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Five Things About Sherlock: The Hounds Of Baskerville
Once again, I should warn you that there will be spoilers ahead as we take a closer look at a few little pieces of tonight's fresh Sherlock installment, The Hounds of Baskerville.
This episode was written by Mark Gatiss, the show's co-creator alongside Steven Moffat and, I suppose, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Hopes were high that this could match, at least, the quality of last week's chapter...
1. Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound.
Holmes is hooked into taking the case of Henry Knight when the terrified young man pleads "Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound."
This has proven to be one of the most popular lines from the original Conan Doyle. It's one of those phrases that auto-completes itself very early on Google. "They were the f" gives you "ootprints of a gigantic hound" for free.
But what gave Sherlock pause, stopped him in his tracks and convinced him that he should take the case? Was the phrase calling out to him through the decades, the multiple fictional iterations, from somewhere in the core of his being?
Or was it just a bit of fan-service double timing as set-up to underline the use of the word hound?
2. Fangs for the memories
The word "hound" needed to be underlined because it was crucial to the episode's silly conceit. There were acronyms being bandied around, and H.O.U.N.D was one of them.
This acronym had lodged itself into the memory of Henry Knight and was invading his dreams, meddling with his imagination. He was taking his repressed memories of a tragedy and reinterpreting into something he got from an acronym. A great big hound, fanged and fierce.
Yeah. Seems that Sherlock is a lot more rigorous and rational than his writers. Though I suppose that was always the case, what with Conan Doyle's belief in fairies at the bottom of the garden.
And to think Gatiss even gave Sherlock a chance to state his belief in Occam's razor tonight.
3. International relations
After last week's conspicuous overuse of the word cameraphone, when a mobile phone got called a "cell" tonight, alarm bells went off. Was this the show's makers selling out to the international market?
As it happens, no. But I'm not so sure about their spelling of authorized with a z.
It's interesting to note that the "cell" clue won't work so well in the US where that's precisely the expected term. Sorry PBS viewers, that little nugget was not really for you.
And when I last checked, the US didn't know what the term "dogging" referred to, so the joke about Watson going looking for a dog and finding doggers instead won't fully connect in the States either. And I suppose that makes the Americans the lucky ones.
4. Feelings, nothing more than feelings
Last week we were asked if Sherlock Holmes could feel love; this week we were asked if he could feel fear.
It seems that he can, with the aid of mood altering substances. Tip to Irene Adler: keep some MDMA secreted somewhere about your person (and with your wardrobe, I do mean your person).
There was also a fun set of maneuvres by which Holmes appeared to be extending friendship to Watson when, really, he was finding a way to discretely drug him. It didn't play quite as brilliantly as it sounds, but that's a good concept.
5. Plurals
By means of Gatiss' new plot, The Hound of the Baskervilles became The Hounds of Baskerville. Next week comes The Reichenbach Fall, singular.
We can expect much of the plot to come from The Final Problem, it seems, but it doesn't necessary follow that this Reichenbach will be the one with the waterfalls. Not without that S. It could be a person, for all we know. It could be an institution. I wouldn't be surprised if it's a bank, say. That would be topical.
But the final episode is set to be a big, Sherlock vs. Moriarty climax. There was a little bit of Jim Moriarty business tacked on at the end of tonight's episode to create rev us up for the final installment and perhaps foster the illusion of some kind of overall arc - exactly the ploy utilised last year, and it didn't feel entirely sincere then either.
Perhaps more successful was the way Moriarty appeared to the drugged Sherlock, because if they really do have this terrible relationship, and Moriarty really is the one thing that Sherlock would fear - the one physical thing, at least - then it only makes sense.
And just one more thing
Before I slink off into the night, increasingly convinced that this show will never live up to the excitement and cleverness of its first ever episode, one more observation.
There were two Little Johns in this episode - and no, readers in the US, this isn't another dogging thing. I mean Robin Hood's Little John.
There was Gordon Kennedy, who played Gary, the landlord at the Cross Keys. He was Little John in the recent BBC Robin Hood, and more or less the best thing about it.
And there was Clive Mantle, who played Dr. Franklyn, the apparent Sherlock fan at the Baskerville complex. He played Little John in ITV's mid-80s Robin of Sherwood, and was often the best thing about it.
Though despite their strong performances, neither of them proved to be a scene stealer tonight, however. Sorry fellas - but you must know when you've been Cumberbatched.
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Originally Posted by TommieKelly
