Go Conan Doyle, go!

The very idea of a Fox network show about Conan Doyle just makes me grin.

Entertainment Weekly online just came out with a tidbit about Fox ordering a show with Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini investigating supernatural crime. And Fox doesn't do anything by halves . . . if this thing makes it to the air, it's going to not just be a dusty, slow historical bit. I'd even bet the supernatural on the show turns out to be actually supernatural.

And why not? Conan Doyle believed in the supernatural. Sure the fairies got debunked, sure Houdini could shoot down Doyle's mediums, but in a TV show world? Conan Doyle could actually have some of what he believed in turn out to be real!

Truth be told, Conan Doyle lived in a much more fantastical world than that of Sherlock Holmes. In Holmes's world, the demon dogs turn out to be frauds, the vampires are just kids tormenting their brothers, no ghosts need apply because they don't freakin' exist. But in Doyle's world? All sorts of supernatural possibilities existed, just waiting to be photographed.

The world of Sherlock Holmes was much more down-to-Earth than that of Arthur Conan Doyle, and for that reason, and that reason alone, Conan Doyle has a better chance at pulling off a lively, entertaining weekly TV series on an American network.

I'm still a little worried about Harry Houdini, though. In a show with much action, I just know I'm going to wince every time he takes a punch to the gut.

And then there's the inevitable Conan Doyle/Houdini slash fanfic (Does one need to say "slash" if there's an actual slash symbol already there?). The potential for bondage fan fiction for that show is . . . . well, kinda obvious.

Somehow this show's possibilities remind me of a line from Michael Keaton in that old Batman movie: "You wanna get nuts? C'mon! Let's get nuts!"

Go for it, Fox!