The fic-king finish line

Well, lords, ladies, and deities of unspecific genders, when I set up my Three Patch Challenge at the beginning of the month, there were doubters out there, and, indeed, there will be those who even might claim that technically I did not read the entirety of the Three Patch fic list for December. And that would be true. A first chapter alone doth not a novel make . . . though often 'tis the best part.

The blog-diary of my fic-read made it to December 16, before Christmas movie releases started sucking up my time. And once I went evangelical on Holmes and Watson, well . . . .

But here we are with a mere three days until my deadline, month-end, and the new year. So let us reconvene.

December 29

John Watson's Twelve Days of Christmas by earlgreytea68. Boy, I'm late on this one. But at this point, with Watson dressed and Jingle the elf and Holmes dressed as Jangle the elf, I'm really feeling it, having been tasked with solving Jingle's murder myself a few days before Christmas at a holiday party. My elf name was Sparky. Here's the picture, just so you know I'm not having you on.

How could I be reading fics dressed like that? Anyways . . . .

Sherlock and John meeting as department store holiday temps (well, one of them is actually employed there) rings pretty true and the first chapter is the entire set-up to a traditional holiday romantic comedy.

Sleep Study by AxeMeAboutAxinomancy.  Well, first I had to google "Axinomancy." It's pretty much exactly what you'd think it would be. Not a good late night read, as there's a lot of sleep going on. And what's going on in Sherlock's head while John is sleeping, so it gets a tad science-y. Until a finale that's a start to more than just the reader.

Damage by lifeonmars. Coming between seasons, I'm not quite sure where my feet are on this one, as it may be heading somewhere the later season blew away. 

Scotch by earlgraytea68. Also at a specific place in the continuity, but this one clicks pretty quickly, and the first part is purely a Mycroft character bit. And as such, pretty analytical. That's Mycroft.

December 30

"Slow Revolutions" in the Irregular Pieces series by Amythe3lder. A short character piece of young Mycroft's attraction to a girl older than him.

"Genius Loci" by silverpad. Here's something a little out-there from the norm: London as the main character. London talks to Baker Street, which makes me get very philosophical about London being Baker Street's god that it is also a part of. It's a lovely piece of urban spirit and how Sherlock and John connect with that spirit.

Sketchy by serpentynka has a very short first chapter, and I don't really get a feel for where it's headed from just the one. But I have to keep moving to meet the month-end. Hopefully I'll get time to circle back.

"Alone On The Water" by Mad_Lori . . . we meet at last. I have heard this fic mentioned so much, and its devastating effects upon its readers, that I'm hesitating on its opening even now . . . .

It doesn't spare any time into getting someone terminally ill and with a short clock, but like all fanfic written in 2011, it's hard to read without facts we later learned creeeping in. The parents we got to meet. The death of Sherlock Holmes. Even that sister that was lurking out there, and might surely have contrived to show up if she knew her brother was terminal. With its 2011 state of things, it seems like a closed box of a world, where Sally Donovan gets to show up simply because she's one of the few people that exist in that universe. With so much fic written after each season break, the multiverse of Sherlocks truly is a place where a myriad of paths spun out of each season's moments.

"The Truth of the Musgrave Ritual" by mydwynter. This one goes original Canon . . . or at least the story behind the original story and just why it is that Watson is not in the case as it appeared in The Strand Magazine. Having a touch of something myself at the moment, the mix of flu and cocaine that leads into the tale are not quite as romantic as they might otherwise seem, I'm sure . . . . I really should have not gotten to this final deadline pace.

Children of Small Gods, Chapter One: Temple of Small Gods, by alexxphoenix42. Ah. Nice little fantasy universe where a Sherlock is discovered by a monk named Brother John and magic ensues. Literal and kissing magic. Starting to feel a little like Fred Savage in The Princess Bride about these kissing parts, but like I said, I've got a touch of something and my inner child might be the only thing supporting my frame right now.

