Pardon, but your tie is not symmetrical.

The appalling travesty that was BBC’s Sherlock has infested the Sherlock Holmes fandom like a malignant tumour so I want you all to know how awesome the OG literary Holmes was:

Mr. Doyle if you didn’t want us to love your weird detective so much you shouldn’t have made him such a fucking delight

someone: sherlock holmes is a machine, haven’t you read the books—

me, opening up my ornate copy of acd’s sherlock holmes, with its tender illustrations, pointing blindly to any line holmes says: he’s a sweet boy

Holmes: *catches Watson’s eye and bursts into helpless giggles*

Holmes: “No, you haven’t committed an actual crime, but if the lady has a brother or a friend he ought to lay a whip across your shoulders. In fact–” *flushes with rage* *grabs riding crop* *smug ill-treater of women flees in terror*

Holmes: *philosophizes about goodness* *sees God in a rose*

Holmes: *constantly frets that Watson - who adores Holmes so transparently he practically walks around with hearteyes - will stop admiring him if he explains his deductions and takes the magic out of them* *like* *the master of observation is straight-up oblivious to the fact that Watson thinks he hung the moon* *or else too insecure to accept the blindingly obvious*

Holmes: *is extraordinarily sensitive to the signs of abuse, and unfailingly gentle and careful with abuse victims*

Holmes: *encounters particularly engaging puzzle of a case* *rubs fingers in glee* *quite literally WRIGGLES IN HIS CHAIR out of sheer delight*

Holmes: *battles chronic depression for his entire life*

Holmes: *leaves a king’s handshake hanging because he treated his mistress poorly* *in fact, derives a good bit of his reputation for rudeness from the fact that he is supremely unintimidated by rank and power*

Holmes: “You look exhausted my dear doctor, lie down on our couch and let me play you to sleep with my violin”

Holmes: *uses drugs because his brain constantly runs at about 500000 rpms and he needs a fucking break*

Holmes: *goes to concerts, closes his eyes, and listens for hours with a soft half-smile of rapture on his face*

Holmes: *unselfconsciously chatters endearments at a dog*

Holmes: *devotes his entire life to helping people, and does it for free anytime someone can’t afford him*

Watson: *gets grazed by a bullet*

Holmes: *Pistol-whips Watson’s attacker* *drops to the floor and begs Watson to tell Holmes he’s all right* *upon confirming that his friend isn’t hurt, informs the would-be murderer in a cold, terrifying fury that if he’d succeeded in killing Watson he wouldn’t have made it out of the room alive*

Me: WTF STORIES DID THESE PEOPLE EVEN READ

MOOD

@oldshrewsburyian

I’ve never heard of this kind of Sherlock…

I never got into it cos I just heard he was cold and standoffish but this… This just 🥺who is this sweet boy?

@starlightshadowsworld this is the original Arthur Conan Doyle canon. The post doesn’t mention—perhaps because it’s already so long—the following:

—Holmes catches a murderer. Proceeds to let him go on the basis that the murderer was protecting his childhood sweetheart, who was being horribly abused.

—Lets a completely different murderer go on the basis that he’s terminally ill and two innocent people’s lives will be ruined if he’s convicted, something today we’d call “compassionate release.”

—A client gets Holmes’ advice and basically goes “thank you, but no.” Rather than berate her about being a stupid woman and him being a man who knows best (which would have been totally expected in the time period), Holmes basically goes “I think you’re making a mistake, I hope I’m wrong, but if I’m not all you have to do is send a letter and Watson and I will be there any time, day or night, to assist you.” If you’re following Dracula Daily, you’ll know that this promise means Holmes expects he can be summoned literally within only a couple of hours and he will be there in the same amount of time, no questions asked.

