What a mess! Messes can be fun, granted. Entertaining, even. But instead of gripping and compelling television, the newest season of Sherlock (and for my money, the entire series) is just a barely cogent series of fun sequences that scream "look at how well Benedict Cumberbatch is thinking on his feet without even trying!" mixed with absurd melodrama and farcical twists and action sequences that feel like they needed higher budgets than they were granted. Sherlock just isn't good! It's not that I'm missing what makes it great; it's that the show simply isn't great. And that's fine! Anyone out there reading this who's a big fan - hey, cool! I enjoy a lot of crappy television myself. No judgment here. But this particular mess just ain't my thing.
Kayla was telling me recently that a big reason the show seems to get messier and less consistent every time it comes back (her own hypothesis) is that, since there are two years between every season, its writers go off and do different things between seasons, and every time they come back they've all acquired different flourishes and styles and they're eager to cram them all into three ninety-minute episodes and call it a season of Sherlock. That makes a lot of sense to me! It certainly seems to explain the show's ongoing and ever-wrosening ADHD. And it also helps to suggest why this show is, and long has been, literally unbelievable, which is not something an ostensible mystery series should strive to be. I don't think I'll be back for Season 5.
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