I agree with this. Watson is our interlocutor regarding Holmes, but in the original stories and novels he still remains very much his own intellectual man. Portraying him as a bumbler (as Nigel Bruce portrayed him opposite Basil Rathbone's Holmes in the 1930s and 1940s) or a Holmes fan-boy is not only inaccurate, but insulting.
Yes, anyone who's read the stories knows that Watson was crucial to Holmes in so many ways. (That pattern Doyle established got repeated over and over. Hercule Poirot and Captain Hastings, Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin, many more. The audience stand ins.)
I generally really like Guy Ritchie's work, but I *hated* his Sherlock Holmes movies. Turned him into yet another action hero, and you're spot on in your analysis of the elevation of Holmes and the dismissal of Watson. Probably the worst Holmes adaptations I've ever seen.
Good points! The relationship between characters is often what gives heft to a story. That’s doubly true if the Holmes & Watson stories in which, as you say, Holmes’s antics become baffling without the lens that Watson provides. He was a bit of a master-stroke on Conan Doyle’s part. Perhaps relationships are not coni all the cinematic?
I agree with this. Watson is our interlocutor regarding Holmes, but in the original stories and novels he still remains very much his own intellectual man. Portraying him as a bumbler (as Nigel Bruce portrayed him opposite Basil Rathbone's Holmes in the 1930s and 1940s) or a Holmes fan-boy is not only inaccurate, but insulting.
Yes, anyone who's read the stories knows that Watson was crucial to Holmes in so many ways. (That pattern Doyle established got repeated over and over. Hercule Poirot and Captain Hastings, Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin, many more. The audience stand ins.)
I generally really like Guy Ritchie's work, but I *hated* his Sherlock Holmes movies. Turned him into yet another action hero, and you're spot on in your analysis of the elevation of Holmes and the dismissal of Watson. Probably the worst Holmes adaptations I've ever seen.
The BBC Sherlock may be among the best, though!
I completely agree with this. The dynamics we get when Watson and Holmes are together are unmatched. Wonderfully written!
Good points! The relationship between characters is often what gives heft to a story. That’s doubly true if the Holmes & Watson stories in which, as you say, Holmes’s antics become baffling without the lens that Watson provides. He was a bit of a master-stroke on Conan Doyle’s part. Perhaps relationships are not coni all the cinematic?