Elementary Season 2 Thoughts, So Far

Happy long weekend, fellow Canadians!

The first three episodes of the lesser-liked modern Sherlock Holmes series are out. So of course I jotted down what I thought, because: Sherlock Holmes.

Step Nine (2×01)

+ Mycroft! Lestrade! Langdale Pike! REFERENCES = MY FAVOURITE.

+ Let me expand a little more: I love that we get Lestrade and Gregson in the same re-working of canon (and also Hopkins, but we saw less him), and that they have distinct personalities.

– But did they decide they’d have enough of making straight, white male characters into new characters who were something other than straight, white, and male? Or did they just forget that other types of people exist in England? C’mon, that’s one of the things that fascinates me about this show: how the dynamic between the characters changes when their personalities stay the same but their demographic is different.

– Little thing, but why does Watson hand her suitcase off to Holmes to go upstairs? Watson is strong enough to carry that. We don’t even get a redeeming little moment, like Sherlock: “Yay, stairs!!!”, Watson: “Yeah, I’m jet-lagged, and if you’re excited about stairs, you can carry this.”

+/- I’m ambivalent about the portrayal of Mycroft. So far, he seems like just a normal guy who’s kind of suave and mature, actually. I like him as a person. But how is he Mycroft Holmes? Mycroft is canonically smarter than Sherlock — didn’t see that here.

+/- P.S., why do modern adaptations of Sherlock Holmes always make Sherlock and Mycroft hate each other? I get that contemporary writers need to explain why Holmes never mentions that he has a brother. And I see why the BBC’s Sherlock needed inter-sibling conflict to make the viewer unsure whether certain mysterious shadowy figures were Moriarty or Mycroft. But is that the only interesting way their relationship can go? And it’s kind of weird that modern!Mycroft is usually a force trying to bring his younger brother more in-line with society, when Conan Doyle’s Mycroft always seemed to me to be the more socially messed-up Holmes brother. At least Sherlock has an affinity for other people and has to be out there in the world interacting with them, even if he does do things like run around in disguise and get engaged to housemaids. Mycroft barricades himself behind closed doors and doesn’t seem to be as concerned as Sherlock with doing what’s right. Yet Sherlock‘s Mycroft wants Sherlock to fall in line with social norms and Elementary‘s Mycroft wants Sherlock to stop being an entitled dick.

+/- A lot of this episode was Sherlock making Grumpy Cat face. I found it amusing. Maybe you will too.

Solve for X (2×02)

– Don’t get me wrong, I like feeling smarter than Sherlock Holmes. But at the same time, I’m unimpressed with the amount of research (or lack thereof) that went into the portrayal of this episode’s Macguffin, the solution to the p vs. np problem. I’ll buy that mathematicians can be weird. I’ll even buy that you can look at someone’s work on a proof and authoritatively declare that the writers are definitely only a month or so away from a solution (the magic of TV!). But: 1) a solution to p vs. np does not necessarily mean proving p = np. It could also mean proving that there is a definite case in which p =/= np; and  2) merely proving p = np does not suddenly make all encryption obsolete. At most, it proves that an algorithm to make most encryption obsolete exists. You still have to figure out that algorithm, which is, yeah, kind of hard, hence the fact that factoring large numbers quickly is still really time-consuming.

– Also, really? Sherlock Holmes doesn’t know what p vs. np is when it’s literally one of the greatest unsolved problems in computer science and computer security, and those are subjects which should interest him professionally? I get that the writers have to give us exposition on the subject, but what happened to Sherlock lecturing Watson about stuff like this while Watson rolls her eyes?

– See, I mind mistakes like this even though I’m willing to give ridiculous coincidences and other plot holes a pass because… p vs. np is an actual thing. It wouldn’t be that hard to twist the story slightly and make this plot make sense (have your mathematicians working on factoring really big numbers really fast, or just make up a fake problem). Why try to show off your cutting-edge knowledge on p vs. np and then not have that knowledge?

We Are Everyone (2×03)

– You can’t fool me, Holmes and Watson! McNulty and The Wire taught me how to tail people… though I can see how your version makes it easier for you to have your two leads actually discuss things during the scene.

+ I like how there’s still fallout from the Holmes/Adler relationship. No spoilers, but I’ve never seen Holmes caught in this ongoing dilemma before. Although it was heavy-handed, I’m interested in the struggle of someone tempted to sever ties with the rest of humanity and blame circumstance instead of arrogance while at the same time being brave enough not to succumb.

– So given the way Holmes and Watson discuss Anonymous — oops, sorry, I mean “Everyone” — and computers, I’ve got to assume that they both live about twenty years in the past. The Sherlock Holmes I know and love from Conan Doyle’s canon was equally at home everywhere. He’s eccentric to everyone, but I can’t help but think he wouldn’t be any less knowledgeable about trolls from 4chan than suits from Chase Manhattan. But Holmes and Watson are acting like they have no idea about Internet culture.  Pretty mcuh real scene:

INTERNET: U MAD BRO?
HOLMES: I have discovered, Watson, that in the vernacular of those who create the online drawings known as ‘rage comics,’ this expression is often paired with an image known as ‘troll face’ to indicate the user is purposely antagonizing the recipient.
INTERNET: …

– Also, the plot of this episode is “Edward Snowden, except he’s also a raging misogynist, and we’re going to treat it as expected when he kills a woman who won’t sleep with him.” Just in case we might have had to deal with the ethics of leaking state secrets that one feels are illegal.

– It also kind of pushed the episode over the limit for scare-quotes plot points. “So… “Fake Edward Snowden” is being helped by “Fake Anonymous” who are “fake word for trolling” us.”

+/- Not really about Elementary, but I like the way The Good Wife deals with Internet culture much better. Theirs feels real to me. Maybe it’s the difference between having a lead character I expect not to know much about Internet culture vs. Sherlock Holmes who’s supposed to know everything? Or maybe just… better writing.

+/- That was mean. I’m sorry, Elementary. I like you! I’m still watching, aren’t I?

Come on now: it’s Sherlock Holmes, and it co-stars Lucy Liu. Like there was a chance I’d turn it off.