Sherlock co-creator Mark Gatiss has revealed this week that the next season of the BBC’s hit detective drama is “even longer” than two years away. If and when it does return, though, the writer has teased that anything could happen. In fact, he doesn’t rule out another one-off, alternate universe special like the 2015 episode “The Abominable Bride,” which deposited the detective and the doctor in the Victorian era.
Gatiss was asked in an interview with Radio Times (see above) what he and co-creator Steven Moffat would never do in another season of Sherlock – and he refused to rule anything out.
“Who knows? Well, the Victorian special kind of started out as a joke and then became a real thing and we have joked about doing one in black and white where they fight the Nazis so, you know, maybe that’s what we’ll do.”
Moffat and Gatiss’ idea presumably stems from the classic Sherlock Holmes films starring Basil Rathbone that were made through World War II. These flicks were the first adaptation to bring the character into the then present, with the detective helping the war effort and defeating Nazi agents. Moffat and Gatiss have always said how the Rathbone movies have been a big influence on them, so it would be fun if they paid homage with a one-off special.
Gatiss also talked about the importance of how season 4 of the show ended, as it reimagined the series as a kind of “origin story” to the usual Sherlock Holmes tale.
“I think what we did – and it wasn’t our intention at the beginning – I think what we sort of ended up doing was writing their origin story. The reason, very specifically, the last frame of the end of series four is them in Rathbone Place and Mary’s Morstan’s voiceover saying ‘you have become the legend. You have become what we need you to be’ is we’ve sort of got them to where they usually are when we pick up the story.”
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