Back to mydwynter and Memoranda of Understanding. 'The Opposition Party." Ooooo, the bulk of chapter one is Mycroft and Greg Lestrade having dinner. And a good dinner. There just isn't enough food porn fanfic. (Did I mention that my only contribution to A03 involves Sherlock and ice cream? I need to get to the John and cookies tale one of these days, which leads into the . . . well, you can guess.)  Mycroft and Greg are still spending time together in mydwinter's So Full of Light. A lot less food and a little more business. They do make the interesting pair, and maybe don't seem to jump in the sack as quickly as John and Sherlock. Probably Mycroft's part.

Handle with Care by Brainygirl. Aren't recovering addicts supposed to stay clean from all sorts of addictive things . . . other drugs, alcohol . . . sexxxxx? John isn't doing too well on that last score with Sherlock in this one.

Four or five left before midnight tomorrow.

December 30

"Saved by the Bell" by IamJohnLocked4Life. Sherlock, John, and friends in TV sitcoms? While I'm not of the "Saved by the Bell" generation, sign me up! "I Love Sherlock," where the Watsons live upstairs from Greg and Molly, and Sherlock's schemes are always pissing off John. "The Baker Street Bunch," where Papa Holmes and Mama Moriarty try to create a blended family with Mycroft, Sherlock, and little Eurus having issues getting along with Jim, Jamie, and James Junior. "How I Met Your Mycroft?" "Myke and Molly?" "M*A*S*H Afghanistan?"

"Instrument" from redscudery's Rare Pair Bazaar. Janine and Sally Donovan should be a sitcom . . . though more of an HBO sitcom, as their breasts come into focus very quickly. So short that I head into "Dare" which pairs Stephen Bainbridge and Corporal Lyons, and I go "Who?" and move along.

"Through the Clouds" by Mazarin221B. We don't get enough of Sherlock Holmes at the point of his retirement decision, and this one definitely seems to be making that a happy transition.

Performance in A Leading Role by the well-known Mad_Lori. This one, it turns out, I have read . . . at least part of . . . a while back during a sampling phase. Three Patch do have their favorites that have come up more than once.

Finis

And with that, I'm done. I have managed to both succeed and fail at my Three Patch Challenge. Succeed, because I read each of the fics listed in the show notes for the December episode during the month of December, and failed because . . . well, reading every part, start to finish, of said fics would have taken a lot more obsession. And with some of the series, someone might have been writing more as I read. Fics do go on. But it was still a worthwhile exercise.

Why?

I don't think anyone from the older parts of our hobby can really appreciate the depth and breadth of the fan fiction universe out there, the quality of the writing, the so-varied planets of content spinning around the twin suns of Sherlock and John, without making themselves go an a reading marathon. We might think, "Oh, I've got a couple shelves of pastiches that someone managed to sell to a publisher over the last fifty years, and since I paid money they must be better than the free stuff on AO3," but that's just holding on a little too tightly to the past.

True, most of what you find there is BBC Sherlock and John, but how many commercial novels are you going to find of that? Sherlock Holmes still comes through as Sherlock Holmes. And think they don't have editors? They have "betas" and good beta is a bit like an editor with subject knowledge. Having read through the entire December list, I didn't find any crap. Porn, yes, but no crap.

Explorations of Sherlock Holmes and John H. Watson, along with their friends and family, through alternate universes, between-the-canon-cracks scenes, and bizarre situations shine a lot of lights that cast shadows of Sherlock, etc. that can be quite refreshing.

But there's a good side and a bad side to rampaging through so much fic in a few short periods of time. You get a feel for the wide open universe of stuff that you still haven't read very quickly. But, if you're me, you might get a little tired of the kissing. (Kind of "I get it, universe, they're soul-mates! Can they be unrequited this time?") The myriad paths by which they get to that point, however, are always illuminating.

And so, 2018 ends with a fanfic marathon, and a major motion picture where Holmes and Watson sing of their love for each other in the climax. I'm pretty satisfied with that.

2019 is going to be fun.

