Boswell

Most people nowadays are far more grammatical when writing than when speaking, and I suspect that was even more the case in "proper" Victorian times. Also bearing in mind that Watson didn't write down his accounts till well after the fact, I would guess that the dialog in them is far more stilted than would have been the case in real life. Moftiss may be dealing with a choice between having their Victorian characters "sound Victorian" (i.e., like a Victorian novel) and having them sound like real people talking. They've often said that they don't see Sherlock Holmes as a museum piece, they see him (even in the original stories) as a leading-edge man of his times. Therefore I doubt that they care to have their Victorian Holmes talking like a book. Of course, they can't very well have him using twenty-first-century slang, but neither can they use much Victorian slang -- their twenty-first-century audience wouldn't understand it. They've presumably tried to strike some sort of balance between book authenticity, real-life authenticity, and understandability. Sorry, I may have conveyed the wrong impression there. I meant to say I fully agree that the characters need to sound natural, as opposed to weirdly bookish, of course. Which is why I find it jarring when Mr. Sherlock Holmes of 1895 is made to spout such a very-21st-century, obviously youth-oriented catchphrase as "Nothing made me. I made me."; maybe I'm just being my obnoxiously picky self but this does detract from the Victorian milieu, and is simply put there for the 'cool' of it. So, three errors/mismatches already in a trailer that's not even 2 minutes long - and i havent mentioned one or two more in the same category, which I won't because I don't want to be cast out of this forum yet

You're just now noticing? :D But seriously, if you haven't already, do check out some of his other work. Yes actually :blush2: To my mind, Martin Freeman has thus far been witty, amiable, blokeish, endearingly angry, and even romantic (and here I'm thinking of the HoB scene where John chats up Dr Mortimer), but dashing - never! That scene of him clicking the pistol made my eyes pop out like Tom the cat's on seeing a pretty female! Which other work of Martin's would you recommend though? Apart from The Office which is yet to captivate my interest, or The Hobbit? Me too! And I suspect you're right about most of the above. But I'm trying to recall whether the original Watson was unfailingly grammatical. He was a doctor, not a grammar teacher. And surely he got flustered on occasion! If grammar was only for grammar teachers, then good health would only be for doctors, and intelligence only for consulting detectives :D Good grammar is like good manners, not a necessity but a sign of respect for the other personAnd if you're still unconvinced, may I remind of you of Ben's edict that grammar is important? B) (can't find the interview link just now) Plus, some of these errors are logical rather than grammatical -- and fairly picky at that! The writers may have put more emphasis on having the characters sound natural than keeping them strictly grammatical, and if so, I certainly won't argue. Very few people are all that consistently grammatical in real life. To your point about characters sounding natural, that is the exact problem with most of these ...incongruities; they are not mere technicalities, they just don't sound right for the period & characters - like the one Inge cited above. A period film (for that's just what the Special is really) is all about the detail. If you're not going to get the detail right then it looks a total sham.

Intriguing...how about U?

O please

Hmm I don't recall that...I'll have to rewatch TEH now, it isn't exactly my favourite episode and the reunion sequence is the only thing I really remember about it. But if these are genuine errors then I am seriously disappointed. It would show they haven't learned from the mixed reactions to Series 3, and prove my apprehensions that the sincere dedication and earnestness that underpinned Series 1 & 2 have been eroded by the resulting success.

Yes exactly !! My very thoughts I sincerely hope they do have something insidious & deceptive going on there, because i cannot believe they would allow such errors/mismatches, and such a number of them in this compact trailer.

"Well Holmes, surely you must have some theory?" Should that not be "Well Holmes, surely you have some theory?" or "Well Holmes, you must have some theory?" in order to be grammatically accurate; at least, for the period? Did they just spoil my favourite line in this trailer? Inge, i'd love for you to correct me here..

...hmm...I've just seen the trailer and it's a knockout...it's a crash course on 'how to make a good trailer' While 'Victorian' Benedict is by himself pure magic , what i found surprisingly cool in this trailer is Martin Freeman looking quite dashing. This man has range! I'm going to let my brain wallow in this for a bit before i try to make sense of the more recent posts about it!

More people I know are aware of Benedict Cumberbatch because of The Imitation Game than because of Sherlock, shockingly; it could be that I just don't know enough of the 'right' kind of people! :lol: But I guess it also shows that the 'accessibility' of TIG is actually a good thing, for Benedict's popularity atleast ;) And his role as Alan Turing was as much, if not more, about the vulnerability of the character as/than his genius. It is a very important story to bring to the masses, Alan Turing is a man to be celebrated, and I think whatever means the makers used to achieve that noble end are justified.

