Elementary: The Grand Experiment
May 15, 2014 10:59 PM - Season 2, Episode 24 - Subscribe
The game of cat and mouse mole is afoot! Sherlock and Joan try to determine the identity of the double agent, but are they the hunters or the prey? Season finale.
I thought it was an excellent season finale.
Mycoft has slowly made me love the hell out of him.
posted by royalsong at 7:56 AM on May 16, 2014 [2 favorites]
Mycoft has slowly made me love the hell out of him.
posted by royalsong at 7:56 AM on May 16, 2014 [2 favorites]
They really gave Mycroft a Sydney Carton kind of Louse Redeems Himself With Unexpected Selflessness kinda stories and I loved it.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:26 AM on May 16, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:26 AM on May 16, 2014 [1 favorite]
It's fascinating to watch Sherlock continually attempt to make everything about him, and how those closest to him have learned to deal with it. Mycroft just giving him a hug and saying how the time with him has been a gift was just perfect; as was Joan's speech about his the peculiar gravity of Sherlock.
I keep my fingers crossed that this show will keep figuring out the right balances.
posted by nubs at 9:59 AM on May 16, 2014 [1 favorite]
I keep my fingers crossed that this show will keep figuring out the right balances.
posted by nubs at 9:59 AM on May 16, 2014 [1 favorite]
I'm glad the show went the other direction in making Mycroft less intelligent than Sherlock. Canonically, he's brighter but lazier or involved in high level politics. As Joan points out, he's successful in his own way, doing something he lives.
I thought with the earlier NA meeting when Sherlock implied that he was without peer, except for Moriarty, that they meant to reveal Mycroft as his intellectual peer. I'm glad the show went a different and much more holistic approach to have Sherlock realize that he needs connections beyond purely intellectual jousting partners.
The reworking of Doyle's famous description of Mycroft as an insult by a teenaged Sherlock to their (apparently horrific and despised) father that cut Mycroft to the quick, was a very deft narrative mashup.
The final scene, is Sherlock high?
posted by viggorlijah at 5:24 PM on May 16, 2014 [1 favorite]
I thought with the earlier NA meeting when Sherlock implied that he was without peer, except for Moriarty, that they meant to reveal Mycroft as his intellectual peer. I'm glad the show went a different and much more holistic approach to have Sherlock realize that he needs connections beyond purely intellectual jousting partners.
The reworking of Doyle's famous description of Mycroft as an insult by a teenaged Sherlock to their (apparently horrific and despised) father that cut Mycroft to the quick, was a very deft narrative mashup.
The final scene, is Sherlock high?
posted by viggorlijah at 5:24 PM on May 16, 2014 [1 favorite]
The reworking of Doyle's famous description of Mycroft as an insult by a teenaged Sherlock to their (apparently horrific and despised) father that cut Mycroft to the quick, was a very deft narrative mashup.
It's been a while since I read the original stories, I'm blanking on what the description/insult was, can you expand?
posted by oh yeah! at 6:13 PM on May 16, 2014
It's been a while since I read the original stories, I'm blanking on what the description/insult was, can you expand?
posted by oh yeah! at 6:13 PM on May 16, 2014
...he has no ambition and no energy. He will not even go out of his way to verify his own solutions, and would rather be considered wrong than take the trouble to prove himself right. Again and again I have taken a problem to him, and have received an explanation which has afterwards proved to be the correct one. And yet he was absolutely incapable of working out the practical points...
posted by viggorlijah at 6:37 PM on May 16, 2014
posted by viggorlijah at 6:37 PM on May 16, 2014
oh yeah, it was almost exactly word for word
from wikipedia
from wikipedia
...he has no ambition and no energy. He will not even go out of his way to verify his own solutions, and would rather be considered wrong than take the trouble to prove himself right. Again and again I have taken a problem to him, and have received an explanation which has afterwards proved to be the correct one. And yet he was absolutely incapable of working out the practical points...posted by rebent at 6:38 PM on May 16, 2014
How is this show compared to Sherlock? We just binge watched the BBC show and wouldn't mind watching more of the same.
