Enola Holmes & Young Sherlock

Transcript

Speaker: Welcome to Clued in Mystery. I'm Sarah. And I'm Brooke, and we both love mystery. Brooke. Hi, Sarah. Today we're doing something we've never done before, and that's a collaboration episode. We have Jessica of Clued on It podcast with us, and she reached out to us a while back and suggested we do a crossover episode because, quite honestly, our audiences are probably very similar. So welcome, Jessica. And can you share with our listeners what Clued on It podcast is all about?

Speaker: Sure. Thank you for having me, Sarah and Brooke. I'm so happy that we finally connected this. So Clued on it podcast, we watch mystery television or film, and we try to guess whodunit before the first commercial break or the title sequence. So when the cold open happens, we're trying to guess with no clues, no context sometimes, and generally no accuracy. and

Speaker: And we've done about 100 episodes and we do do some interviews as well with different um creators of shows and films. And we also have mystery writers on um recently suggesting shows for us to watch and giving us clues. And and we've done some collaborations as well. We really enjoy mystery genre. We are very much more on the film and TV side of it. But we I love it all. We love it all.

Speaker: Yeah, that sounds like so much fun. It's like the perfect thing that you want to do with your mystery loving friend. Right. So that's awesome. Well, today our topic of conversation is right in line with that.

Speaker: We thought it would be fun as a group to do a comparison of two very popular Sherlock Holmes adaptations as of late, the Enola Holmes movies and the New Young Sherlock series.

Speaker: So let's get into it, you guys. We talked about a couple of different options to talk about today. And i was like, oh, yeah, the Enolas. I hadn't watched them in a while. I hadn't seen the third one. And so I went back to watch that. And then i was like, I'm not remembering some of the things. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. I had so much fun going back and watching the first and second one as well Anola Holmes. um Gosh, it was – I think i was – which I guess is weird to say for somebody who's like –

Speaker: so into mystery TV and and film, I was so dazzled, I think the first time around with all the visuals that i wasn't following some of the clues, i wasn't following um some of the just important exposition, and just trying to get to know the characters. And so now going back, I was like, gosh I love this even more. i would watch this again. um and then i was also, i it was perfect timing for me when, for you to suggest young Sherlock because I had just finished The Other Bennett Sister. And so i was so prepared to see Donald Thin on screen and be like, yes, give me this guy in a different role and so different. It was so great to see his range.

Speaker: Yes, I'm jealous because I don't have the right streaming service to watch the other Bennett sisters. So eventually i will get to do that. But yes, such good timing. And we had just barely watched the new young Sherlock. And so it was all fresh in our minds too.

Speaker: Yeah, i rewatched the first and second of the Enola Holmes films. And I'm with you, Jessica, I think, like, they're very, they're so clever, they are very easy to rewatch, because there is so much going on, right? So you do pick up something that second time around that you maybe didn't see the first time. And what i really like is that and this is probably because the source material is intended for a YA audience, that it is um something that kind of a family can enjoy.

Speaker: Yeah, yeah, definitely. And i I think so many of the um the messages came through for me so much stronger. and And doing the comparison, I think, has also been exciting for me going back and watching Enola. Thinking about this fresh Sherlock that they're doing in Young Sherlock.

Speaker: And I watched a bunch of Matthew Park Hills promo videos talking to media um promoting the show and him listing the different things that he was like, yes, we did that purposely. We did this purposely. We wanted this. We wanted this. So seeing this fresh Sherlock versus um Henry Cavill as Sherlock and then Enola and Edoria, her mom.

Speaker: how those values played out. um And then also, ah i thought it was interesting too, i think in both these works, I guess we'll say, um the the ah Women's ah Property Act,

Speaker: yeah figures very strongly because it's very connected to suffragettes and suffragism. So it was interesting that they wove that into both storylines and made made it meaningful.

Speaker: Yeah, you're right. i I didn't pinpoint that, but it was something they easily could have left out, but they made a point to bring in like the women's rights movements that were happening at the time. That's really interesting. The first film was released in 2020.

Speaker: Do you guys think that it at all impacted the producers of young Sherlock? Because visually there are some similarities and there's a lot of action and fight scenes. um but what do What do you think? Do you think that they were noticing the popularity of Enola and wanted to kind of do the maybe boy version of that?

