Caught for good.

I remember the first time I saw Sherlock on PBS.

Let me back up slightly. Dad had gotten me to watch the first RDJ movie by the clever expedient of turning it on and walking out of the room. I'm the curious sort, so I'd stopped for a moment... and was sucked in.

This was like that.


Again, Dad turned on a show and skedaddled. I had read an article about Sherlock Holmes being a SF sort of character [pretty sure this is over on Clarkesworld, will link at end of post]. But otherwise, I really had no idea there was any new Sherlock Holmes loose in the world save the new movies.

There was a man. I saw his silhouette. I was caught. I knew that shape. Knew that coat, knew who it had to be. I knew who it was.

Then he spoke. And it was Sherlock Holmes's voice.


Had you said to me, "Who is your Sherlock Holmes?" I wouldn't have had an answer. Nor did I care. Onscreen, I'd seen various actors, but none of them was him. I'd read Arthur Conan Doyle, of course. I think that was my first introduction to mysteries, which I'm yet addicted to.

When I say "Nor did I care" I mean that I didn't have a preference, didn't really have someone who was definitively Sherlock Holmes. At best, I had the illustrations in my head, vaguely. That was all.

It wasn't a matter that troubled me.

Because to me Sherlock Holmes was a character in many places, first in ACD, but one I'd seen [read] all over. Someone I knew as a shadowy figure but who I knew by the words -- by the stories. I am a text-based lifeform.


But that moment, watching that man speak to a prisoner in a jail, with cold white light faintly coming through the far window... I knew. This was Sherlock Holmes. This was MY Sherlock.

Almost scary in a way. That absolute recognition.

A friend had me watch a Youtube episode where a New Doctor Who gets to speak with Peter Davison. He tells the Fifth Doctor, "You were MY Doctor."

Yes. Exactly like that.


That was The Great Game. I always remember that first scene, and then I have to remind myself later that I didn't see Sherlock in order; I saw the third ep first.

Because after that, that scene where Sherlock is so very Nero Wolfe -- correcting his speech, impatient, sighing a little with boredom -- came the next bit. There was 221B, and I saw the ugly wallpaper, and I distinctly heard a tiny mental voice say [gasp, really] "It's in modern day... glub."

And my brain went down like a swimmer going underwater. I was lost. I was sucked in, pulled completely under. There was no disbelief after that, no debate, nothing. This was the world, and I was watching.

I really heard the glub.


I didn't know my Sherlock could exist; I didn't dream of him. Moffat and Gatiss, bless their wickedly clever brains, made him out of all the right damned things. Benedict Cumberbatch is perfect [and a stellar actor]. So is Martin Freeman, who -- I'm sorry, Martin! -- I probably won't say enough about. Because, like poor our John Watson, my eyes are almost all for Sherlock.

Their chemistry is just exactly right.

People talk about the bromance. Bah. It is the friendship. Haven't we all dreamed of a best friend forever? Who's always there, who sticks by you no matter what you say, who puts up with you and doesn't wring your neck at the worst of times. I know that I'm desperate to think of how to help Sherlock get back to John before both of them crack into little tiny pieces. Come home, Sherlock; come home. Find ----- and return.

Your best friend needs you so much, Sherlock. :( Hurry up.



Yep, Clarkesworld: Sherlock Holmes & the Science of Deduction.