On CBS-TV’s ongoing Elementary series, a modern day interpretation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson characters, the show runners decided to shake things up by having Holmes go through a drug relapse.
In Doyle’s original stories, Holmes famously used cocaine, against the wishes of his fellow lodger, sleuthing companion and friend Dr. John Watson. Eventually Watson reveals he weaned Holmes off the (at the time legal) drug, probably as the harmful effects of cocaine became better known (Doyle also was a physician).
It’s not the first time Holmes has been depicted as an actual addict. Novelist and filmmaker Nicholas Meyer devoted an entire book and film to Holmes being a delusional cocaine addict requiring treatment from none other than Sigmund Freud himself. But most adaptations stick to only occasional drug use by Holmes, normally when he is bored between cases (though in Billy Wilder’s film The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, he is seen to use after learning that an attractive enemy – for whom he had developed feelings – had been executed).
On this latest TV show however, the show runners decided to make Holmes a heroin addict instead, into which dependence he fell when he believed his girlfriend Irene Adler was dead. He recovers with the aid of Dr. Joan Watson – who was hired by Holmes’ father to be his sober companion – as well as regular attendance at an unnamed support group. There he becomes close friends with Alfredo Llamosa, one of the other members of the group, who also becomes his sponsor (it’s apparently a 12-step group). Holmes even becomes a sponsor himself. His recovery seems complete.
But no recovery is ever complete. When Oscar Rankin, a former heroin addict buddy of Holmes, who resents Holmes’ sobriety and rejection of him, kidnaps Llamosa. His purported reason is to force Holmes find his missing sister, but really he wants to prove to Holmes that he’s not better than Rankin, and that enough pressure will awaken Holmes addiction, too.
Holmes saves Llamosa, but is driven to beat Rankin almost to death, and then gives in and injects the heroin (that Rankin has thoughtfully provided). It’s not revealed how long he takes heroin this time – it may have been the once only, but that could be enough to send Holmes into a tailspin – or if he sought additional heroin addiction rehab treatment help. Watson (who has long since become his partner in investigation, as well as working solo) remains with him, but Holmes’ father decides he is needed as well, at least to deal with the legal consequences (re: beating a man almost to death).
Holmes manages to get through another season without a further relapse, but as any addiction counselor will tell you, it’s a day-to-day process. It’s unlikely it will happen too often on the show, no matter how often in happens in real life. If and when it does, Holmes has a support network to help him pick himself up again, including Watson and Llamosa (no longer Holmes’ sponsor, but still a friend with experience with addiction).
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In Doyle’s original stories, Holmes famously used cocaine, against the wishes of his fellow lodger, sleuthing companion and friend Dr. John Watson. Eventually Watson reveals he weaned Holmes off the (at the time legal) drug, probably as the harmful effects of cocaine became better known (Doyle also was a physician).
It’s not the first time Holmes has been depicted as an actual addict. Novelist and filmmaker Nicholas Meyer devoted an entire book and film to Holmes being a delusional cocaine addict requiring treatment from none other than Sigmund Freud himself. But most adaptations stick to only occasional drug use by Holmes, normally when he is bored between cases (though in Billy Wilder’s film The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, he is seen to use after learning that an attractive enemy – for whom he had developed feelings – had been executed).
On this latest TV show however, the show runners decided to make Holmes a heroin addict instead, into which dependence he fell when he believed his girlfriend Irene Adler was dead. He recovers with the aid of Dr. Joan Watson – who was hired by Holmes’ father to be his sober companion – as well as regular attendance at an unnamed support group. There he becomes close friends with Alfredo Llamosa, one of the other members of the group, who also becomes his sponsor (it’s apparently a 12-step group). Holmes even becomes a sponsor himself. His recovery seems complete.
But no recovery is ever complete. When Oscar Rankin, a former heroin addict buddy of Holmes, who resents Holmes’ sobriety and rejection of him, kidnaps Llamosa. His purported reason is to force Holmes find his missing sister, but really he wants to prove to Holmes that he’s not better than Rankin, and that enough pressure will awaken Holmes addiction, too.
Holmes saves Llamosa, but is driven to beat Rankin almost to death, and then gives in and injects the heroin (that Rankin has thoughtfully provided). It’s not revealed how long he takes heroin this time – it may have been the once only, but that could be enough to send Holmes into a tailspin – or if he sought additional heroin addiction rehab treatment help. Watson (who has long since become his partner in investigation, as well as working solo) remains with him, but Holmes’ father decides he is needed as well, at least to deal with the legal consequences (re: beating a man almost to death).
Holmes manages to get through another season without a further relapse, but as any addiction counselor will tell you, it’s a day-to-day process. It’s unlikely it will happen too often on the show, no matter how often in happens in real life. If and when it does, Holmes has a support network to help him pick himself up again, including Watson and Llamosa (no longer Holmes’ sponsor, but still a friend with experience with addiction).
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