"Mr Mac, the most practical thing that you ever did in your life would be to shut yourself up for three months and read twelve hours a day at the annals of crime."

-- Sherlock Holmes, The Valley of Fear

The Most Hated Sherlock Holmes Movie Of All Time!

As we come to the end of Holmes and Watson's first week in theaters, I'm going to call it: This, truly, is the most hated Sherlock Holmes movie of all time. Can you think of any that can compete? I can't. Even Adolph Hitler's favorite Sherlock Holmes movie hasn't gotten as much hate as Holmes and Watson and it was Hitler's favorite Sherlock Holmes movie.

I mean, I love the movie (Holmes and Watson, not Hitler's). So why would I want to acknowledge its place as "Most Hated Sherlock Holmes Movie Of All Time?"

Because something has to hold that title. It's still an accomplishment. And, if it truly isn't that bad a movie, one that will inevitably surprise some viewers as actually having very funny moments, well, being the worst may attract some of those viewers out of sheer curiosity.

Yet one still has to wonder, why the hate? Why the social media mobs turned up and against it, even when the larger share of those folks won't even watch it to begin with? It's not like there aren't dozens and dozens of really bad movies released every year. REALLY bad, in ways you can't even imagine if you're not an every-week sort of movie-goer.

So why this one?

Well, there are a lot of reasons, and I've hit a few of them in past blogs. But I think that most of it was simply the timing of the movie's release, which garnered it most of the attention. Christmas day is not not a normal time for a movie release.

Much of the political hate going on these days took a break during the holidays, and I can't help but wonder if all those habitual haters were also looking for fresh social media targets on Christmas, which ramped up the visibility of this single movie's unpopularity. So many people with no intention of ever seeing the movie jumped on the bandwagon of hating on it. Some of them were just Will Ferrell haters ("I said he wasn't funny in 1994, and here is finally the movie that proves me right!"). Some just had to fill their Tweet-thread with some proof they were awake and aware. ("A Rotten Tomatoes score of zero! That movie is trash!") Haters be hating.

But let's start with those who actually saw the movie. Holmes and Watson is a nonsense comedy. Random weirdnesses dropping like hail in a hailstorm. When Rob Nunn asked me what I specifically  liked about it, I had a hard time choosing a specific thing. Once it had me tickled, I stayed tickled. So much nonsense. Non-sense. No rhyme or reason, kind of a Zen thing. What is the sound of one hand clapping? Contemplating why Holmes and Watson is funny could be the Zen koan that offers you enlightenment at long last.

And critics, along with holiday movie crowds, do like things to make a little more sense. You know who also doesn't care if things make sense?

Thirteen-year-old boys.

I have a feeling that forty years from now, Holmes and Watson will be hailed as a Sherlockian classic, just because the now-thirteen-year-old boys will be established Sherlockians remembering a Holmes that broke them up laughing when they were young. But after our latest live-action Sherlock Holmes theatrical outing was Mr. Holmes, which definitely targeted a very different demographic . . . well, any big Mr. Holmes fans that walked into Holmes and Watson were probably definite walk-outs. (Not saying you can't like both, of course. But not everyone is as special as you, right?)

Whatever the perfect storm of reasons for Holmes and Watson's surge of notoriety, we've all got something to talk about for a while. Not sure at what point people will stop listening, of course, but since when has that ever stopped a devoted Sherlockian?

A name for that small society of "Holmes and Watson" enjoyment feelers?

As the movie Holmes and Watson settles in as a thing that exists in our cultural filmography, there is an aspect for those of us who enjoyed it that is a bit like searching for survivors in a post-apocalyptic landscape. Those like us seem far and few between.

Dr. Tassy expressed this perfectly this morning upon finding Paul Thomas Miller newly joining our ranks, with the tweet: "Welcome to our small and exclusive society!"

