Sherlock - Season Four!

Season Four seems to have put a pretty good little bow on the run and for the first time we don't have a monumental cliffhanger which is highly suggestive to me that new ones will be far off if ever. The shows in this most recent trilogy had the kinetic fun we've come to expect from the series and some pretty well-done deduction scenes for the classic Sherlock fan, but the constant twisting and turning gets a bit tiresome after a bit. It's rather like a roller coaster that goes too long, eventually the fun begins to wear off and the whole shebang becomes somewhat of an ordeal. These shows don't quite reach that point, but there were places in the storytelling where I did just want the plot to progress a bit more rapidly and to dispense with the quips.

More after this break for SPOILERS.

Of the three episodes this time, my favorite was "The Lying Detective" which delivered a proper villain played brilliantly by Toby Jones. The malignant Culverton Smith was the most odious TV villain I've seen since this same show gave us Charles Augustus Magnussen a while back. Sleazy and oily and just plain vile, he was a truly bad man. Now Sherlock's scheme to capture him seemed a bit overheated and wildly unreliable, but I guess his ability to read people and anticipate them was the point. Best twists of the season. And an immoral man who is too rich and famous and so powerful to be properly brought to heel by his fellows seems a very timely creation indeed.

"The Six Thatchers" began wonderfully, but the secret was a bit too apparent though the action sequences were very compelling. The death of Mary was a surprise but not a shock. Her continued appearances as a ghost giving advice to the two of them was a nifty twist and added a bit of heart to a show that can depend a bit too much on intellectual whimsy.

"The Final Problem" had the most potential, seeing as the we were on an island of madmen, but somehow the incessant games Euros played with Sherlock, Watson, and Mycroft became tiresome before the final revelation and that seemed a tad overheated. The secret of Redbeard was properly gruesome, but the web of deceptions was a bit opaque at times. The death and mayhem were pretty strong in this one and the ending seemed a tad antiseptic given all of that destruction. Nonetheless the end of this series did leave a good feeling overall as the heroes are finally fully formed.

This marks the end of the SPOILERS.

What we have at the end of this series are a fully functioning Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson team, both men more emotionally stable than they've been in the entire run, both having to some extent come to terms with the torments of their personal lives. Sherlock's fractured personality seems to have healed itself as he allows himself feel, and Watson's survivor's guilt has transformed into a life of service which helps him and us all. They are properly heroes now, less concerned with themselves than helping others. It bodes well for any new ones they do decide to cook up. Personally, I like how it "ended" (or "began" if you prefer) and I'm satisfied if it ends on this exceptionally high note.

NOTE: This is a Dojo Revised Classic Post. 

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