—in one of the later stories, Watson comments that Holmes could easily have purchased the Baker Street boarding house four times over for the amount he’s paid in rent over the years. Since the place is owned by Mrs. Hudson but we never see a Mr. Hudson in residence, there’s some speculation that Mr. Hudson either has passed away or is estranged from his wife due to abuse, and Holmes’ decision to remain as a renter rather than purchasing the place or moving to more moneyed quarters is because it’s a way of ensuring Mrs. Hudson has an income and can remain independent.

If the written word isn’t your thing, please check out the Jeremy Brett series, also known as the Granada series, from the 1980s. Brett insisted on it being so loyal to the original stories that you can almost use the books to read along.

as with so much media, i am really only familiar with TEH ORIGINALE but yes this is the sherlock i love <3

the character of benoit blanc references many other fictional detectives. for example, the fact he's gay is a nod to sherlock holmes

Watson and Holmes have a true crime podcast. Holmes goes off on very boring scientific tangents at least thrice an episode and Watson guides him back on topic with his extremely dry sense of humor. Lestrade is occasionally a guest on the show and Holmes finds new ways to subtly suggest he’s an idiot. Mycroft is in like one show a year and the fans love him because he’s unexpectedly very funny. They ask for more Mycroft episodes and it becomes a running gag that every week Mycroft is in a different obscure location where he cannot he reached. Mrs. Hudson invites herself in and knows a suspicious amount about dismemberment strategy and blood spatter.

Watson: Hello, and welcome back to the show. The elder Holmes will not be consulting on this case as he is still trapped in the catacombs and we have received word he has dropped his phone in a puddle of Parisian sewage. Rotten luck, truly. In other news, our landlady has begun rendering fat for the creation of lye soap, she claims it is lard but we have not seen her bridge club rival in some time. We will certainly come back to that later but now for the more pressing topic.

Holmes: This week we will be discussing the rash of arsenic poisonings occurring in Whitechapel between 1884 and 1887.

Watson: This week we WILL be discussing the rash of arsenic poisonings occurring in Whitechapel between 1884 and 1887, so help us God.

Watson: How have you been since we last spoke, Lestrade.

Lestrade: Well, somewhat vexed. A woman in my jurisdiction received a pair of human ears in the post and my wife has left m-

Holmes: WAIT WAIT, GO BACK!

Watson: EARS?

Holmes: EARS?!?!?!?

Holmes: HOW COME NO ONE GIVES ME EARS?!?!?!?

they then set up a PO box so people may send Holmes weird stuff they find, thus beginning his consulting detective career and also his collection of human teeth and cursed objects

someone: sherlock holmes is a machine, haven’t you read the books—

me, opening up my ornate copy of acd’s sherlock holmes, with its tender illustrations, pointing blindly to any line holmes says: he’s a sweet boy

Holmes: *catches Watson’s eye and bursts into helpless giggles*

Holmes: “No, you haven’t committed an actual crime, but if the lady has a brother or a friend he ought to lay a whip across your shoulders. In fact–” *flushes with rage* *grabs riding crop* *smug ill-treater of women flees in terror*

Holmes: *philosophizes about goodness* *sees God in a rose*

Holmes: *constantly frets that Watson - who adores Holmes so transparently he practically walks around with hearteyes - will stop admiring him if he explains his deductions and takes the magic out of them* *like* *the master of observation is straight-up oblivious to the fact that Watson thinks he hung the moon* *or else too insecure to accept the blindingly obvious*

Holmes: *is extraordinarily sensitive to the signs of abuse, and unfailingly gentle and careful with abuse victims*

Holmes: *encounters particularly engaging puzzle of a case* *rubs fingers in glee* *quite literally WRIGGLES IN HIS CHAIR out of sheer delight*

Holmes: *battles chronic depression for his entire life*

Holmes: *leaves a king’s handshake hanging because he treated his mistress poorly* *in fact, derives a good bit of his reputation for rudeness from the fact that he is supremely unintimidated by rank and power*

Holmes: “You look exhausted my dear doctor, lie down on our couch and let me play you to sleep with my violin”

