Gem compares Elementary and Sherlock’s approach to adapting Arthur Conan Doyle’s original stories…
Warning: contains plot details forSherlockseries three andElementaryseason two.
Weve been granted no fewer than three recent interpretations of the consulting detective.
Purists, however, should probably look elsewhere.
In Jonny Lee Miller and Benedict Cumberbatch, we have two completely different Sherlocks.
Many feared thatElementarywould merely retread the ground covered by the BBCs version.
Instead, weve seen the same material reworked by both in subtly different ways.
Other aspects of Conan Doyles original stories, of course, need no real adjustment at all.
Some things, sadly, never change.
The choices made byElementarys showrunner, Rob Doherty, have been a little different.
Her gender change isnt entirely unprecedented, either.
In any case, modern tweaks naturally required adjustments to be made.
Elementarys rarely tackled individual Conan Doyle stories head on.
As the great man himself would doubtless remind us, the devil is in the detail.
Cumberbatchs Sherlock describes himself as a high-functioning sociopath.
Millers Holmes, meanwhile, is a different proposition.
A single scene defines Millers spin on the character.
Perhaps, he muses, it would have been better had he been born in another, simpler time.
Read , andSherlockon Den of Geek.