And as a Sherlockian raised in a past era, my knee-jerk reaction is "Society? We have a society? What do we call our society? Let's have membership cards! Or BADGE RIBBONS FOR 221B CON!" (Yes, I love my badge ribbons. If you haven't been to a venue that lets your con-badge grow a beautiful beard of ribbons, you are missing a treat!) So I turned to my second viewing notes to try to come up with a potential Ferrell/Reilly Canonical club name.

"The Companion's Room"

"American Ladies"

'The Terminally Ill Onanists"

"Hudson's Many Lovers"

"The Electroshock Patients of Dr. Grace Hart"

"The Deadly African Plague Mosquitos"

"Millicent's Family of Feral Cats"

"The Okinawan Beard Flippers"

"The Anglo-American Exhibitionists"

"The Queen's Platypus Lips"

"The Baker Street Co-Detectives"

"The Effects of Black Orchid Poisoning"

"The Child Boxers of Quarterman's Pub"

"Watson's Intoxigrams"

"The Stationary Cyclists of Fumbles Gymnasiums"

"The Tattoos of Gustav Klinger"

"Klinger's Corpse-filled Cake Bakers"

"The Eastbourne Sailors and Mermaids"

"Watson's Last Meal Hair Buckets"

"The Grimey News Kids"

Now, that last one is Holmes and Watson's stand-in for the Baker Street Irregulars, so I would suppose it would have to be the central NYC society that the rest beg scion status from, but as you can see there are many more potential society names than we shall probably ever have members for, should we ever go that traditional route. But as you can see from this little exercise, Holmes and Watson has a ridiculous amount of content crammed into its ninety minute runtime (I suspect it would be easy to double that list), one of the many reasons I find its utter nonsense a treat.

Societies or no societies, as with all Sherlockiana, there is much fun to be had beyond the thing itself, and for some of us, Holmes and Watson will be no exception.

How Sherlockian is "Holmes and Watson?" [SPOILERS!)

The first key to any Sherlock Holmes movie is always the leads. If you don't find the actors quite right, you're not going to like much that follows. T'were Jonny Lee Miller not the lead in Elementary, I might have felt more kindly to it. Robert Downey Jr. is a bad fit as Sherlock Holmes, but he has enough charm as RDJ to fill that gap while surrounded by more passable Holmes players. And Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly?

Well, they really work for me. But beyond that, Holmes and Watson is a very Sherlockian movie, full of lovely details that might trip lots of triggers for a broad-spectrum Holmes fan.

In its pre-credits origin sequence for Sherlock Holmes, young Sherlock arrives at boarding school with his pet turtle. Clyde the turtle from Elementary is now part of the lore? Cool. And the rest of Holmes's origin is properly over-the-top parody. Tricked by his school-mates into kissing a donkey's butt when thinking it's Bridgette, his school crush, Sherlock starts to shed a single tear, then uncries, drawing the tear back in and immediately launching into a chain of observation-deductions that gets all of his schoolmates expelled so he is the only child at school, and all of the teachers can focus only on him, making him the smartest boy in England. An unlikely origin? Well, I like it better than "his mother had an affair with his math tutor" that another movie and book tried to tell us.

And just like Young Sherlock Holmes, he meets Watson at that school (Watson being the janitor's son) and his first words are, of course, "Elementary, my dear . . ." needing Watson to introduce himself before he can finish the line. One of the charming elements of this movie is that "origins" aspect -- one ongoing thread through the whole film is Holmes's search for the perfect hat, a search that culminates only when he and Watson have reached their own relationship culmination.

The credits are a quick flashing of Holmes's career blooming from boy detective to the capture of Professor Moriarty, and the movie truly begins with Moriarty's trial . . . a trial which hinges on the famous Sherlock Holmes's evidence, of course.

But where is Holmes? Back at Baker Street practicing his pronouncements, down to the way he holds his index finger. This, to me, is some prime Sherlock pushed to the nth degree. His pronouncements are a key part of the Holmes way of solving crimes, and seeing him primp over them is lovely. Need a little Canon in the movie already? In a bit that borrows from "Dying Detective" a mystery box arrives at Baker Street purporting to be evidence for the trial, yet containing a virulent disease. This time, instead of a spring and sharp bit assembly, the African plague virus is borne by a mosquito.

