Sherlock – The Abominable Bride [DVD] [2016]

Wow! Take the concept, add the twist - show us what is going on in Sherlock's mind and how he works out the problem, sometimes holding onto his sanity, his concentration and his plot twists by a knife edge. This is brilliant writing from a team that knows and loves the Holmes character and canon inside out and treat their audience as intelligent - as intelligent as they are (what a compliment!) Thus is ground breaking, revelatory TV at it's best.No wonder so many people have got the wrong end of the stick and are confused and disappointed. Look again, open your mind, recognise you have been pitched headlong deep into Sherlock's though processes - have you spotted that wonderful fleeting scene in the hansom cab where Watson appears as both his modern and Victorian selves as Sherlock holds onto his sanity by his fingertips?This special manages to deliver several things all at once: a new Victorian plot, an insight into all the characters, give a respectful nod to the original stories, provide an old fashioned ghost story for Christmas and find a way of adding even more depths to the continuing modern saga of Sherlock - and yet they still manage to add a great cliffhanger ending which leads us brilliantly into series four.Compliments too for the presence of the grossly fat Mycroft ( as per the original stories; yet unrecognisable as the normally sleek Mark Gatiss ) and a transmutation of Molly into Hooper; a credible and well acted trope based in history, fact and folklore. Give Moffatt and Gatiss all credit for their courage and commitment for writing the most intelligent, brilliant and trailblazing drama on television today. Onwards and upwards, everyone! And God bless you all for the only intelligent, daring and fresh take on current TV.

I've been a Sherlock Holmes fan for many years and so many great actors have played the part (Peter Cushing, Basil Rathbone, and Ian McKellen to name but a few). For me Benedict Cumberbatch is as good as the best of them and the new adaptations are wonderful to watch as they nod to the original Conan Doyle stories but with new twists and turns. This episode is one I love as one thread so resembles the Jeremy Brett era but also there's the modern day tale running alongside, all peppered with humour and Hammer Horror. For me it was a case of just watching, not thinking and enjoying the well written, superbly acted, great special effect laden story. This edition has a 'Making Of'' section on the bonus disc which is also worth watching. Basically if the new Sherlock isn't your thing, don't buy this. If you however, enjoy the Moffat/Gatiss vision of the world's greatest consulting detective you'll enjoy this.

Unfortunately, it's difficult to review this without giving away spoilers, so you have been warned. First of all, is this scary? No. Not really. I'm a self-confessed wuss, but this is not scary - creepy at times, yes, but there are no jump scares and I'm sure that if you can't sleep after watching this, it'll be because you're mulling over the crazy and complicated plot, not because you're terrified that the bride's gonna kill ya! The episode got a 15 rating from the BBFC due to the graphic scene of suicide (some blood is shown, again I'm a wuss and I was fine, so you will be too).You have to watch this with your full attention - it is so complicated that you can't miss anything without becoming completely lost. Also, don't watch if you haven't seen at least S2E3 and S3E3, as this episode follows directly from these episodes. It's complicated and confusing but so totally worth it - watch it before series 4 comes out in 2017!

First of all: I liked this idea very much.(Beware: Spoiler!)The story is mostly set in Sherlock's mind, in his Mind Palace, where he tries to solve a puzzle by solving an old puzzle of the year 1895. This - imagined - case of a Sherlock Holmes and John Watson living in the victorian era centres around a real cirme of that era that has never been solved. Whilst this dreamt up plot evolves, the other pressures of Sherlock's life - his relationship with his brother, Molly, and, most of all, Moriarty as THE nemesis of Sherlock's existence, the only opponent who ever really got under his skin and built a nest there - get mixed up with the story. The plot is therefore not always very realistic, but that is just the point of it all: Sherlock, massively self-drugged to the dismay of his friends, makes it all up in his mind. The plot is a mixture of a dream (and how realistic are those, usually?), a vision (people who have a rare talent for interconnected thinking tend to have those) and a new way to use a restructured Mind Palace. In short: Sherlock is busy restructuring his mental infrastructure after the encounter with Moriarty (and Milverton) left him damaged. Milverton has a short and almost unconnected show-up, to be sure. But it is readily believable that the strain of the murder and the subsequent time in prison, the new exile that had been a death sentence really, and then Mycroft's call back from that would have driven Sherlock to an overdose and to the ensuing visions. He's struggling to get the upper hand on his inner life. At the same time he's trying, with this very imaginations, to solve the puzzle of Moriarty's death and reappearnce by solving that 120 year old crime of a woman doing the same: Blowing her head off, and coming back to commit crimes.Towards the end, there's a short but cheeky detour into violent feminism and Suffragettes which I find very witty and a nice touch. As Sherlock himself never suffered a blow without fighting back, as he's seen first hand what a secret criminal network can do, and as he's got a guilty consience about what he did to Janine and Molly, it seems "logical" that he expects women to form an underground army and shoot their male oppressors for their misbehaviour. Sometimes I ask myself why we haven't done that yet :-). So, although I do not condone homicide in women more than in men: As this is a dream of a man with a well deserved guilty conscience, all accusations of a morally ambigious "bow" to violent feminism concerning this film are grossly exaggerated in my opinion.The only thing I did, to my own dismay, not like about the film, is seeing Sherlock and John in the setting and the footsteps of Holmes and Watson. It is true that the Victorian setting Sherlock chooses for his Mind Palace (and one might assume that this redecoration and restructuring is of the permanent sort) is much closer to Arthur Conan Doyle's stories than the 21st century setting. But in the original stories, as much as I adore them, the others, Lestrade, for example and most prominently John Watson himself, have no life of their own. They're lovable, but a trifle dumb. They're in the plot to get it - and/or keep it - going. That is, to quote the film, in the narrative, broadly speaking, their function. For that I (for one) prefer Jeremy Brett and the Granada series or the Arthur Conan Doyle Books themselves.I've fallen in love with the more vulnerable Sherlock, the smarter and stronger John Watson, the less expendable Mrs Hudson and the formidable, lovable and not at all stupid Lestrade of the 21st century. To see the supporting characters cut back once more to fit into Sherlock's very personal, very individual and very Doyl-ish inner world is an ingenious idea, but it is not as likable to me as the 21st century setting has become.Therefore, although I could do with more of the Christmas Specials in Sherlock's Victorian Mind Palace in contrast to not seeing Sherlock and John AT ALL, I'm longingly looking forward to the next three pieces in our own time. May they come to us very soon, to a small screen near us.