posted by empath at 1:39 PM on May 17, 2014
posted by empath at 1:39 PM on May 17, 2014
Comparing them is a bit apples & oranges what with Sherlock being a 3-episode mini-series event versus Elementary being a 24-episode-a-year CBS-network procedural. But, personally, I'm pretty burnt out on Moffat's writing choices, so, I prefer Elementary over Sherlock.
posted by oh yeah! at 2:09 PM on May 17, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by oh yeah! at 2:09 PM on May 17, 2014 [3 favorites]
Elementary has more in common with House then with Sherlock. The episodes play out in the same manner, and there is a larger focus on the characters in Elementary then in Sherlock.
E-Sherlock is a hell of a lot more pleasant and less destructive then House, though.
posted by royalsong at 6:05 AM on May 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
E-Sherlock is a hell of a lot more pleasant and less destructive then House, though.
posted by royalsong at 6:05 AM on May 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
The final scene, is Sherlock high?
That was my question, he sure was blinking a lot.
I like Sherlock (the show) also but it's stronger at he beginning and weaker towards the end when Watson gets married and the energy between Holmes/Watson gets weirder. Cumberbatch is amazing but he's also sort of insufferable and doesn't seem to really live in the world in the same way that Miller's Sherlock seems a bit more down to earth and warts-and-all.
The US show is definitely more cop procedural and Liu is a lot more of a full-fledged character with her own arc in a way that I felt that Freeman's Watson never really was. The other characters like Aidan Quinn's NYPL captain and Jon Michael Hill are also characters that get their own stories. And even though there's technically a Mrs Hudson in the Elementary universe (played by the excellent
Candis Cayne) she's not as much of a character as the one in the Sherlock universe. Not yet anyhow.
posted by jessamyn at 6:59 PM on May 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
That was my question, he sure was blinking a lot.
I like Sherlock (the show) also but it's stronger at he beginning and weaker towards the end when Watson gets married and the energy between Holmes/Watson gets weirder. Cumberbatch is amazing but he's also sort of insufferable and doesn't seem to really live in the world in the same way that Miller's Sherlock seems a bit more down to earth and warts-and-all.
The US show is definitely more cop procedural and Liu is a lot more of a full-fledged character with her own arc in a way that I felt that Freeman's Watson never really was. The other characters like Aidan Quinn's NYPL captain and Jon Michael Hill are also characters that get their own stories. And even though there's technically a Mrs Hudson in the Elementary universe (played by the excellent
Candis Cayne) she's not as much of a character as the one in the Sherlock universe. Not yet anyhow.
posted by jessamyn at 6:59 PM on May 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
I continue to love BBC Sherlock (warts and all) and I would recommend watching Elementary, but not comparing the two if you can avoid it.
I think Elementary didn't click until midway through the first season, but I pushed through that for love of all versions of Doyle's character. It started out as too purely a police procedural - a Law and Order with oddly named people. Eventually they started pulling in more canon references and characters and that is when the show really became enjoyable for me.
posted by Julnyes at 10:48 AM on May 21, 2014
I think Elementary didn't click until midway through the first season, but I pushed through that for love of all versions of Doyle's character. It started out as too purely a police procedural - a Law and Order with oddly named people. Eventually they started pulling in more canon references and characters and that is when the show really became enjoyable for me.
posted by Julnyes at 10:48 AM on May 21, 2014
I really like Joan Watson in Elementary, and find the character growth of Elementary's Sherlock a lot more appealing than the (largely) enjoyable Cumberbatch as Sherlock. Part of that growth comes from the fact that the US show has a lot more time to build characters, whereas the UK show hasn't had that space to grow.
posted by filthy light thief at 9:46 AM on June 2, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by filthy light thief at 9:46 AM on June 2, 2014 [2 favorites]
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posted by 1970s Antihero at 6:34 AM on May 16, 2014