And that leads to another Holmes/Watson tradition that the parody pushes to the extreme: Holmes telling Watson what to do, with Watson immediately doing it. Holmes tells Watson to do a Dutch jig, and Watson does it, Holmes then explaining that the rising body temperature from the jig will attract the mosquito so they can kill it.

Here we get into our first session of literal slapstick as the two attempt to swat the mosquito on each other, and the long-suffering Mrs. Hudson gets a cricket-bat to the face as she tries to help. (Hey, "Smack! Smack! Smack!" is Canonical.) And if that wasn't enough slapstick, Holmes's RDJ-based mental calculations to finally kill the bug lead to cracking the killer beehive case (Holmes keeps bees in Baker Street, why not?), and the part that has cracked me up every time I've seen it, including the previews, Watson attempting to shoot bees. And the diving helmet bit just makes it better.

"It's working!"

"IT'S NOT WORKING!"

But, with all these distractions, can they make Moriarty's trial?

Gun-toting John Watson is a classic John Watson. Gun-firing John Watson is the perfect parody extreme of that John. They make Moriarty's trial in a hail of bullets . . . perhaps not from a source you would normally expect.

Moriarty on trial after Holmes captures him isn't Canon, but if it was good enough for Rathbone and Cumberbatch, it's good enough for Ferrell. And of course there is a twist at the end of the trial, every single time. Remember Sherlock Holmes's "cat-like love of cleanliness?" His panther impression at the trial might make one recall that line, as well as set up a reason for his eventual love interest.

And it is obvious from the start that Holmes doesn't consider Watson as he should saying how he was alone at the crime scene when Watson was plainly there. Because the real plot of this movie is completely Holmes and Watson's relationship . . . which is completely in tune with a more modern focus on the pair. It's not just about the deductions any more, and this movie gets it, at least on that point.

The crowds that chant Sherlock's name in the courtroom may not be Canon, but if feels like Canon, as beloved as Holmes has become over the years. A character named "Jacob Musgrave" flips one of our Canonical triggers, though, as does Holmes's solution involving fingerprints, an art he pioneered in "Norwood Builder."

Lestrade's constant frustration with Sherlock Holmes is well-played in the movie, though one has to wonder who Lestrade's un-named constant companion with that stereotypical period cleavage is. And half the time, the inspector is only doing what Holmes tells him, only to have it turned-about later.

Watson writes Canon while Holmes plays the violin, Holmes contemplates how dull detective-work will be with no Moriarty. Cocaine and opium are tossed in as ridiculous Victorian commonplaces. There's a lot of Holmes-stuff here, but a lot of Ferrell/Reilly as well, when they start screaming for Mrs. Hudson in a very improv-sounding sequence, pleasant to the ears of a fan, horrific to the casual movie-goer, I'm sure. But the conclusion of the sequence, with Mrs. Hudson coming out of Watson's bedroom with her Mark-Twain-looking lover quickly turns things in a different direction.

This is one of the movie's great strengths -- it moves through bits like a train. Too many comedies dwell on a single line or moment as if waiting for their laughs, this one just keeps charging ahead, and that pace makes it an eminently rewatchable film for those of us who are into it.

Watson's fanning over Queen Victoria seems very appropriate for our Watson taken to the extreme. And Holmes just can't stop making deductions . . . unless it's a moment where a knife won't cut a cake properly, Lines like "The game is a-starting" might be meaningless to a non-Sherlockian, but a Holmes-that-is-not-quite-full-Sherlock is kinda fun for . . . well, some Sherlockians . . . the ones the movie hasn't lost already.