I'd like more scenes of Sherlock at his laptop, it's a joy to watch him type away at express speed. It was one of the bits I liked in the unaired pilot, and which was turned into a thing of beauty in The Great Game. When I first saw the pilot, I thought there was the possibility to make Sherlock a computer security expert, or atleast dabble in a bit of computer forensics. It is certainly something the modern Holmes would find fascinating. Yes a humongous amount of research would be required to get it right, however.

Support group, yeah, that's what I thought this was too, except most support groups are intended to help you get over your addiction/affliction/whatever, not drag you in deeper until resistance becomes futile! :lol2: Thanks for the correction, i just knew something was off there, and even though I was having a worse day than usual I need to be more careful when going by a name that Holmes honours with the possessive pronoun 'my' !

Your obsession is really bad when you join an online discussion forum with the objective of catharsis and rehabilitation through writing down what you think and feel*, only to find that you are now obsessed with the forum itself! And can barely get through a regular workday without looking in atleast once :( * - how sad is it that the therapist's advice to John in ASiP played in my mind as i wrote that line? Is there any hope for me at all? PS: I can actually remember a time not long ago when i used to be normal; but then, that was boring :lol: PS2: I am frightened of myself!

Yeah, could be dangerous

No, we're not likely to hear anything more about it But then "Not sure my life with Sherlock is compatible with long-term relationships." goes a little against his policy. To me this is a far more personal statement than the breakup with Sarah. It's a conclusion he seems to have jumped to, shockingly early, and basis just one example so far (i believe Sarah was John's first girlfriend after his moving into 221B). It is not a natural assumption for a normal person to make that living with his current flatmate is going to be the defining pattern of his life when he can see it is not 'compatible' with having a long-term relationship, and if the thought does occur to John on some level, he certainly wouldn't post it on his blog. Unless of course he's saying it in a light-hearted joking way, in which case the whole thing really does come across as quite heartless and more typical of Sherlock rather than John who is forever the careful and 'correct' one.

Is that how they put it on his blog? It sounds so cold and unaffected, he could be talking about the weather in New Zealand! If he were in the least bit emotionally invested in a relationship with Sarah, wouldn't he more likely say something like "Sarah thinks I spend less time with her than I do with my eccentric flatmate!"? instead of using the words "with Sherlock" as if that was the one unchanging descriptor of his life? I mean, yes that's how it's meant to be but do they have to be so obvious and artless about it? Not a very good choice of words there

I know. I didn't mean my response to sound as sharp as it may have done. And you may very well be right! ...I must tell you I hold the official world record for sounding sharper than intended; been at it since I was this high. From what I've read of your posts here you don't stand a whiff of a chance against me on that count :D

Well of course he read the script; don't take me literally, i was being facetious and that imagined conversation is meant to be a sort of verbal cartoon What I was trying to convey is that there probably was significant (to BC) difference between his original impression of the movie & his role, and the final product that was screened. I like Johnny Depp and I also like gangster movies as a genre, and yet such was my experience, so you certainly have every reason to pass up this one

See Inge, that happens too :D Seriously though, this image of Watson as the overall better guy is so widespread and deep-rooted that I was working from that assumption too, until I realised it is what was confusing me all this while about that scene. John isn't the calmest person in the world, certainly not as calm & collected as Sherlock is, despite his military experience (or maybe because of it). And when you spelled it out, it just clicked into place with what Arcadia said about Sherlock's insensitive comment triggering John's anger and the penny dropped in my head. I do agree with Arcadia that John is the perfect friend for Sherlock: his emotional nature and admiration for Sherlock ensure his complete loyalty to the detective, his adventurous side, intelligence, and skill with weapons make him a most reliable companion when it's time for action, and even if he initially has trouble coming to grips with Sherlock's motivations & principles he must be given credit for making an effort to understand. How else could he live with him for so long? What I do not like is his near-presumption of moral superiority when he 'corrects' Sherlock, I find it actually annoying at times. And the fact that the writers insinuated the "you keep me right" bit into the best man speech was, to me, proof that the whole episode was a JohnLock fantasy-feeder (as if that fantasy needed any more feeding!) Coming back to topic though,...er.. sorry I've no idea how to do that now

