Warren Ellis asked The Engineers to re-imagine Sherlock Holmes… And I don’t draw, but it piqued my curiosity, largely because, well, how do you reinvent Sherlock Holmes without either staying too close to the original or Basil Rathbone, or going too far off the original (and it’s worth noting that almost any “genius detective savant” concept, such Monk or Psych, is basically a revisiting of the same basic idea, with a twist!)
So I doodled this out, based on some things that were occuring to me while looking at other people’s awesome efforts.
There’s a kind of “not too much text” rule on the forum, so I’m going to just meander a bit about the subject here.
First off, it’s no coincidence that I based this on a photo from the movie Pi… reading through the entries, and finding myself thinking more and more about the flat and emotionless, scientific “voice” that Holmes has in my head, I kept going back to the robotic repetition of Pi’s protagonist’s scientific observations… I could see Holmes moving around a crime scene, and vocalising constant, clipped pieces of evidence, and free-association, like a less paranoid version of Milton Dammers in The Frighteners.
My Holmes is, like the original, a genius, and very detached from his fellow man. And he has absolutely no interest in solving crime for any moral reasons. I believe the original did it for the sheer intellectual challenge, whereas this Holmes only gets involved in sleuthing as a by-product of his obsession. This Holmes was a child prodigy… he is a mathematical and scientific genius, constantly absorbing information, and has been at a distance from others for his entire life. Agnostic and driven, he has become obsessed with unlocking the secret of the nature of the universe, and his ingrained feeling is that, by constantly taking in data, finding mysteries (criminal or otherwise) and unravelling them, and collating this data constantly, he will find the key or rosetta stone… put simply, I suppose he wants to “solve” the confusing nature of reality.
His lack of empathy with other people naturally finds him drawn to humanity at it’s excesses… in murder, in lusts, infidelity, debauchery, and chemical recreation. He finds that human nature is the thing that confounds him the most, and so believes that the biggest clues to the secrets he’s searching out lie in working his fellow man out.
He is quite obsessed, and as such, his constant notes are indecipherable to most people. Watson would be another extremely intelligent man (although not quite in Holmes’ league) who translates Holmes’ tiny scribblings into publishable academic papers. Perhaps Watson uses the small salary that Holmes’ provides him for this to supplement some kind of military service disability pension. As their relationship has progressed, he now accompanies Holmes and transcribes the constant verbal notes that issue forth from him. From an admittedly Hollywood viewpoint, Watson would also provide a necessary humanising conduit, both between Holmes and the world outside his offices, and Holmes and the audience.
As part of his earlier attempts to gather data to help him divine reality, Holmes found himself progressing from the physical sciences to number theory, and then on to a structured and prolonged series of experiments with chemicals. Most of his observation work from testing various concoctions on himself has been done, now, but he still regularly uses them as a means for replicating emotional or cognitive states, as they pertain to his work. This has, understandably, taken it’s physical and mental toll on Holmes, and whether or not he realises this, and recognises the cycle of dependancy that he is most certainly in, I haven’t yet decided, but the potential for pathos and black comedy is huge.
This version of Holmes can be of the original period, or contemporary… either works. The only differences would be naturally of surroundings… and the present day iteration would number advanced modern forensic evidence gathering and computer science among his large mental toolkit. There’s a charm to a period approach, of course.
His fashion choices, or lack of them, are as described on the picture. I’ve ditched the pipe and deerstalker… the big, eccentric hair provides a similar visual motif to the hat anyway, and the pipe is a fond and nostalgic affectation, but I don’t think it’s as central to the character as his vague arrogance and reptilian coolness, which are at the core of my take.
(I’m probably never going to write this, but I’d love to hear any comments on the ideas… it’s been a fun process that’s taken an hour or so of time where I would have been preoccupied and struggled to sleep…)
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