ELEMENTARY - News, Reviews, and Discussion

[Guy Gardener]

Here's how you watch more.

Show "something" to one of your children, and after they are hooked, they will force you to binge watch with them hard.

A friend of mine was dragged through 2 seasons of Elementary in a month by her 12 year old daughter.

The trick is to make you-time seem like family-time so that maybe you look like a super hero.

 

[Bisz]

Here's how you watch more.

Show "something" to one of your children, and after they are hooked, they will force you to binge watch with them hard.

A friend of mine was dragged through 2 seasons of Elementary in a month by her 12 year old daughter.

The trick is to make you-time seem like family-time so that maybe you look like a super hero.

Alas, I'm a SINK.

And by no means is the concept of binge watching alien to me, you're talking to the guy who can go through seven seasons of TNG or DS9 in 6 weeks.

 

[YellowSubmarine]

I am having a déjà lu in this thread. It's like I am reading something about Ophelia Lovibond from months ago, yet the dates next to the posts are from this week. How is this even possible? Am I witnessing time travel?

Spoiler: Enough Nemesis to Go Around. Literally.

The magnet was clever, but I was hoping for some less high-tech solution. Simple low-fi solutions are my thing* – they should do more of those. Along the lines of the two people in the elevator shooting each other with the same gun, but less blatant – I mean, that would have been solved by ballistics 101.

One thing I kept wondering – is a perfect crime a possibility in this case? Wouldn't something reveal what actually happened at the scene? Like gun residue in the wrong places? That's why I prefer simple solutions – when you hear them, they kick you in the head, and even when they are damn unrealistic you're still telling yourself how brilliant they are. Now this is forcing me to think about physics, and I hate physics.

But it is still pretty good.

* I guess that's why I never mention time travel.

The episode was fantastic. Loving Watson in it, she's terrific in it. I hope they keep the current situation for a larger part of the season too.

 

[Saul]

Here's how you watch more.


*SNIP*

First, you buy a bottle of whiskey. Then you drink it as you watch this show. As you drink you won't really care about the quality of the show anymore and you will find yourself in a mildly entertained state. If episode quality starts to decrease then you need to drink more or buy another bottler. At the end of the season either the show will have put you asleep or the whiskey will. Win win all the way. When you wake up you won't even remember what you watched
I suggest strapping yourself into a chair first though as I have often found myself wondering the streets at night trying to straighten sign posts.

 

[davejames]

Really enjoyed last night's episode, and thought it had one of the best-constructed mysteries in awhile. Even if it was pretty obvious the second we saw him who the killer would end up being, I still thought it was really clever how the story developed and got to that point.

I also thought the episode finally made Kitty a lot more compelling as well. To the point where I actually wouldn't mind her sticking around now.

And I absolutely cracked up at Sherlock's line about Watson seeming to be "adequately sexed" by her boyfriend.

 

[Christopher]

This is very much a show about recovery. First Sherlock's recovery from addiction, now Kitty's recovery from sexual abuse. There's a real optimism and sensitivity to it. It's one reason I like it better than Sherlock, which is about characters wallowing in their worst and most extreme behavior, refusing to admit there's anything wrong with it, and getting away with it because the writers think it's entertaining.

I honestly didn't remember that Harlan had been in a previous episode. It was pretty obvious that he had, and IMDb confirms it, but I have no recollection of him at all.

Ophelia Lovibond reminds me of Jenna Coleman -- similar look, similar accent, similar attitude -- but isn't as engaging an actress.

 

[davejames]

Yeah good point about the BBC Sherlock. Not only are the characters on Elementary a whole lot deeper and more interesting, but they actually come across like good, decent human beings that you actually find yourself caring for.

The BBC version is definitely entertaining to watch (more often than not), but the Holmes and Watson in that come across more like nasty, cartoonish caricatures than real people.

 

[Christopher]

^As I said in my Locus essay:

From an in-story standpoint, one could chalk up the difference in the two Sherlocks at least partly to the difference between their Watsons. Watson has always been Holmes’s anchor and his filter, his interface with the rest of humanity, as it were. So change Watson and you change Holmes accordingly, or at least change how others perceive and relate to him. Elementary‘s Joan Watson came into her Sherlock’s life as a sober companion, a guide toward rehabilitation and functional behavior; thus, she’s become his conscience, a gadfly who cuts through his excuses for bad behavior and convinces him that it’s logical to show more regard for other people. But Sherlock‘s John Hamish Watson is an adrenaline junkie who thrives on danger and chaos and thus is essentially an enabler to Holmes—even as Holmes is an enabler to him. He makes a show of being outraged by Sherlock’s excesses, but does little to actually influence or change his behavior, because ultimately he doesn’t want to. So they’re Watsons of opposite polarity: John Hamish feeds his Sherlock’s excesses and addictions, while Joan tempers them in hers. Thus, Sherlock is an exercise in self-indulgence, while Elementary is a story about redemption and recovery.

 

[davejames]

If Joan thought her Sherlock was aggravating, just imagine what she would think of the other Sherlock! I'm guessing she wouldn't put up with his behavior and attitude for longer than 5 minutes before walking out. Lol

 

[May 20]

Here's how you watch more.

Show "something" to one of your children, and after they are hooked, they will force you to binge watch with them hard.

A friend of mine was dragged through 2 seasons of Elementary in a month by her 12 year old daughter.

The trick is to make you-time seem like family-time so that maybe you look like a super hero.

A child is why we watch Elementary here in Mayville. My daughter discovered and read many of the Sherlock Holmes mysteries while in middle school, so she insisted we watch this when it began airing.

Fortunately, the show passed muster, so we still enjoy it together. She is a junior now.

