Review: 'Elementary'

It’s difficult to view a show like "Elementary" without comparing it to current movies or BBC series incarnations. However, I went into the pilot with an open mind viewing Sherlock Holmes not as a comparable standard but as a character ingredient. That being said, if you’ve already decided on either Robert Downey Jr. or Benedict Cumberbatch as “your” Sherlock, Jonny Lee Miller probably won’t replace them. But if you’re open to a version more like "The Mentalist," you may find this entertaining.

In this modern take on the iconic detective, Sherlock Holmes (Jonny Lee Miller) has been transferred to the NYPD after his drug addiction while working as a consultant for Scotland Yard. To keep him on track, he is appointed a female rehab officer, Doctor Joan Watson (Lucy Liu). She soon discovers Holmes’s detail-oriented gift for detective work as he begins to deduce her past from simple clues. Before she can even check his pee, however, Sherlock is thrust upon his first murder case involving home invasion involving plastic surgery and jealousy.

The murder plot has a few twists to keep it interesting, but it’s nothing groundbreaking. The manner in which Sherlock makes his clue discoveries range from the cleverly observant (rolling a marble on the floor to discover a hidden room) to the ridiculous (placing rage as a motivator by watching wrestling on TV). His social deduction skills still have an impressive nature, but some of them seem not much clever than your average TV detectives. At least it gave Watson a chance to step in and bring the master detective back down to a human level.

As for the characters themselves, I’m of two minds. On the one hand, Sherlock and Watson are written with a great deal of backstory and mystery that they have the potential to be more than just props for procedural plots. It gives them both some much needed depth and a reason to keep watching. However, this can really only develop properly if the characters have chemistry and right now the actors seem dialed back. Jonny Lee Miller is given plenty of eccentric opportunities to shine, but hardly ever seems to take advantage of them. For a character that watches multiple TVs at once and breeds bees on his apartment roof, he is far too timid. Lucy Liu’s portrayal of Watson isn’t anything special either given how little she has to work with. The most emotion she displays is during a Yankee’s game and even then she seems to be holding back her enthusiasm. There are hints of romantic tension between the two, but most of their friendly banter feels forced with hardly any humor present where it should be.

There have been many media incarnations of Sherlock Holmes. From modern miniseries (Sherlock) to futuristic cartoons (Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century), the classic detective has been portrayed in a variety of different plots and settings. Elementary has the potential to standout from its predecessors, but it needs to take some bigger risks and amp up the energy if it hopes to succeed. Otherwise it’ll just blend in with series like The Mentalists and NCIS as a pale imitation until it fades away into obscurity. And Sherlock Holmes deserves better than that.