Speaker: Maybe. I mean, so the let's maybe provide a little bit of context for the two shows, right? So Enola Holmes is Sherlock's younger sister. um and ah the the series really focuses on her. Sherlock is really a side character um in in those shows. he ah He's portrayed by, as you say, Jessica Henry Cavill, and But he's not the he's not the prime character, whereas with young Sherlock. But we meet um Sherlock and Moriarty when ah they are in their late teens, early 20s at university.

Speaker: And um we see the blossoming of that relationship. So Sherlock is it core character in that in that series. But both of those series build out these families around them.

Speaker: They are both based on books. So that, you know original source material for for both of them. But in terms of how they are visually shown to us, I think you're right, Brooke. There are definitely some parallels between what the people behind Enola Holmes did and what Guy Ritchie did with um young Sherlock. and But it feels like ah it feels Guy Ritchie-esque.

Speaker: It really does. Yeah. The Enola Holmes, I was shocked. and And I thought that it was interesting, too. And you mentioned this in your bonus episode as well, that the Guy Ritchie, he directs the first two young Sherlock's. But then there are other directors for the other sick ah eight um episodes. And I feel like you can really tell the difference, especially when you get towards seven, eight, nine, ten. um And that towards the end of the series, it's, it it is almost like, where oh where, did you introduce that? I don't remember

Speaker: that Like, where did this style or this graphic or this? like there and And that happens in TV shows. You always are, especially in the first season, you're playing around with things and deciding to do this or that. But Guy Ritchie's style is so specific.

Speaker: And I really felt like even though Enola Holmes, totally different director, they actually executed on that sort of sassy, sparky, straight to the camera, quick cuts,

Speaker: angles, um speed, and and youthful vivaciousness. Like, they really nailed it, all three of them, all the way through. Whereas um they really, i think, gave other directors more of a leash in in their episodes of Young Sherlock so that you get, like, that the the Haunted Mansion episode. um And which is cool, like to have all those different styles and genres in one series in one season.

Speaker: In Young Sherlock, we get like, kind of like being able to see the calculations of his mind, like his mind working. And then in Enola, we have like, script on this, as if somebody was handwriting notes on the screen. So that's that felt very similar to me too.

Speaker: and Helpful because neither of these have a Watson narrating that's like explaining how this brilliant detective has come to the conclusions. We need a Watson. And in this case, I think those visual cues become that way for the audience to figure out how the the brilliant person has deduced it.

Speaker: That is such a great point. I had not picked that out. But yeah, there's no Watson in this. And they even one of the the media asked Matthew Parkhill, are you going to add a Watson in the second season of a Young Sherlock? And he was like, I i mean, I can't really. And i mean, that would be a weird threesome, though, i think. Like they're this strange triangle relationship, a love triangle because we they have such ah a lovely thing going with Moriarty and and Sherlock and trying and building that story. Everybody's trying. I'm i'm probably not even going to nail it, but I feel like they they have a hard time nailing it, even in the promos of trying to explain how it can lay out how Reichenbach Falls can be so much more tragic when you realize that they were such great friends and that they essentially made each other.

Speaker: um and you know, when you see see that story that they've made up in Young Sherlock, how much it could be such a heartbreaker. Also, i really appreciated this topic for you um today too because I have always joked about um so we so kind of started our podcast just as a little background um talking watching after watching Endeavor because they have such great ah do you did you ever watch that show which is like baby like a baby um Inspector Morse it's the prequel to Inspector Morse and so I always called it like Muppet Babies and like how we became obsessed with that like in the 90s and the early 2000s is ah prequels of stories that we love and I think um thinking about this young Sherlock and um Endeavor being the prequel of Inspector Morse like you see um Endeavor's kind of slide into Inspector Morse and how he is alone and is just always going to have problems with women and that he gets this house and he gets this car that he's attached to and um and his relationships with his friends and with Thursday but it's it's this slide into Inspector Morse whereas this young Sherlock is really going to build us up to a heartbreaker i feel like and um that's interesting to me

Speaker: Yeah, i think I think you've captured that really well, Jessica. um Because ah Endeavor is a ah great example of another kind of um prequel ah extending the story, right, of of something that is really well loved. Morse is incredibly popular. Yeah.

Speaker: ah Even still, even though they haven't made a ah more separate, you know, he died. I think in creating either Endeavor or Young Sherlock or even Enola Holmes, it's providing audiences who love these characters with another way to love them.