I went to see Black Mass on Saturday, with cautiously high expectations, and returned rather disappointed. It’s a movie that seems to keep wishing it were Donnie Brasco. (I certainly did) Black Mass tries to go almost everywhere that DB or Goodfellas did, but doesn’t quite get there. It is slow yet sketchy, and lacks much of the tension that marks a good gangster movie (e.g. any of Martin Scorsese’s stuff). Johnny Depp easily commands the show despite his makeup which is rather pasty. He achieves with his voice and body language what none of the violence could. Cumberbatch seems to have been conned (or threatened!) into signing this movie, because he’s utterly wasted. The interview of him that I saw was sprinkled with words like “Shakespearean” and “searing”, and there definitely was scope to explore the brothers’ complex relationship, but that potential sadly remained ignored. One of the scenes he may have been referring to was between him and Depp where Billy persuades Jimmy to meet with Connolly, but which was conspicuously edited out, leaving us just a fragment where we see Senator Billy Bulger in an apron, serving his mom and brother dinner. Because it was more important to show us the ‘warm family’ picture than the brothers’ conversation! Of course, Cumberbatch is earnest and convincing in the non-role he’s been handed, but the bitter truth is they could have edited him out completely and the movie would still stand. Why suffer such injustice Ben? You deserve much better. Your fear of being stereotyped by the success of Sherlock is understandable but it’s no reason to rush into cool-sounding projects without making sure you’re getting a substantial deal. I can almost picture what the conversation must have been like: Ben, are you sick of playing intellectual sociopaths? Yes Wanna do a gangster flick? Yes of course I keep dreaming about it but ..er.. We’re going to cross-breed Donnie Brasco and The Departed. <Sharp intake of breath> You’ll play a suave politician whose complex, dark relationship with his gang-leader brother is the centerpiece of the story. Oh-kaay sounds lovely Johnny Depp’s playing that gang-leader brother. Wanna sign up? God, yes Tricky business, movies.

Hmm...thanks Arcadia and Inge, those two comments from you seem to be the solution I'm looking for: John Watson as someone easy to anger plus Sherlock's comment being just the trigger to unleash his anger. May also explain why John bothers correcting Sherlock's manners throughout the series - its the one way he gets some of his own back after playing second fiddle. And Sherlock must have a lot of patience to resign himself to so much 'correcting'. To me Sherlock will always be the better human being of the two, not just in this series but even in the canon.

Thanks Arcadia Mark of respect, yes; though what form might John expect it to take - words? Especially as it didn't look to me as if Sherlock was feeling no remorse; he was clearly affected by it, he just managed to shrug it off quickly rather than dwelling on it. Instead of assuming Sherlock wasn't human enough and being angry about it, I expected John to see it as Sherlock's extreme self-possession and focus, and feel a bit of admiration.

I partially rewatched The Great Game yesterday (it is possibly my favourite episode of all) and wondered all over again what exactly John expects Sherlock to do in that scene at 221B where he gets angry / feels disappointed with Sherlock. The first time I watched the episode my reaction to John's reaction was and it hasn't evolved much in subsequent rewatches: so far I just ignored it in favour of the myriad other interesting things going on in this episode, but now I really need to understand what exactly John wanted there. Did he just want Sherlock to state, out loud, how sorry he was that so many died in that blast? That would be just silly considering (a) John knows how focussed Sherlock is on the work and can hardly be expected to waste time mourning strangers when he's on a case, and (b) Sherlock's expression there conveys that he does regret the needless death of so many innocents. Or maybe (a) above is not (yet) true, that at this point John doesn't really know Sherlock? Even so, is that reason enough for him to be angry? (It is possible that if i keep on typing and expanding this post I may just hit upon the answer myself but who knows how much time that will take :D ) I read through some of the early posts in this thread which touch on this scene but I don't think any of them really answers my question. Any ideas please?

I haven't the least clue how the political levers work in the world of the BBC, so when I read that in the race to succeed Stephenson as drama controller, Faith Penhale who apparently has been managing Sherlock and Doctor Who et al lost out to Polly Hill (Poldark etc.), I imagine dark implications. Maybe I am worrying needlessly, and being too cynical, but all too often I've seen politics undercut talent and render some very good work undone.

http://www.contactmusic.com/benedict-cumberbatch/news/bbc-drama-chief-ben-stephenson-says-licence-fee-needs-to-be-increased-to-save-dramas_4721825 I do hope this doesn't prove to be bad news for British television in general and Sherlock in particular.

I wouldn't have known he said that if it weren't for your post, thanks Inge; and I actually like it that Cumberbatch speaks his mind instead of going to painful lengths to achieve political correctness. I prefer my celebrities to be outspoken rather than overly guarded. It's the only way to get any sort of glimpse into how they really are as people, and I find it very heartening that actors like Cumberbatch are too passionately devoted to their work to be constantly thinking about their image and choice of words. Of course, Cumberbatch is hardly Bohemian in that sense, but I'd rather hear sincerely meant abuse from his lips than a PR-manufactured, perfectly constructed statement meant only to please. Coming to 'populist', from interviews I have watched dating to 2010-'11, I gather that Cumberbatch was in two minds when told he was the makers' choice to play Sherlock, because of the immense popularity of, and the sheer number of productions involving, that character - this series had to be something special and different in order to really work and be a worthy addition to a serious actor's resume. It wasn't a hard argument to follow and the rationale was quite logical. I believe that his use of the word 'populist' was in that spirit, and see no reason why it should be otherwise. He's not a maverick but he's hardly snobbish either.