Be careful what you wish for!

 Sometimes we all wish Sherlockiana was more mainstream.

(Side note for those who disagree with my opening line: What? You don't? Yes, I know you're different. Most of us are.)

Sherlock Holmes, even with that RDJ hit movie and BBC series, just didn't catch on as hard as Marvel superheroes or Star Wars. (Disney didn't open a Sherlock Holmes franchise.) Or even Star Trek or DC superheroes. (Paramount and Warner Brothers's attempts to match the Disney stuff.) And I'm kind of fine with that. Because have you noticed what's happening lately?

Thanks to the internet we all know about some things. And we all want to do the cool things.

Only we can't all go see Taylor Swift. Or blooming cherry trees in a specific place in the spring. Or the BSI dinner. (Yeah, I know, we all don't want to go to the BSI dinner. Some of us are different, more than ever now, for sure.) Going to see a full solar eclipse in the middle of a less populated part of Illinois really drove that home for me a few years back -- the local infrastructure was not designed to handle the mass migration of humans returning home as soon as the eclipse was over. Traffic snarls on two-lane highways with stop signs was insane and made you realize how screwed we'd be in a Godzilla movie just trying to drive away from that big bastard.

But what makes Sherlockiana truly great in our less-than-mainstream fandom is how rare it makes us, and how wonderful it is when we gather. I can go into work and talk about Star Wars or Marvel with fifteen people. (If I can find them -- work-from-home is really messing with us.) The rarity of the hardcore Sherlockian makes finding one an exciting event. Of course, it's still exciting to find someone who likes a mainstream fandom as much as you do, as my friend Madeline recently pointed out to me, finding someone who likes that special part of a larger fandom as much as you do can also be pretty cool.

Is Sherlockiana "niche" enough to be kind of hip and cool at some point? 

Sure, and that leads to eventual larger popularity, and the waves we see around a Seven Per-Cent Solution or a BBC Sherlock, when we see a new influx of Sherlockians. We need those to keep our fandom engine running at a certain level. But do we ever want Sherlock to be NFL football popular? With big-name Sherlockians making millions and you have to pay a hundred bucks to get them to sign your book?

Nawwwww.

It's hard enough to get into the dang BSI dinner as it is. (Yes, yes, I never go, but someone has to stay home and leave a chair open for the new kids.) Mainstream might not be for us. (Though if Disney was to buy out BSI Inc. and take it over . . . hey, the January dinner might be in Florida! And held at "Baker Street Land" or something like that! Quick, somebody sell the BSI to Disney!)

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