In a few short years, Benedict Cumberbatch has become a fan-favourite so beloved, he can barely blow his nose without the internet exploding. Following in the footsteps of his old pal Tom Hiddleston, we've taken a forensic eye to the back catalogue of the man you voted the Sexiest in movies. Here, then, are the great, the good and the (very occasionally) terrible entries on his CV so far...
Essential viewing: Sherlock (2011-)
These entries are usually confined to films but Cumberbatch’s TV triumphs can't be ignored. With brutal brilliance and a lack of anything resembling manners, his Sherlock is an unlikely object of devotion, but that’s exactly what he inspires. Cumberbatch, sporting Byronic curls and the greatest coat the world has ever seen, muses and deduces while Martin Freeman’s civil Dr. Watson throws his genius into relief. He builds on his early smartypants work in Starter For Ten here to establish himself as the go-to guy for the stupidity-challenged
Essential viewing: Parade's End (2013)
Imagine Downton Abbey's Earl of Grantham, only with a million Germans trying to kill him and you have Ford Madox Ford’s great Edwardian hero Christopher Tietjens. He’s brought to life by Cumberbatch in a hugely elegant BBC/HBO adaptation. Plenty of credit is also due to Rebecca Hall as Tietjens’ louchely cruel and adulterous wife Sylvia, and writer Tom Stoppard, whose script engages both heart and brain. But it’s the Cumberbatch show from beginning to end as a kind, occasionally mulish but ultimately upstanding member of an ancient class torn apart by war. Billed by its director as “Downton meets The Wire” – if you haven’t seen it, the sherry-ups will blow your mind – it’s sophisticated telly with plenty to say and a fantastic actor to say it.
Essential viewing: 12 Years A Slave (2013)
Lupita Nyong’o won the Oscar and Chiwetel Ejiofor and Michael Fassbender also got nods, but Benedict Cumberbatch deserves a mention too for bringing nuance to the smaller but equally pivotal role of slave owner William Ford. Is he a decent man corroded by the system or a pious fool deluded into thinking he’s on the side of the angels? The actor has us thinking first one thing and then the other. In his kindly-creepy hands, the gift of a violin to Solomon Northup feels about as welcome as a sheep poo in Maltesers packet. The real Ford’s ancestors were reportedly unhappy with the depiction; everyone else just bowed to the Cumbercraft on display.
Recommended: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)
With a dandyish air masking a needle-sharp intellect, the role of MI6 enforcer Peter Guillam fit Cumberbatch like one of those Savile Row suits in Tomas Alfredson’s mole-hunt thriller. He’s the centre-point of the film’s best set piece, a blood-pressure-cranking rummage through the Circus archives for a crucial clue, but is equally good patrolling the perimeter of scenes with languorous menace as head of the Scalphunters. To prep for the role Cumberbatch visited the seaside Moroccan town of Essaouira where his character’s back story plays out in John le Carré’s tale. “I was wandering around the streets at night,” he recalled, “thinking what it must be like to know that every turn could be my last.” Still sounds like a holiday to us.
Recommended: The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug (2013)
Huffy fire drake Smaug just pips another hissable Cumberbatch role, Star Trek Into Darkness’s John ‘It’s My Real Name, Honest’ Harrison, in this section, mostly by dint of some [first-rate motion-capture work](http://www.empireonline.com/movies/news/new-hobbit-behind-scenes-clip-benedict-cumberbatch/
) and vocal chords that couldn’t be more perfect for the role if they occasionally burped flames. The battle of wits with Bilbo (Martin Freeman) stands alongside Bilbo and Gollum's riddle-a-thon as the yarn’s most gripping sequence to date. As his tape reveals, even the most bizarre framing in audition history couldn’t prevent Cumberbatch’s rare mixture of honey and thunder from snapping Peter Jackson’s casting bods to attention.
Recommended: Doctor Strange (2016)
Long-rumoured for the role (Cumberbatch once teased at a Comic-Con panel that he was up for the role of 'Nurse Normal'), this was about as perfect a piece of MCU casting as when Kevin Feige stumbled across Robert Downey Jr.'s headshot and thought, "Maybe this is our Iron Man?" Benny-C's face handsomely sculpted in a canon-respectful goatee, Cumberbatch is every inch the smug, hyper-intelligent surgeon-turned-magic-man Stephen Strange, keeping his head above the whirlwind of CGI to leave a powerful impression for future Cumberheroic installments.
One for the fans: Zoolander 2 (2016)
Ben Stiller's sequel to his male-modelling cult comedy was really, really, ridiculously not good, by most accounts. But it is a notable oddity in the Cumberbatch-ouevre for the actor's brief and singularly bizarre cameo as 'All', an androgenous non-binary model who holds a party entitled the IncredibAll. The character sparked accusations of transphobia, but whatever your position, you have never seen Benedict look like this before.
One to avoid: The Fifth Estate (2013)
If you queued up to hear the Cummer get Wiki, you were probably on your own. A good and decent man by every account, Cumberbatch stood loyally by his IckyLeaks flop while the world inched away from it like a stink bomb in a cinema foyer. It’s the narrative rather than any flaws in B-Cumbs’ performance that makes it such an enervating experience. Joining the dots on Julian ‘Wikileaks’ Assange’s life is Bill ‘Dreamgirls’ Condon, an uneasy marriage of director and material that plods methodically from A to B to C with little enlightenment. Assange refused to meet Cumberbatch before filming and later published a letter condemning the movie. Strangely, there was no mention of a garb of white wig, contact lenses and anorak that made him look like an extra-terrestrial rambler.