Holmes: *uses drugs because his brain constantly runs at about 500000 rpms and he needs a fucking break*

Holmes: *goes to concerts, closes his eyes, and listens for hours with a soft half-smile of rapture on his face*

Holmes: *unselfconsciously chatters endearments at a dog*

Holmes: *devotes his entire life to helping people, and does it for free anytime someone can’t afford him*

Watson: *gets grazed by a bullet*

Holmes: *Pistol-whips Watson’s attacker* *drops to the floor and begs Watson to tell Holmes he’s all right* *upon confirming that his friend isn’t hurt, informs the would-be murderer in a cold, terrifying fury that if he’d succeeded in killing Watson he wouldn’t have made it out of the room alive*

Me: WTF STORIES DID THESE PEOPLE EVEN READ

MOOD

Bath commission for bilbos-pantaloons

The Unpublished Cases

If you are ever looking for plot ideas… take a look at the list of cases mentioned in Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories which are mentioned but not explained. I have italicised the cases that make a reappearance in some form or another in BBC Sherlock.

I have used several of these in my own stories, including Wilson, the notorious canary-trainer and the Bishopsgate Jewellery case.  Case fic lies at the heart of every Sherlock Holmes story, so you might want to think about how to work these ACD stories into your own. 

[ID: a black and white, pen & ink and wash drawing of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson by Sidney Paget.

Watson sits in an armchair, legs crossed, leaning back. Holmes lies sideways on a chaise longue, one hand on his hip, the other holding a note. Between them on the ground is a newspaper. Both look relaxed. The following words, in colorful and varied fonts, got edited onto the drawing:

Saturday chillin. Don't fucking @ me today. I'm chillin. /end ID].

The way that most of Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories’ most horrible villains are rich dudes that are abusive to women, in a time such as the 1880’s, compels me.

There’s a whole subset of Sherlock Holmes stories that could be labeled Asshole Guys Try to Control Women’s Money.

Yup, there’s a huge number of times where Sherlock Holmes is the ONLY person to take a young woman’s complaint or worry seriously and finds out someone is up to some serious evil.  Holmes also shows a lot of compassion and empathy with the victims over and over again.  (This is why I find “Secretly a woman” or “Trans” Holmes headcanons much more convincing than “sociopath” Holmes.)

I am never going to shut up about how much I specifically love The Adventure of The Copper Beeches because it is literally Sherlock Holmes listening to a young lady he does not know except as a potential client, agreeing with her that a potential job she has interviewed for that she thinks is SUPER SKETCHY is, indeed, sketchy as fuck and when she says she’s probably gonna take the job anyways because the money is good and she needs it going “OKAY I GUESS but for the love of god please write to us so we know you’re okay we will literally drop everything and jump on a train if you want us to”.

The job turns out to indeed be sketchy as fuck, she writes to them, Holmes and Watson drop everything and jump on a train when she asks them to. I read this story for the first time when I was twelve and it made a HUGE impression.

This is also the basis for a lot of speculation about Holmes’ family life.  The idea that he has been a victim of abuse, or his mother was abused (or even murdered by his father.)  There’s definitely SOMETHING that makes him very aware of how dangerous isolated families can be, and the dark things that can happen behind closed doors.  Plus, of course, the motivation to devote himself to stopping crime.  And yes, so much of it is of the personal type. 

dude see this is one aspect of the original books i NEVER understand why modern remakes (cough cough) don’t go all in on. Like, in the 21th c we HAVE all the dumb forensic shit that made Victorian Holmes stand out, but we STILL DON’T HAVE uh….you know, compassion for women and minorities, or the willingness to believe them, adequate community support for domestic violence or hate crimes, etc. etc. which you’d think is exactly where a renegade consulting detective would come in handy. A good modern day Sherlock Holmes remake, instead of trying to convince us that Holmes is some super genius for being better than fingerprint analysis or whatever, could have him just be…a good person who helps out people the police can’t and won’t help. There you go. That’s how to write a relevant modern Holmes.