Speaker: yeah Right? There was one episode, I don't remember which one, of Young Sherlock where I was like, oh, this is This is going to be really sad. Like, yes, because you know where it's going.

Speaker: Right. As you say, it's this this heartbreaking relationship between Moriarty and Holmes, but also, i think, ah a heartbreaking relationship with himself.

Speaker: Yes. And you, you see where that, where that comes from. And I think that's maybe the difference between Enola Holmes and young Sherlock is, uh, because Enola Holmes, she is not a character that exists in canon, right? There is no younger sister. so she's completely fabricated and it's a great, you know,

Speaker: um it's great fun to think about, okay, what if there were more people in their, in their family? um But young Sherlock Moriarty is someone in, yes, in Sherlock's life. Right. So like it is a relationship that, um that we are familiar with. and And so I think it's a bit more not meaningful. That's not the right word, but there's something more to the Young Sherlock series, because it it really does lead us to that place, which Enola Holmes is never going to lead us.

Speaker: yeah yes Yeah, great point, Sarah. And I think that that... demonstrates the importance of this being a series because if they had decided to do young Sherlock as a film and Sarah you and I have talked about this um in different episodes about different shows you get so much more ability to flesh out characters and develop backstories if you have eight episodes versus an hour and a half and it it wouldn't have worked so i i really appreciate the fact that they chose to do it as a series where

Speaker: I think that what Enola Holmes is attempting to capture works as feature films to the same way. Agreed. Yeah. Yeah, it's very hopeful, the character going along with her, following her story.

Speaker: And I thought that was interesting, too, actually, is that she realizes in the first ah film that alone doesn't mean lonely.

Speaker: it just means following your own path. And I was like, oh my gosh, that's so hopeful, as opposed to something like um Which, I mean, this is iconic. I'm not putting this down. But if you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable must be the truth. Yeah.

Speaker: I mean, great quote, great way of looking at life deduction, but it's all very in your head. And of course he eschews emotion, but it's so um it's so powerful. It's such a fun and um just, yeah, powerful thought to be like, I don't know, I can be alone. I can choose my own path, but I'm not lonely And i choose, i alone choose my path.

Speaker: I think even they didn't say that, but I was like, oh, actually, i like that even more. Well, and I think you're capturing really nicely the difference between the two. i think Enola Holmes, as you say, is hopeful, right? There's there's optimism when you're when you're watching it whereas young Sherlock is inevitable, right?

Speaker: Yes. Right? Like, there is, yeah, there is going to be some broken hearts along the way. right And it's that car crash you can't help but watch because at the same time I am so invested because I'm like how is this going to develop because at this point where they left us at the end of the first season there's some friction but they're still friends and I'm like what is going to happen I'm dying to know where the turning point happens um but you're right Sarah it's we know going into it that it's not going to end well

Speaker: Yeah. How did you feel? i heard um in one of the interviews, Matthew, well, I guess in a couple of them, Matthew Parkhill said that he really enjoyed Hero Finds.

Speaker: Is it Tierney? His last name? Yeah. his in he in his ah original audition he noticed that he made the choice to lean in whereas a lot of other sherlocks are um kind of observers they're just looking at the world they're emotionally detached but he's leaning in and How did you feel about that when you were, because it's it's very, he's he makes a lot of mistakes. He ah bumbles around, even though he's completely brilliant. um

Speaker: He's a little... ah He has um a little bit of, ah he he feels that like he's maybe losing his mind a little bit, if that's the appropriate way to say it. um Yeah, so i any thoughts on on on that presentation?

Speaker: I wonder what, because I'll be very honest that I'm not, I would never call myself a Sherlockian, right? Like the people who know the canon and who are absorbed in it, I'm not one of those.

Speaker: So I wonder what somebody who is a diehard Sherlock fan feels about that because it's very different from what the canon tells us about him. But for me personally, i enjoyed the idea that, yes, he's brilliant. He's you know a genius right off the bat, but he's also a real person.

Speaker: And you can watch him grow into his skills and gain new skills. um I really liked that. ah But again, I'm not sure everyone would. They might like shake their finger at that.

Speaker: I think i'm I'm with you, Brooke. I really liked how he feels closer, right than many of the other portrayals, even even if you think about Henry Cavill, who, you know, he's on screen for, i don't know, a few minutes total, right? But when he when he is, yeah, I guess you could describe him as as he's leaning away from the audience, right?

