Reviews and Thinkings

As you probably know it has been weathering like the end of the world for about a month outside and now it has the temerity to turn cold. (Not America cold but cold enough for me to discover that I have, in a kind of traditional way, lost my gloves again.) 

We haven't managed to spend much time outside except getting to and from places and dragging a recalcitrant dog around the park. I did make the piccs though and got to see "Saving Mr Banks" just in time. Just, just fantastic and lovely and sad and Emma Thompson you are brilliant. Academy Awards people - you know nothing. Nothing I tell you! No nomination for Ms Thompson or  Tom Hanks in Captain Phillips. Seriously - you couldn't pick a good performance in a Godfather movie. 

Various members of my family saw "12 Years a Slave" Hard to review because what do you say? I didn't like it? I don't think you are supposed to LIKE it are you? But still, they didn't like it. Relentless was the word used. I didn't go myself. A girl's gotta know her limitations. I know I would spend two and a half hours trying to get my head between my knees. 

So then. To Sherlock. SPOILER ALERT 

To tell you up front, I think it is head and shoulders above anything else on the Telly-Telly-Bunkum-Box (Thank you Mr Dahl) but I worried a bit at first. You will understand my wobbles if you are a Doctor Who fan. I'm not really - hasn't been the same since Eccleston left for me but did like Tennant quite a lot. But in Doctor Who - it sometimes feels to me like the fans write it now and I worried with the first episode of Sherlock that it was happening again. The outlandish solution to his death, the Morriarty nearly snog, the Bulgaria thingy. If you go anywhere near the Interweb, these will not have been new developments. Fans have been speculating about developments like these for ages. However, for me they did manage to turn it around. The wedding episode was just lovely and I think it needed to be lovely - it was the wedding for goodness sake. My favourite one though was the final episode in which we got the return of what was missing from the other two - menace. That chap from Borgen playing Rupert Murdoch was genuinely scary.

I've watched em all again. (Told you I wasn't getting out much) and these are my best bits

• Sherlock snogging Molly. Didn't say all the fan fiction was bad did I?
• John Watson's face when he sees Sherlock for the first time. Underrated excellence.
• Sherlock and Mycroft's parents being played by Benedict's Mum and Dad. Classy
• The character of Mary. Really glad she fits in with them Would have been boring drivel to make her antagonistic to Sherlock (See every other girl who has gone out with Watson in every other adaptation - ever)
• The game of Operation between Mycroft and Sherlock. So much back story in there. Excellent writing.
• Sherlock's battle for survival after being shot. Genuinely original and engaging. Nice to see Andrew Strong back but am hoping he is not alive. (Morriarty that is) Does no one die in this thing?

Stephen Moffat says he wants to write it as long as he can keep Benedict in it as the Cumberbatch is hot as July there now. I am hoping Hollywood holds its horses for just a bit longer.