One thing that annoys me is how much the BBC version of Sherlock (and the fandom around it) focus on police cases or cold cases.  In the stories, Holmes’ bread and butter cases had fuck-all to do with the police and in a few stories, he actively works around/against them, or outright lies to them.  Of the many, many things I wish that show had done differently, this is one is particularly obnoxious since it’s such a gimme.

There were very few actual murder cases in the Canon, and Holmes handled them either one of two ways:

Option one: The murder victim was innocent while the killer was an abusive bastard, see Speckled Band. Conclusion, arrest and have the killer charged (Or in the case of Speckled Band, indirectly murder him yourself then shrug and go home)

Option two: The victim was murdered to protect someone that the victim was abusing, or for vengeance, see Boscombe Valley, Devil’s Foot, Abbey Grange. Conclusion, Oops, I don’t know who the killer is, I am suddenly incompetent, oh look a pheasant.

#my favorite murder in holmes canon#is when they straight up witness a lady murder her blackmailer#do nothing except destroy his other blackmail material#and then straight up lie to lestrade about it#sherlock holmes#more of this in modern adaptations pls (via @cactusspatz )

I just imagined the sherlock holmes canon written in the style of pg wodehouse and im on the floor dying. “His chin had a certain thinginess to it and he shimmered about the place with a dash good amount of whotsit.”

*sherlock swooning on a chaise* fish me out of the soup, doctor

[standing above a dead body at a crime scene]

john: rummy circs this. i mean to say this cove’s sleeping with hades tonight for cert, what

sherlock: you’ve got the ticket again, old thing, and yours are usually first class. never lower than second. i advise we dine out to further pursue that thread.

lestrade: dr watson, mr holmes, can you please talk in an english the rest of us can understand 

john: Oh You Old So and So! always so froggy with the old map, what! we’re right on top of it 

sherlock: toodle pip, you darling lamb 

lestrade: omg pls

TOODLE PIP

Happy New Year one and all!

This marks the end of my third year posting a short story or chapter a week! This past year was mostly longer fics with a few shorts scattered in between. It’s time again to count down some highlights:

Bertie Solves a Mystery - The year started off strong with what is probably my favorite thing I’ve ever written. Jeeves and Wooster get entangled in a murder mystery and none other than Hercule Poirot comes to investigate (and Wooster learns a bit more about Jeeves’s past along the way).

The Courting of Sherlock Holmes - In between my longer fics, I also posted a little series about the development of Holmes and Watson’s early relationship, of which I think this is my favorite, though I had a little trouble capturing the exact dynamic I had in mind.

Always the World’s Finest - I got back into superheroes and wrote a few short Superman/Batman fics, featuring a bit of fun and a bit of metafictional angst.

The Biology of Vulcans - I’ve slowed down significantly on writing for Star Trek, but I wrote a few shorts here and there, as well as something new: an essay about how the Vulcan mating system may have evolved.

Jeeves and the Great War - I was playing around with the chronology of the Jeeves stories and ended up with Jeeves and Wooster serving in WWI (don’t worry, they live). Angst and recovery, what more could you ask for?

Pursuing our True Selves - I got into Persona 4 a few years back and finally did a character deconstruction/reconstruction of Yosuke Hanamura, where he learns to accept his true self and his feelings for Yu/Souji.

As always there’s much more to come! Things may slow down a little bit because I’ve finally used up most of my backlog (which was up to 6 months at the beginning of this year), but the writing continues! I’ve been working on a Holmes/Watson post-return getting back together fic, which should come out in the next few weeks. I’ve been thinking about finishing up a bunch of short Jeeves and Wooster fics, and I’ve had my multi-crossover dark backstory Sherlock Holmes (etc…) AU, Designation: H, on the brain, so I expect more will come of that (and I am more than open to requests). With Millennium Death Note finished, I’ve been thinking about an even more ambitious Disney crossover that I keep swearing I’ll get back to one of these days… I have also had original fiction on the brain lately, which I expect I will be posting further thoughts about in the near future.