Speaker: And other characters, like the other people even in this story. The whole kind of leaning back that he does um and even kind of he's so bulky, like as a man, like as as as a, as Superman, as a literally you like as a man, the camera, I feel like even like really takes him in.

Speaker: Cause he is leaning back. Like if they were to like focus on him, like give him a headshot, it wouldn't show how he's kind of, I i don't want to be really part of this. I don't want to.

Speaker: I don't want to get involved. i shouldn't get involved. I'm curious, but I'm not going to get involved. like That's your thing. And know and i I respect that also because it's a it's a nice way of respecting her space and um and showing that he's kind of like, yeah, you you do your own thing. I i don't.

Speaker: um And edie again, she's there to help, but also also hands off. Like they're all very individual, um which is like a a fault of their raising and also a ah and also an asset of their, the way they were raised.

Speaker: So that brings up a lot um of thoughts for me about the way that these, Sarah brought it up earlier, these fictionalized characters, like each show has this set of characters that never appeared in the canon.

Speaker: are completely made up by the writers. And I find myself really fascinated by, like, why as an audience do we care? But we do. We want to know like, um about parents and siblings and the relationships that Sherlock has aside from Watson, which is all we almost all we get in the original canon. um I don't know what that says, if it's, like, shows us how...

Speaker: much we revere him because what other character do we do this like i don't care about miss marvel's siblings i just don't i don't even think about it what's the draw because it's there a really good question brooke i don't know yeah it's a mystery you guys yeah yeah i i kind of start i remember in 2020 thinking kind of like why am I so into this but I'm I'm down like just in the promo I was like yeah who is this I I want to I want to know more about this woman I feel like he's he's just one of those characters he's like Santa Claus like everybody knows who he is

Speaker: Right? yeah and And so the opportunity to, like, imagine how he became who he is, i think, is, is really appealing.

Speaker: It makes stories more accessible. you know You've got much younger people who are at enjoying Sherlock or become familiar with Sherlock, who may go on and and pick up some of Doyle's work.

Speaker: Or not, right? I mean, there's a lot of other people who have been writing about Sherlock and and making films and shows that kind of feature Sherlock-type characters that they can enjoy as well. You could spend a lot of time just looking through other films and shows that feature Sherlock, either modern day or in the past.

Speaker: Wow. Yeah, I like that ah because these are targeted for a younger audience. Definitely the whole family can enjoy them. But I like the idea that a whole new generation is becoming familiar with the character and he's just going to continue to live on.

Speaker: Yeah, yeah. I was listening yesterday in sort of in preparation to um some old recordings. You can find them as podcasts of like Basil Rathbone doing Sherlock. And I was reminded and I'm still trying to actually...

Speaker: remember ah what it was. if i think my first, other than reading Sherlock, I think my first on-screen Sherlock was was maybe the young Sherlock of the 90s, but I can't remember, I haven't dug up yet if that was the episode. I remember watching, um there was the thing thing and that uh that plot blew my mind as a kid i i was like oh my gosh i i cannot believe that and i think i annoyed all of my like childhood friends like at any time we were playing some sort of imaginative thing i'd be like and then i have a poison dart okay you what are you talking about Anyway, but I think we're watching and um and listening and reading Sherlock as a kid. um He was so, like you said, Santa Claus, but also he was so um he was so arrogant and he really thought he was...

Speaker: incontrovertible, like, I know what is happening here. And I am going to, and this is how it's going to play out. And this is how we're going to trap the person. This is how we're going to, or as Enola says, put our feet in the water for the sharks to bite, try to get the sharks to bite. um But I was listening to that Basil Rathbone.

Speaker: And i think it it was ah ah a study in Scarlet, um some part of it, or no, maybe it was another one. ah Hugh Bonneville does a reading of Sherlock, by the way, and I was listening to that. That was really fun too. But I think it was the other one where, yeah, Sherlock says, we're going to do this and we're going to set up the character and mark my words. They're going to come for the ring and it's going to be, it's good. This is the way it's going to go down. And it totally doesn't happen that way. and i was like,

Speaker: Oh, I remember him being like perfect, just spot on perfect as a kid. And I think I, again, was probably just dazzled by his dazzled. I don't know if though that's right or intimidated by his arrogance. And so I also am enjoying these, the young Sherlock and the and the Enola Holmes for showing Sherlock showing. Well, not so much Enola because she does. She is in a state of like,