Holmes vomiting at the mere though of corpses in the morgue is the exact opposite of Canon-Holmes, yet harkens nicely to the Holmes-with-diarrhea of 2001's O Xango De Baker Street. It also gives Holmes that needed moment to connect with Millicent, the newest competition for Irene Adler as the woman. (They both have that Canonical "cat-like love of cleanliness," you see. Literally, in her case.) Watson's autopsy-love scene with Dr. Grace Hart quickly gets him in a romantic place as well.

Grace's suggestion that Watson try to advance his part of the partnership to "co-detective" is both a big plot driver and a real understanding of current views of the Holmes and Watson partnership. CBS's Elementary is all about Watson becoming a consulting detective equal to Holmes. We view their partnership differently now than our counterparts in the 1940s did, and Holmes and Watson leans hard into that thought. While Holmes is a genius, far beyond Watson in intellect at every turn, whether it's mental Battleship or communicating with Mycroft at the Diogenes, but Watson is Holmes's guide in the realm of emotion. And this movie is all over that paradigm.

Want more Canon? Stamford's prediction in A Study in Scarlet that "I could imagine his giving a friend of pinch of the latest vegetable alkaloid, not of malevolence, you understand, but simply out of a spirit of inquiry in order to have an accurate idea of the effects" is completely put on display here, as Holmes tests the black orchid poison that the murderer used by dosing Watson with it . . . and then observing the effects. Sure, they are things like temporary brain damage, body image dismorphia, and lactation, which might be funny to you, or not, but, hey! Canon!

Okay, and is "Gustav Klinger," the one-armed tattoo artist, a reference to Les Klinger who has consulted on Hollywood things occasionally? Well, given that there was a Russian Bolshevik politician with that name, maybe not, but one has to wonder.

Is an "Okinawan beard flip" a baritsu move?

Did drunk Holmes and Watson start with Cumberbatch and Freeman? I suspect that's a thing now.

When they go to Dorset Street, a neighborhood so bad that prostitutes pull men off coaches and you can get stabbed for asking the time, it was the site of a Ripper murder that Holmes and Watson have visited many times in pastiches, so that almost counts as Canon . . . well, almost.

Moriarty's daughter was a concept pioneered by Laurie King as a foil for Mary Russell, and do we get a Moriarty daughter here? Welllll, maybe . . . I won't spoil that. A touch of Steve Hockensmith-type "Holmes in the West?" Well, that might show up, too.

And of course we get "Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth" . . . . only at the most dire time for Holmes to make that pronouncement, as be betrays Watson during the movie's break-up turn.  (Does it bother you to think of Ghandi saying of Watson, "I'd hang that bitch myself!"? Then this might not be the movie for you.)

There is a level of detail to Holmes and Watson that I dearly love and I look forward to the DVD release, just so I can pause to read the newspapers and journal entries that flash across the screen. Even fish-and-chips wrappers have headlines trumpeting Sherlock Holmes, so there's a lot to see here.

Details, fun characters, it's a pity this movie is being dismissed by so many, eager to toss another film on their "Worst of 2018" list because they didn't get it. But there is something to get here, and laughs to be had. (Hey, the one other person in the theater for my second viewing was laughing as much as me!) A lovely Mark Mothersbaugh soundtrack that, unfortunately, doesn't contain the climactic duet-plus-one of Holmes finally finding his love of Watson (don't get your hopes up -- they're shippable, but they don't go full-on bi in the movie). What does it take to "get it" with this one?

Well, Holmes and Watson might be the sort of thing that scientists one day narrow down as one of those DNA-level tastes that you have to be born with. We could deep-dive on psychological factors all day long and probably still not completely profile why some of us are enjoying this movie even as the torches come out from the cinema villagers.  But is it a Sherlockian movie?

Yes. There's a lot of Sherlock to find inside it, if certain aspects don't scare you off. (Not for the easily grossed-out, not for the Trump fans, not for the purists, not for the Ferrell-haters, not for any who thinks stupid can't be genius . . . .) It will be very interesting to see how this does on DVD, when that initial Rotten Tomatoes score is but a misty memory.

