The Irregulars: Season One
May 12, 2021 3:12 PM - Season 1 (Full Season) - Subscribe

"Set in Victorian London, the series follows a gang of troubled street teens who are manipulated into solving crimes for the sinister Doctor Watson and his mysterious business partner, the elusive Sherlock Holmes." -- IMDB description

This slipped completely under my radar, but I'm halfway now and really enjoying it. So of course it has already been cancelled!

Relatively little of this is actually a Holmes reimagining, although familiar characters keep popping up as very different versions of themselves. Mostly it's about orphans with powers in Victorian London (like that other series, but completely different).

The series is certainly not flawless. There are some obvious anachronisms (mostly linguistic), and a bit of teen relationship drama which I as an Old Person am not very invested in. But I really like the characters, the (from what I've seen so far) colourblind casting, and the monsters-of-the-week, most of which have been interesting and appropriately creepy.
posted by confluency (11 comments total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
I'm almost at the end of episode 4, and I'm having that unfortunate experience where I suspect that a seemingly nice character is secretly villainous because I know they wouldn't have wasted an actor of that calibre on a whole bunch of smiling and being friendly. Yvara Zna, I have my eye on you!
posted by confluency at 3:18 PM on May 12, 2021 [1 favorite]


Really enjoyed episode 3, and the rest of it was decent. Also, bear with me here, but:

Bea :: Hannibal
Spike :: Face
Billy :: BA
Jessie :: Murdoch

Right?
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 6:19 PM on May 12, 2021 [3 favorites]


I binged this two weeks ago and i liked it a lot. But the power of friendship and found family tropes are my jam.

I thought it was kind of hilarious how the love triangle was set up to be between Billy and Leo when Leo was clearly um, aesthetically much more pleasing.

Also at one point Leo mentions that he has a broken body, takes off his shirt and has abs for days and I died of laughter.

The story wraps up pretty nicely at the end so I don't really consider it cancelled?
posted by vespertinism at 5:22 AM on May 13, 2021 [2 favorites]


A fun, little show. I had very different expectations going into it than what it was. I thought it was going to be a 'Monster of the Week' and it was definitely that for the first few episodes then it became much more about the Big Bad(s). My favorite episode was the whodunnit tarot card mystery. It was pretty obvious who the killer was but it was still a fun ride.

I loved Bea and Jessie's relationship. Give me more SF/fantasy shows with these types of relationships at the forefront. I could have done without Billy. I just kinda glazed over his story; I didn't find him that interesting of character and he was just kinda there for the love triangle. I'm really tired of love triangles in YA; it's a boring, overdone trope that doesn't really add anything.

I kept waiting for Spike to do something more. I liked his character but we hardly saw him; he was just kinda there.

I liked how the show ended and even made a mental note to myself that it concluded nicely and would be ok if it ended there.
posted by wasabifooting at 7:55 AM on May 13, 2021 [3 favorites]


> I kept waiting for Spike to do something more. I liked his character but we hardly saw him; he was just kinda there.

I thought for sure that the "Edna Skiffins" bit would have shown up more frequently than it did.
posted by haileris23 at 11:52 AM on May 13, 2021 [1 favorite]


These takes have been super helpful for deciding whether to dig in. Gonna check it out.
posted by zeek321 at 1:31 PM on May 13, 2021 [1 favorite]


Finished it! Suspicions vindicated.

In the end, I think that they could have filed off the Holmesian serial numbers without losing very much -- nothing really hinged on the characters being those particular characters, and it might have been less weird if they hadn't been.

I'm glad that the season told a complete story, but I could have watched more of the same. There was definitely an option for (most of) the gang to come back for more supernatural investigation.

Is it just me or does Darci Shaw look a lot like a young Jennifer Connelly?
posted by confluency at 2:35 PM on May 13, 2021 [2 favorites]


I finished episode one, and despite the anachronisms, I liked the main characters and the supernatural element. I am wondering who the hell that guy pretending to be Watson is, because Watson would NEVER act like that.
posted by happyroach at 11:45 PM on May 14, 2021


I don't think any of the Holmesian characters bore very much resemblance to their canon counterparts (so don't expect that bit to get better!). I do think that the Watson interpretation ends up being a somewhat logical extrapolation of a certain Watson flavour from other adaptations, if that flavour of Watson were a lot more ambitious and resentful.
posted by confluency at 4:26 AM on May 15, 2021


I liked it well enough. Some things I really liked - especially the relationship between the main character and her sister, even if it did get off to a rocky start (do we always have to make conversations about sex or boys). The found family trope. The mix of campy schlock and horror.

I liked that the main character was smart but not in a ... like ...unrealistic way? Like, she is really clever, but not in the power fantasy kind of way that Sherlock Holmes is. And the show values her intelligence and knowledge about her city.

Was not particularly enthralled by the use of the Magical Negro trope, especially not when he turns out to be a villain as expected.

Was not particularly enthralled by the love triangle, especially when one of the love interests seemed so resentful and angry. I am so over it. I feel like Billy could have been a much more interesting character without that angle.

Did not really care about the fact that it's really not Sherlock Holmes fanfiction at all, but original fiction with original characters who just stole some people's names. It was a bit confusing at first, because I kept expecting to learn something that would bring the characters closer to their canon counterparts, but ... nope.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 10:16 AM on May 16, 2021 [1 favorite]


I liked it well enough, but I gave it up after the third episode because it might be my TV, but I couldn't see anything half the time. Every other scene seemed to be shot in the dark.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 12:59 PM on May 16, 2021


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