Ok, so I consider myself to be a bit of a purist. I can get really mad when the movie version of a novel airily ignores the fact that the hero has blond hair and blue eyes and casts a Latino to play his part. I hate it when people take a book, say, Terry Goodkind's Legend of the Seeker, and turn it into The Legendary Journeys of Richard and Kahlan, and episodic action comedy.
So I was kind of surprised to really like Merlin, which is one big anachronism with sloppy characterization.
And then along came Sherlock, the three movie BBC series about contemporary Sherlock Holmes.
I adore it. The new Sherlock looks like a very white version of Sam from Supernatural and talks like a crossover between ZeroPunctuation (look here if you don't know who I mean) and the last two Doctors from Doctor Who. Not very surprising, since it's directed by Moffat. But DAMN! this new Sherlock rocks! Nothing bad about Jeremy Brett from the old series, but this sleek, arrogant, sociopath-almost-psychopath Sherlock as Benedict Cumberbatch puts him down is about the most amazing thing I've seen first season Dexter.
The Brett Sherlock Holmes was sophisticated, smart, quick, arrogant, disdainful at times but always a gentleman. He was in his early forties, smoked a pipe and used cocaine when bored. He used his eyes, ears and newspapers mainly to reach his conclusions.
The Cumberbatch Sherlock (Sherlock, not Holmes; and he calls Dr. Watson by his first name, too), is in his early thirties and gets his cases mainly through his website: The Science of Deduction. He is, as mentioned, and as he describes himself, a high-functioning sociopath, utterly frustrating, brilliant and insufferable. He is also sexy as hell. He wears tailored clothes and uses multiple nicotine patches as a stimulant--he doesn't smoke. This Sherlock is the kind of man who asks you to hand him his phone, which is in his jacket--while he is wearing that jacket himself. And yet you can still understand why poor John Watson puts up with him.
The old Watsons, until Jude Law, are usually portrayed as somewhat simple chaps, very friendly, barely functional. The new John is, more than anything else, Normal. Ordinary. He's a Good Guy. And he doesn't hesitate to shoot people in the head when his friends are threatened. The new John is mesmerized by Sherlock, dazzled by the man's genius even if Sherlock annoys the hell out of him. He is incredibly likeable, mainly because he isn't a simpleton. he's just an ordinary guy caught up in the life of someone who is more than extraordinary.
And after this little rant of giddy joy, I also present you with my first great findings of Sherlock fic: An Act of Charity, by Wordstrings. Becomes slash fairly quickly, and then to think I wasn't even looking for slash particularly. This is the first story in a wonderful series that leads up to an established and very unhealthy relationship between John and Sherlock, but don't read it for sex, because it's quite short on porn. What makes Wordstrings' fics worth reading, almost required reading, I think, is her description of Sherlock's mental state, and how terribly, horribly sick he is. Really, you don't know who to pity more, Sherlock, for being who he is, or John, for having to live with the man. It's funny and quirky, very, very sick at times, and a nice bit to read, too.
Great stuff, well worth your time.