Prelude to a second viewing of "Holmes and Watson"

"It's astounding. Time is . . . fleeting. Madness . . . takes its toll. But listen closely . . ."

-- Riff Raff, The Rocky Horror Picture Show

As you may have noticed, I'm in a very special place this week. As prophesied in my initial review, my particular level of enjoyment of the movie Holmes and Watson has not been shared by . . . well, most. And in typical contrarian fashion, that just adds to the piquancy of the feast.

And so, this morning, even with a touch of some virus, I shall do what few Sherlockians will dare.

I am going to see Holmes and Watson a second time. And taking notes.

Second viewings are always a good test. Do the reactions from the first time hold up? Can a movie hold your attention when you know what's coming? Is there anything in the film worth closer observation?

Due to the way Sony released Holmes and Watson, its critical appraisals might have been slightly tainted by said critics being forced to see it among Christmas Day audiences -- perhaps the worst audiences of the year in my long experience of movie-going. Kinfolk who never go to the theater are suddenly pulled in by family outings and their behavior is horrible. (And the older folks do tend to fall asleep after their Christmas dinner.) Going to see a movie that you would not normally be attracted to enough to spend ten bucks on is no way to see a movie. Which brings me to Sherlockians who would never see a Will Ferrell movie being drawn in by Sherlock Holmes and John H. Watson -- like me and CBS's Elementary, it was oil and water to begin with. Add in a touch of the Asch Conformity Paradigm to that critical lambasting and you get a movie that was doomed, doomed, I say!

Does this mean it was a bad movie? Like music, humor is a very individual taste. It might have been a bad movie for you, and I won't argue otherwise. You get to have your own opinion, just as I do with that accursed Elementary. But I do find myself in the position where I might need to explain myself, just so I don't get locked up . . . well, if we locked up madmen anymore, instead of just casting them to the curb.

It's been interesting how many social media pundits cite this as the end of Will Ferrell's career, without really considering Will Ferrell's career. Casa de mi padre was six years ago. A Deadly Adoption was three years ago. From the medium-wandering Ron Burgundy to the casual commentary of "Cord and Tish," Ferrell gets out there and takes chances that drive some people crazy in his pursuit of comedy. But it's a great comedic voice (at least for those of us that get it), and I strongly doubt this will bring him down. He might not completely have a cult following, but the seeds are there.

Which is going to be the big test in seeing Holmes and Watson again today. Is it re-watchable enough for someone going in with a positive attitude to make it a cult movie?  So many "bad" movies are still with us today after attaining cult status -- even though flawed, like Tommy Wiseau's The Room, there is an inherent watchability to them that makes going back an easy choice. Can Holmes and Watson pull off that trick? The first viewing went amazingly quickly -- I thought I'd only been in the theater an hour when the movie was done, which is a very good sign. A truly bad movie seems like an never-ending torture.

"Treasure or torture?" is a question that comes up time and again in our Sherlockian lives, whether it be a particular month-long quiz or a classic area of study like Sherlockian chronology. I'm leaning toward "treasure" this time out, but we will see what that critical second viewing brings.

Off I go! 

Problems of that final problem

The Sherlock Holmes Story Society at the North Branch Peoria Public Library met again tonight, and our focus was "The Final Problem." (And nary a word of a certain film you might have heard about.)

And, boy, are there problems to be discussed there.

In Professor Moriarty, Conan Doyle created a foe that not only could elude Scotland Yard -- he can elude a reader as well. For a little old mathematics professor moonlighting as a criminal mastermind, he does some very weird things.

For one, he chases a train. And like a dog chasing a car, we have to wonder what Moriarty would have done with that train had he caught it. He was plainly outnumbered, two to one, by men known to carry guns. He actually lets Sherlock Holmes write a note while explaining his super-villain plotting, as super-villains must do by law (or out-law) apparently. And then he just throws himself at Sherlock Holmes. When you put it all together, Moriarty comes off more as an obsessed, unrequited lover than a criminal genius.

Holmes, of course, is no great brain himself at times on this one.

