Kicking off the TV panel at Empire Presents... Big Screen in fine style was Sherlock creator/writer and erstwhile League Of Gentlemen star Mark Gatiss. With shooting on Sherlock season two only "a week and a bit" away from completion, Gatiss spilled some news that'll have Conan Doyle purists purring. "Season two is what we're calling 'The Woman, The Hound and The Fall’ trilogy," he explained, "so there'll be a version of ‘A Scandal In Bohemia’, a version of ‘The Hound Of The Baskervilles’ and a version of ‘The Final Problem’."
For the spoiler-wary, those are the Wikipedia pages to avoid between now and session two’s airing, the date of which remains almost as under wraps as the will-he/won't-he appearance of Holmes' nemesis, Moriaty.
So will Holmes be encountering the nefarious Moriarty? “Wait and see!” laughed Gatiss. So is that a 'yes'? “It’s a nnn-yes.”
If we're filing the arch-villain's appearance as a 'definitely maybe', Gatiss was happy to delve into the background of the next instalment of Sherlock adventures. “It’s a rare chance to do the early days of Holmes and Watson's friendship, right from the beginning, so everything you know has not yet formed. Sherlock’s attitude to women and to crime is still forming, so it’s much more 'plastic'. The only heresy [a**bout the show] is that it’s modern day, but after that it’s one of the most faithful versions there’s ever been, because Stephen (Moffat) and I just love it. Sherlock Holmes had become all about the hansom cabs and the fog, rather than about the friendship of this unlikely couple, but ours is very much inspired by the Basil Rathbone’s version.”
We've got a sneaking feeling that some version of that famous Reichenbach Falls denouement is on the cards. As Gatiss explained cryptically, “We get to the cliffhanger somehow…”