Fans of the excellent BBC series Sherlock can rest assured that the recent Hollywood success of Benedict Cumberbatch and his on-screen partner in crime fighting Martin Freeman will not spell the end for the incredibly popular series. The two English actors have both recently been turning heads across the pond in major big budget blockbusters. Freeman is of course the lead in Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit trilogy, while Cumberbatch is not only voicing the dragon Smaug in Jackson’s opus but also playing the arch villain in next year’s Star Trek Into Darkness.
Naturally, for fans of Sherlock, Steven Moffat and Mark Gattis’ captivating modern day re-imagining of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous sleuth, there is a worry that its two leads will soon become too big for TV and understandably opt to further their movie careers at the expense of the TV series. However, in a recent interview with Yahoo UK, Cumberbatch put those fears to bed and stated:
I don’t think that’s a possibility because I love it too much. Making [Sherlock] is all about availability. Martin Freeman has the same kind of pressures on him now. It’s a thing of quality not quantity that show – thank God. We started young with it. We started when they meet and we still are young for those roles. There’s no reason why it can’t continue until we get too old.
Sherlock really has been one of the best things on UK TV in recent years and it’s telling that as Cumberbatch points out, the series opts for quality not quantity. Every season so far as been just three episodes long but they are so wonderfully crafted that it was like watching three high quality crime dramas rather than your average TV detective series. And so, it’s no surprise that the show’s return has been hotly anticipated ever since Season 2 spectacularly came to a close in January of this year. Filming for Season 3 is due to start in March of 2013, so while a 2013 airing date isn’t out of the question, all things point towards a 2014 release.
Several months ago now the first vague plot details were released for Season 3 when Steven Moffat tweeted:
Last year it was Woman, Hound, Fall. This year’s three words revealed tomorrow at
#MGEITF#Sherlock Master Class.
Each of these words subtly related to an episode from Season 2:
- Woman = A Scandal in Bohemia (‘The Woman’ being Irene Adler)
- Hound = The Hounds of Baskerville (Self explanatory)
- Fall = The Final Problem (The infamous Reichenbach Falls)
Moffat then followed this up with the tweet:
So. The three tease words for the next run of Sherlock … Rat. Wedding. Bow.
Naturally this sent the internet into overdrive, although Moffat did warn that these words could be red-herrings designed to send you in the wrong direction. However, many have argued that ‘Rat’ may refer to The Giant Rat of Sumatra, though it is widely reported that the first episode back will involve elements of The Adventure of the Empty House, which was the first story Conan Doyle wrote after bowing to popular opinion and bringing Sherlock back from the dead. After the incredible cliffhanger at the end of Season 2, which I for one am still trying to figure out, this would certainly make a great deal of sense.
‘Wedding’ has been interpreted as a reference to The Noble Bachelor, while ‘Bow’ ominously has been linked to ‘His Last Bow’, the last chronological Sherlock Holmes story that Conan Doyle wrote and in which he finally had Holmes retire.
As it stands though, we can only hope that the next season will not be Sherlock‘s last. Cumberbatch’s comments are certainly promising but it would not be at all surprising if both he and Freeman opted to focus their energies elsewhere once this next run of three are done. I’m personally torn between wanting the show to go out on a high and also wanting it to go on as long as possible, but for now we can only wait for more news as Moffat and Gattis release it.
Source: Screen Rant