 

[YellowSubmarine]

Holy cow. Did the NYPD just use Gnome 3 in Elementary, or am I taking too much pills again?

That's really shameful. They should acquire a better taste in desktop environments. Real policemen use GUI interface in visual basic to track an IP address.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Next year, we're getting at least one Elementary tie-in novel -- The Ghost Line, by Adam Christopher.

 

[Christopher]

Pretty good episode overall, with some neat twists and turns and some good Holmes-Watson relationship stuff. But man, did they ever botch the portrayal of the Turing Test. First off, it's pointless to attempt a Turing Test when you already know you're talking to an AI; it's only valid if the questioner doesn't know in advance and has to try to determine it. Second, Bella pretty obviously failed the test with her very machinelike repetition of her "I don't understand the question" phrases. And third, the Turing Test has been discredited as an arbiter of genuine machine intelligence, since it can be passed by a good mimic program.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

The episode raised an interesting metatextual question -- if EW Hornung wrote the Raffles stories, what was he writing them in imitation of? In our reality, Hornung was Doyle's brother-in-law, and Raffles was created in imitation of Holmes. But Doyle's Holmes stories don't exist within this series, so what was fictional Hornung writing in response to?

Sexton Blake was my first thought, but it also doesn't entirely work. Perhaps there's a fictional detective that we've forgotten who was influential on the series' Hornung. (I'm proceeding from the assumption that Doyle wrote, just not detective fiction.)

 

[Gov Kodos]

The episode raised an interesting metatextual question -- if EW Hornung wrote the Raffles stories, what was he writing them in imitation of? In our reality, Hornung was Doyle's brother-in-law, and Raffles was created in imitation of Holmes. But Doyle's Holmes stories don't exist within this series, so what was fictional Hornung writing in response to?

Sexton Blake was my first thought, but it also doesn't entirely work. Perhaps there's a fictional detective that we've forgotten who was influential on the series' Hornung. (I'm proceeding from the assumption that Doyle wrote, just not detective fiction.)

How about August Derleth's Solar Pons, which was a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes?

 

[Allyn Gibson]

The episode raised an interesting metatextual question -- if EW Hornung wrote the Raffles stories, what was he writing them in imitation of? In our reality, Hornung was Doyle's brother-in-law, and Raffles was created in imitation of Holmes. But Doyle's Holmes stories don't exist within this series, so what was fictional Hornung writing in response to?

Sexton Blake was my first thought, but it also doesn't entirely work. Perhaps there's a fictional detective that we've forgotten who was influential on the series' Hornung. (I'm proceeding from the assumption that Doyle wrote, just not detective fiction.)

How about August Derleth's Solar Pons, which was a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes?

Derleth didn't start writing the Solar Pons stories until the 1920s. Hornung's last Raffles story was 1909's Mr Justice Raffles. So, Derleth couldn't be Hornung's inspiration.

Or, do you mean, how could Derleth's Pons stories exist in the Elementary universe without Doyle? That one's easier -- they most likely wouldn't.

 

[Gov Kodos]

The episode raised an interesting metatextual question -- if EW Hornung wrote the Raffles stories, what was he writing them in imitation of? In our reality, Hornung was Doyle's brother-in-law, and Raffles was created in imitation of Holmes. But Doyle's Holmes stories don't exist within this series, so what was fictional Hornung writing in response to?

Sexton Blake was my first thought, but it also doesn't entirely work. Perhaps there's a fictional detective that we've forgotten who was influential on the series' Hornung. (I'm proceeding from the assumption that Doyle wrote, just not detective fiction.)

How about August Derleth's Solar Pons, which was a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes?

Derleth didn't start writing the Solar Pons stories until the 1920s. Hornung's last Raffles story was 1909's Mr Justice Raffles. So, Derleth couldn't be Hornung's inspiration.

Or, do you mean, how could Derleth's Pons stories exist in the Elementary universe without Doyle? That one's easier -- they most likely wouldn't.

My timing is off, but if Holmes and Watson can be in 21st century NY, why can't Solar Pons and Derleth inspire Hornung?

 

[Allyn Gibson]

My timing is off, but if Holmes and Watson can be in 21st century NY, why can't Solar Pons and Derleth inspire Hornung?

I won't reject that idea, but Hornung died before Derleth wrote his first Pons story, so 1) Derleth would have to be fifty years older than he is and 2) Pons would have to be far better known to readers in Elementary's world than he is in our world.

 

[Christopher]

Holmes was somewhat inspired by Poe's C. Auguste Dupin, wasn't he? So perhaps in the Elementary-verse, Raffles was inspired by Dupin.

Or -- Holmes was also inspired by Doyle's mentor Dr. Joseph Bell. Maybe, in a world without the fictional Holmes, Dr. Bell became famous through true-to-life accounts of his exploits.

The question I often have about these modern-Holmes stories is more universal. In real life, the Holmes stories inspired advances in police forensics, pioneering evidence-based police work of the sort that's common today. (At the time, they relied more on eyewitness accounts and coerced confessions.) Without the Holmes stories in the 19th century, it seems that police procedure today should be generations less advanced. But instead we see both Miller's and Cumberbatch's Sherlocks working with police forces using the same modern forensic techniques that the original Holmes stories helped inspire, and that's a paradox. Maybe in their universes, then, it was Doyle's accounts of Dr. Bell's real experiences that helped inspire those advances.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

I did more research, because I was going off of half-remembered things last night.

The first Sexton Blake story was published in 1893. The first Raffles story was published in 1898. I had it reversed in my mind; I thought Raffles predated Blake. Thus, Blake could be the model that Hornung chose to imitate, and Blake could have been inspired by Dupin directly much as Holmes was instead of indirectly through Holmes.