I do love the SHERLOCK series. Not in a fanboy sort of way. There are some bits I find down right irritating but this blog isn't about those bits.
It's about one episode in particular. THE SIGN OF THE THREE.
It's the one where Watson and Sherlock go on a bender and have to solve a crime drunk and is the perfect blend of pathos, slapstick, sharp dialogue and wit this side of the tv screen.
You hear, from Sherlock's own mouth, what Watson really means to him, and it is his unshakeable humanity, something Sherlock, if left alone, would eventually lose.
Has there ever been so perfect a partnership as this couple? Watson and Holmes are the ultimate dynamic duo. The SHERLOCK series has solved the riddle of how to make Watson something other than the 'exposition excuse'.
Its' when the author needs the reader to understand something so has one character explain it to another, not really for the character's benefit, but the reader's. Watson was a cool device, after all he was Holmes's biographer so needed to be told but it's a shame its taken so long for him to be something more than that.
The Sherlcok Holmes movies staring Robert Downey Jr and Jude Law manage it too, firstly by casting Jude Law (one of the world's most handsome men) and by making him an action hero. He is, after all, a veteran of the Afghan War. And we know Afghanistan is no easy ride for anyone. Watson is a soldier. Tough, loyal and resourceful. Respect must be due.
I think a lot about this pair when I write.
Firstly great characters need not be sympathetic. As Sherlock says himself he's a 'high functioning sociopath'. Just sometimes that's what you need.
Then there's the team. Both characters are greater, combined. Unless he's Batman. Just sayin'. We, as reader's get to take part in their relationship and glimpse the dedication and love these two very different men have for each other. It need not be said but you know they are halves of a whole, which makes the wedding episode so poignant. Holmes wants Watson happy, but has the intelligence to know what it will cost him. The whole episode plays on Holmes's feelings of bereavement. For al Holmes's brains, coolness under fire and sheer joy of battle, he's a little, lonely boy who more than anything wants his best friend.
Ultimately, what is that episode but one about love? In Watson as a groom. In their unique partnership. In the mystery they try and solve (lonely women loving a ghost. Isn't that what Sherlock is afraid of when Watson leaves?).
Brilliant episode in a brilliant series.
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