Let's be realistic.

A different way of telling a story

The acting in this movie is really good.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

Time jumping, craziness, mind trickery, this special had it all.It wasn't exactly written in the best way and I hate how Sherlock just figures everything out with 20 minutes left out of the blue, but it was surely an entertaining and unique episode of the show.

This story standing all by itself is original in a way because it shifts constantly from what happens in the modern world and what happened a century ago or more. It is nothing but the story of a wife killing her husband but the murderess knows about the stories of the old Sherlock Holmes and she is going to trap him in an old story indeed, that of the abominable bride. Sherlock shifts from one period of time to another by using some drug, cocaine or heroin is not the point, to reach a state of consciousness that makes him cross centuries. And he is going to solve the case by this plying between the present and the past. He will be induced into believed Professor Moriarty is back and he will have to go back to that special event when he "dies" the first time in the water chute somewhere in Switzerland within a confrontation with Moriarty there.This visit to the past event will give him the true answer to the question: Is Moriarty still alive? After all, why not since Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are themselves still alive. Then the present crime is nothing but a simple riddle for primary school children that Sherlock Holmes solves in two seconds, maybe less.This passing from the 21st century to the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century gives the story some dynamism and makes the suspense eventful and active. It even enables the film to give the possibility to suffragettes of the older time to speak their minds against the male dominated society they live in. That's good and entertaining. But from the outside, since we are the audience hence outside the plot itself, it is quite common place to suspect the wife of a murdered husband, and the situation is so simple that there is no other suspect and no other solution. That makes the whole film an attempt to wrap a very simplistic story into a complicated set of slips, underdresses and dresses, and we, like mice in a big wheel of Swiss cheese, get lost in the lace. So this film works because we are such a good audience that we forget to remain critical and attentive. Just what Sherlock Holmes constantly says: keep awake, keep attentive, keep concentrated, don't scatter your brain power. But unluckily we do, and actually luckily for the film itself.Dr. Jacques COULARDEAU

Although this was an entertaining episode, I felt it was the worst of the Sherlock series. Moffat, Gattis, and company had some fun with His Last Vow, but here they take it perhaps a step too far. I, along with most of the Sherlock fandom I suspect, was not expecting this episode to have any bearing on the rest of the series. It doesn't seem like it will impact season 4 much, apart from giving a preemptive explanation for whether Moriarty "survived". But aside from that, the episode gives us a better look at Sherlock's personality. We knew already that he is self-absorbed, not good with people, and unbelievably intelligent. But this episode is spent largely inside of Sherlock's head, which speaks a lot to how much he does with his mind palace. It's more than just the memory bank that he says it is (see Hound of the Bakserville S2: E2). It's an entire world that he uses to rationalize/dramatize what he observes.The Victorian setting was interesting. I liked a lot of the interpretation, aside from Molly posing as a man with that ridiculous mustache. The way Lestrade brings Sherlock the case at the beginning felt a lot like how most of the original short stories begin, and the cinematography with the living room in the street was really cool to see. The case itself felt even more like Scooby-Doo than Hound of the Baskerville did, but fortunately the case itself was not important. And it was justified by the fact that Sherlock was using it to help him figure out the Moriarty case. The subplot with the KKK style women's suffrage movement seemed a bit out of place, and is pretty predictable if you're familiar with the story of the five orange pips. However, it did show us that Sherlock is perhaps feeling some remorse for his treatment of women. In fact, I wonder if the entire women's suffrage thing was his way of realizing that women deserve a vote, so to speak, in his life. But that's just a theory.The other characters get pushed to the side a bit in this episode. We get to see them a bit, but it's basically just a nod to each one. Again, it is all Sherlock's perception of them, so this could provoke some interesting trains of thought regarding why he thinks of each one the way he does. Moriarty gets some screen-time in this episode if that entices you, but Magnussen does not make an appearance.On the whole, it reminded me of "On Stranger Tides". It was entertaining, but the show has produced much better. So this in-between episode was acceptable, but I sincerely hope that this isn't where the series is going. But if this is the worst it's going to be, then the future looks bright. I would suggest that ardent fans watch this, even if you don't think you'll like it. If nothing else, it gives an explanation for the end of His Last Vow. Just go in with slightly low expectations. Overall Rating: 8.6/10.

Overall, I really liked the Gothic portions of this episode, and overweight Mycroft was very entertaining. I expected this episode to be a one off, and I was disappointed to see that it wasn't. The direction was great, and the story was good, but the Mind-palace twist was unnecessary. The episode became hard to follow and messy. I really was enjoying the mystery, but all of it being in Sherlock's head seemed like a way to justify the episode being in the 1800s, which didn't need justifying. It ruined the great mystery we had that was hugely entertaining. The back and forth from the 1800s to modern Sherlock was disorienting. The Abominable Bride would have been much better as a standalone episode. I appreciate the Gothic portions, as they were a good kind of weird, but the ties into last season were unnecessary and unexpected (not in a good way). It was billed as a one-off, but it wasn't. Overall- 6/10