Here’s hoping for a great new year! I’d love to hear what everyone else is most proud of from the past year and what you’ve been thinking about for the next!

The way that most of Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories’ most horrible villains are rich dudes that are abusive to women, in a time such as the 1880’s, compels me.

There’s a whole subset of Sherlock Holmes stories that could be labeled Asshole Guys Try to Control Women’s Money.

Yup, there’s a huge number of times where Sherlock Holmes is the ONLY person to take a young woman’s complaint or worry seriously and finds out someone is up to some serious evil.  Holmes also shows a lot of compassion and empathy with the victims over and over again.  (This is why I find “Secretly a woman” or “Trans” Holmes headcanons much more convincing than “sociopath” Holmes.)

I am never going to shut up about how much I specifically love The Adventure of The Copper Beeches because it is literally Sherlock Holmes listening to a young lady he does not know except as a potential client, agreeing with her that a potential job she has interviewed for that she thinks is SUPER SKETCHY is, indeed, sketchy as fuck and when she says she’s probably gonna take the job anyways because the money is good and she needs it going “OKAY I GUESS but for the love of god please write to us so we know you’re okay we will literally drop everything and jump on a train if you want us to”.

The job turns out to indeed be sketchy as fuck, she writes to them, Holmes and Watson drop everything and jump on a train when she asks them to. I read this story for the first time when I was twelve and it made a HUGE impression.

This is also the basis for a lot of speculation about Holmes’ family life.  The idea that he has been a victim of abuse, or his mother was abused (or even murdered by his father.)  There’s definitely SOMETHING that makes him very aware of how dangerous isolated families can be, and the dark things that can happen behind closed doors.  Plus, of course, the motivation to devote himself to stopping crime.  And yes, so much of it is of the personal type. 

dude see this is one aspect of the original books i NEVER understand why modern remakes (cough cough) don’t go all in on. Like, in the 21th c we HAVE all the dumb forensic shit that made Victorian Holmes stand out, but we STILL DON’T HAVE uh….you know, compassion for women and minorities, or the willingness to believe them, adequate community support for domestic violence or hate crimes, etc. etc. which you’d think is exactly where a renegade consulting detective would come in handy. A good modern day Sherlock Holmes remake, instead of trying to convince us that Holmes is some super genius for being better than fingerprint analysis or whatever, could have him just be…a good person who helps out people the police can’t and won’t help. There you go. That’s how to write a relevant modern Holmes.

One thing that annoys me is how much the BBC version of Sherlock (and the fandom around it) focus on police cases or cold cases.  In the stories, Holmes’ bread and butter cases had fuck-all to do with the police and in a few stories, he actively works around/against them, or outright lies to them.  Of the many, many things I wish that show had done differently, this is one is particularly obnoxious since it’s such a gimme.

There were very few actual murder cases in the Canon, and Holmes handled them either one of two ways:

Option one: The murder victim was innocent while the killer was an abusive bastard, see Speckled Band. Conclusion, arrest and have the killer charged (Or in the case of Speckled Band, indirectly murder him yourself then shrug and go home)

Option two: The victim was murdered to protect someone that the victim was abusing, or for vengeance, see Boscombe Valley, Devil’s Foot, Abbey Grange. Conclusion, Oops, I don’t know who the killer is, I am suddenly incompetent, oh look a pheasant.