Speaker: I don't know what's going on, but I'm going to figure it out. i just have to do some slow steps. But she doesn't have the arrogance about her. and Also, the Henry Cavill doesn't have so much of the arrogance to his character. He has a lot of wondering, like, how's he going to figure it out? Especially in the second Enola Holmes, we see him like with his murder board essentially trying to figure out the the bank heist and ah and then in the young sherlock we again he is arrogant like when he goes and talks to his teachers but he bumbles around and doesn't figure it out the way he he thinks it's gonna happen and gosh i just really appreciate that so much that arrogance is sometimes really grating

Speaker: I think I enjoyed ah Watson for that purpose because he could be so, um he would be annoyed and we would be like, yeah, that is annoying.

Speaker: You poor man. Why do you keep living with him? And as you pointed out, Brooke, we don't have him in these. So it it is nice that we have a different a different Sherlock, a different a character in Enola because then we don't have to ah there isn't anybody that we have to we don't have to be quite so annoyed yeah we don't have to be annoyed but and we don't have to join ourselves to another character to be like yeah he is annoying thank you

Speaker: I was interested to know um from you what you thought of. Well, first of all, we have two contrasting mother characters in the Enola Holmes and then the young Sherlock, which we, again, don't have any mothers in the ah in the original in the Arthur Conan Doyle. And then we have a dead father and in Enola Holmes, which is kind of a jumping off point for her relationship with Tewkesbury. But then um the father, oh my gosh, in young Sherlock.

Speaker: I mean, not to spoil things, but... oh He's a piece of work. He is a piece of work. Yes. Well said. And also i thought, I mean, it kind of gave, he, there's no way after Handmaid's Tale that I could ever think of him like when he's on screen, like to trust him. I really had a hard time with that, like going on first. And then I was like, Oh, thank God. Okay. I, yeah, they, they definitely played him creepy. And then he was, um, or not creepy, but as you said, piece of work.

Speaker: Sinister. Yes, sinister. So what were your thoughts on these additional characters in the stories? It's a good question. i think the mother characters in both, even though they are very different, they both really love their children.

Speaker: And we see that. yeah um Certainly we see her in Enola Holmes, we see that strong bond that she has with her mother and assume that that existed for the um for the older brothers. ah And then in young Sherlock,

Speaker: Yes, she very clearly loves her children, but they have very different circumstances in terms of where they are in their children's lives when we see them in these in these shows.

Speaker: ah But they still have ah have quite a presence in their lives. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I like that, especially Enola Holmes, but I think also in young Sherlock that we kind of get the hint that their brilliance comes through their mother. Now, the father's sinister qualities in young Sherlock, i mean, I think that there's a lot of like...

Speaker: Like he could have used that for good and he's turned it into evil. So maybe part of young Sherlock's brilliance comes through dad too. But I just love that like mom is such a guiding light in both of their, and don't know, maybe that's not the right term because both of them are a little bit absent in their own ways. But I just feel like a lot of their strength and and goodness comes from from their mom.

Speaker: Oh, I love that. Yeah. Yeah. you're You're right, Brooke, I think. and And I think you're right as well that there that that brilliance comes from her. Yeah, certainly in Enola too, right? Because like the mom is the one who teaches her all about ciphers and um yeah and did the same for Sherlock. we'd We hear that along the way. So it's pretty cool.

Speaker: Yeah. Jessica, it has been so much fun to have this conversation with you. Thank you very much for joining us. Do you want to share where our listeners can find you? Well, thank you very much for, first of all, for having me on. It's been really lovely to talk to you both. um And I hope to have you on to talk about your book and suggest a show for us to watch on Cluedunit. And you can find us, Cluedunit Podcast, on any of your podcast platforms, also YouTube. We're also cluedunitpodcast.com online and on Patreon and Instagram and Facebook. Yes.

Speaker: Thank you. That's wonderful. We'll definitely include links. And we would love to come on this your show and maybe recommend a show for you and Jacob. Thank you for being here today, listeners. But until next time, I'm Brooke.

Speaker: And I'm Sarah. And we both love mystery. Clued in Mystery is written and produced by Brooke Peterson and Sarah M. Stephen. Music is by Shane Ivers. If you liked what you heard, please consider telling a friend, leaving a review, or subscribing with your favorite podcast listening app.

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