He explains to Watson how Moriarty will probably go to Paris and watch where their luggage winds up, but then seems surprised that the professor is not arrested in London. And again, bare-handed wrestling with one's arch-foe on a cliff. Guns, knives, hunting crops . . . anything, boys?

It's no wonder Nicholas Meyer found this fodder for calling Holmes delusional in The Seven Per-Cent Solution. Watson himself never gets a good look at a man he could identify as Moriarty in a court of law.

But, as with any Sherlock Holmes story, we get such tantalizing details . . . Holmes writes that his friends will be sad at his solution to Moriarty's end, and especially Watson. What other pre-1891 friends is he writing of? Lestrade, who gets ditched on this big haul for Inspector Patterson? Frank and Hatty Moulton, who proved to be just that charming as dinner guests? Mrs. Hudson? James Mortimer?

I read it this time from Christopher Morley's Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson: A Textbook of Friendship, which follows the tale up with some ridiculous discussion questions. Read all the stories that aren't in this book and figure out how Watson had two wives. Get an atlas and figure out what you would do if you had time to kill in Canterbury. Sherlock Holmes not eating goose liver and only taking a half hour for lunch is a tribute to what? I'll say it: Morley was a bit odd.

But aren't all of us involved with our friend Sherlock Holmes, from Conan Doyle to Will Ferrell. (Whose voice I heard Holmes's lines in, as I read "Final Problem." Yes, I am that far gone.)

A rotten tomato hurled at Sherlock Holmes?

A friend of mine took a stance a couple of years back. He had decided that in order to encourage Hollywood to make quality films, he would only go to movies with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 75% or above. My other movie buddy and I scoffed at this position for good reasons, and eventually our 75% friend relented. Because, when it comes to Rotten Tomatoes, below 75% is where the real fun is.

Action movies, most comedies, genre films of all sorts except that "Oscar-bait" genre . . . critics see so many movies that they occasionally need to relieve their stress by bashing a flawed film about, overlooking the fact that those "flaws" might be what the audience bought their ticket to see. Which brings us to my new favorite Sherlock Holmes movie, Holmes and Watson.

Since the makers of the film didn't allow critics pre-release screener copies, and the movie opened on Christmas Day, one might suspect an actual plot to keep anyone from seeing the movie before audiences had a first chance to buy tickets . . . and you might be right. In this age of Rotten Tomatoes dominance, where that site's score can kill a movie's box office, that strategy is legitimately necessary sometimes. Movies we all saw in the 1970s and 1980s would never have survived their first week had RT existed back then. And while haters of a given movie will always go, "Yeah! Kill those weaklings of the litter!" the truth is that some movies would actually find a larger, satisfied audience without the influence of that single percentage. 

So, a day after the film's release, we find ourselves still awaiting that verdict from Rotten Tomatoes the way a Moriarty on trial waits for his final verdict. As individual reviews started coming in, things weren't looking good for our hero's latest outing. Even ousted governor of Wisconsin Scott Walker had felt the urge for a Christmas Day Twitter review to bash the film. (Which might actually be seen as a positive for the movie in some circles.) Waiting. Watching. Thirteen reviews in. Zero positive ones. Of the about three thousand critics that RT looks at, eighty reviews have to be in for a "Tomatometer" critical consensus, and of those eighty, sixty percent have to be positive for any kind of "Fresh" rating. But a "Rotten" still seems to be coming Holmes and Watson's way.

For those of us that like to make up our own minds, though, the movie theaters are open and it is still there to be seen. Sherlockians who had the time available and were either curious, looking forward to it, or just completists, could still get a viewing in. You could still gather firsthand evidence before Scotland Yard muddled up the crime scene, so to speak. Because once that all-powerful Rotten Tomatoes rating comes in, you're either jumping on to a winning team after they reach the Super Bowl or swimming upstream against the current and racing to see it before it gets yanked from theaters.

It's a weird business, seeing movies in 2018. But make up your own mind, and try to have some fun along the way.