#my favorite murder in holmes canon#is when they straight up witness a lady murder her blackmailer#do nothing except destroy his other blackmail material#and then straight up lie to lestrade about it#sherlock holmes#more of this in modern adaptations pls (via @cactusspatz )

I love the fact that sherlock holmes doesnt really have any qualifications hes just some autistic guy whos allowed to do what he likes and i aspire to be that

Not bbc sherlock we dont talk about him

You understand

This heavily implies that at a certain point the people of London started bringing crime complaints to their awkward neighbor instead of the police and there was fuck all Lestrade could do about it

[#so true op #holmes is just a guy who dropped out of university two years in and hyperfixated on crime #’consulting detective’ just means private detective who lets the police copy his homework from time to time #i also love how he does not hesitate to commit crime]

[additional ID: the above reblog is the description of the screenshoted tags. /end ID]

Thinking about Holmes and Watson post-hiatus and how there's not even a question of them both moving back in to Baker Street. They're back in each other's lives now and it's mutually understood that that means living together again, they were separated once for three years and that was Enough Of That. Mutual "never letting you out of my sight again" you know??

#acd timelines are fucked but they do work out so they both live in baker street a second time i think

not only do we find out that they live there together again, but also how it comes to be:

from "The Adventure of the Norwood Builder"

Ever since I learned of the Russian Flu epidemic that was raging on and off in London (and all of Europe) from 1889 to 1895 with huge spikes every winter, I can't help thinking about how much the three years of Holmes's hiatus cost Watson. Not just in grief for his friend and then for his wife, but as a doctor in practice he'd have been in the forefront of fighting that disease.

Knowing what the current pandemic is doing to medical staff everywhere, and that's with much better means at their disposal, I can't help but think that Watson was in a truly terrible state when Holmes returned. So Holmes lost no time in getting Watson out of a situation that had worn him down completely.

hey, doyle, please don’t say watson keeps his stethoscope in his hat like that’s a normal thing, i refuse to believe that’s a normal thing

Sorry to disappoint but…

THIS IS THE OPPOSITE OF DISAPPOINTMENT IM SO HAPPY THAT PEOPLE SAW TOP HATS AND SAID “oh boy a new pocket :)”

[ID 1: a two-panel comic, showing Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. Sherlock seems to be kneeling and asks: “Whatson, have you got your stethoscope handy?” The next panel shows Watson lifting his hat and a stethoscope falls out of it. Sherlock looks surprised, eyebrows raised.

Underneath is a excerp from “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, A Scandal in Bohemia”:

“As to your practice, if a gentleman walks into my rooms smelling of iodoform, with a black mark of nitrate of silver upon his right forefinger, and a bulge on the right side of his top-hat to show where he has secreted his stethoscope, I must be dull, indeed, if I do not pronounce him to be an active member of the medical profession.’” /end ID].

[ID 2: two screenshots from Google books. The first one is from the book “The Victorian City: Everyday Life in Dicken’s London”:

“99. If Dickens is to be believed, men kept almost everything they woned in their hats. It is almost quicker to itemize those characters who did not use their hat as a handy man-bag. Those who did not include: Mr. Pickwick, who kees his glove and handkerchief there wen he goes skating; in Oliver Twist a hat is home to Mr. Bubmle’s handkerchief; the Dodger brings hot rolls and ham for breakfast in his; his pickpocket colleague Toby Crackit puts a shawl in ‘my castor’ [castor=beaver]; in Nicholas Nickleby, Newman Noggs, flustered, tries to fit a parcel ‘some two feet square’ into his, as well as keeping-”

The second screenshot is from the book “Victorian London: The Life of a City 1840-1870”:

“-temperature. In 1816 a French doctor, Laennec, was faced with a female patient with chest problems. Etiquette forbade him to listen to her thoracic noises by simply putting his ear to her chest, so he invented the stethoscope, a wooded tube which could conveniently be carried in a top hat. Blood presure could be measured by an elderly version of the sphygmomanometer. Microscopy was becoming more and more sophisticated. The 1862 Year Book of Medicine, Surgery and Other Allied Sciences recommended that ‘the bandages and instruments which have been used for gangrenous wounds ought not, if possible [my italics], to be employed for a second time,28 but post-operative deaths from 'hospital-” /end ID].