), is continuing the work of H.O.U.N.D., an aborted project to create a hallucinogenic
gas for military use. Sherlock and John discover that the legendary
hound is an ordinary dog used for publicity that the hallucinogenic gas
makes appear as a demonic monster. The "hound" that killed Henry's
father was actually Frankland wearing a red-lensed gas mask and a
T-shirt bearing the logo of the H.O.U.N.D. group. Confronting both the
dog and Frankland at Dewer's Hollow, John and Lestrade shoot the dog.
Frankland attempts to flee, but dies when he runs into a minefield. In
the final scene, Mycroft releases a confined Jim Moriarty.
Rating - 8.7/10.0
Episode 3 - The Reichenbach Fall Aired - 15 January 2012
Inspired by the short story "The Final Problem". The title alludes to the Reichenbach Falls, where Sherlock and Moriarty supposedly fall to their deaths in the original story.
Moriarty launches a simultaneous heist on the Tower of London, Bank of England and Pentonville Prison
using just a few lines of code that can break any security; crimes for
which he allows himself to be captured and put on trial. He secures a
not-guilty verdict through intimidating the jury and visits Sherlock,
explaining he still intends to "burn" him, taunting him with a "final problem"
for him to solve. Soon afterwards, Moriarty arranges for the kidnapping
of the children of an American ambassador, who are terrified of
Sherlock once he has them rescued. This leads to Sherlock becoming a
suspect. Sherlock escapes arrest, and soon learns Moriarty is using the
alias of an actor who claims to have been hired by Sherlock, and has
seeded the press with a story of Sherlock being a fraud. The two meet on
the roof of a hospital, where Moriarty explains that assassins will
kill John, Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade if Sherlock does not commit suicide;
he wants Sherlock to do this to cement his story after explaining that
his "god code" was a myth. After a tense conversation, in which Moriarty
realises the two are enough alike that Sherlock would be willing to do
anything to Moriarty to get him to call off the assassins, Moriarty
kills himself to force Sherlock to do the same. Sherlock calls John and
"confesses" to being a fraud (which John refuses to believe). John
pleads for him to come down. Sherlock states his final "Goodbye" and
then steps off the roof.
Rating - 9.2/10.0
Christmas mini-episode (2013)
BBC One premiered a seven-minute Sherlock mini-episode over the 2013 Christmas period entitled "Many Happy Returns". The episode is available via BBC iPlayer, BBC Red Button service, and BBC's YouTube channel,and acts as a prequel to the third series.The synopsis for the episode reads "Sherlock has been gone for two years. But someone isn't quite convinced that he's dead."The 'someone' turns out to be Anderson, the forensics technician from series 1 and 2 (who has now lost his job due to his obsessive conviction that the detective still lives). He had a long-standing mistrust of Sherlock, yet is now one of the few people who believes Sherlock is alive, and throughout the episode is trying to convince Lestrade. Anderson tracks him via various mysterious events from Tibet to New Delhi to Germany in which he seems to be involved and points out that the incidents are getting progressively closer to London.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.
Comments
Post a Comment