Many writers make references to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famous literary creation, the detective Sherlock Holmes, and these often become embedded within popular culture. While Holmes exists predominately in the context of Victorian-era London, he has been mentioned in such outre contexts as the 22nd century[1] or hunting aliens or supernatural enemies.[2] In The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen comic book series it is revealed the alternate universe British Empire is falling apart without his skills, leaving only his brother Mycroft and the league to carry on his work. The versions of Holmes usually wear the deer-stalker hat shown only a few in the original Strand pictures, as opposed to the far more common top hat, and frequently they say 'Elementary my dear <name>' to another character.
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One of the first attempts was made in response to the 'Great Hiatus' (when Arthur Conan-Doyle decided not to write any more stories, to the dismay of his fans). Stepping into the breach, in 1897, John Kendrick Bangs wrote Pursuit of the House-Boat (a sequel to his A House-Boat on the Styx), in which a deceased-gentlemen's-club house-boat is stolen, whereupon Holmes arrives to help his fellow-deceased track down the boat by chartering a ship from Hades to London. Bangs' version of Holmes then comments to himself:
"For now," he said, with a chuckle, "I can get back to earth again free of cost on my own hook, whether my eminent inventor wants me there or not. I never approved of his killing me off as he did at the very height of my popularity." [3]
However in 1894 Conan Doyle decided to return to writing, bringing Holmes back from the dead by claiming he had faked his death in The Empty House. While Bangs' attempt was reverential, Maurice Leblanc decided to write the short story "Sherlock Holmes arrive trop tard"[4] ("Sherlock Holmes Arrives Too Late"). In it, Holmes meets the young thief Lupin for a brief time, unaware that he is, in fact, Lupin. After legal objections from Conan Doyle, the name was changed to "Herlock Sholmès" when the story was collected in bookform in Volume 1. Holmes returned in two more stories collected in Volume 2, "Arsène Lupin contre Herlock Sholmès", having opened the floodgates to less flattering versions of Holmes as we shall see. One of the more recent parodies in print is "The Lord Mike Saga", where 'Mycroft Miles' (née Mills) is the Holmes figure, with the titles reflecting the styles: "A Study in Varlets", "The Strange Case of the Moth-Eater of Clapham Common", "Happy Times and Places" and "A Cameo Broached". Miles refuses to talk of Holmes, referring to him only as 'the other chap'.
Frequent speculation as the 'real' Holmes has existed since publication, and Mark Frost's novels The List of Seven and its sequel The Six Messiahs are merely the latest to put a spin on this. He has Sir Arthur Conan Doyle as its main character and tells the (fictional) story of how Doyle's Holmes was inspired by Johnathon Sparks, a mysterious man who saves Doyle's life from a mad occultist. The Wold Newton family series connects multiple famous fictional characters together to a mail coach that passed a radioactive asteroid in the eighteenth century - Holmes is a descendant of one of the travelers in that coach
Television was invented later than Conan Doyle's original writing, but the strength of Holmes has ensured that he has been referenced, or appeared in on TV in new forms. Naturally the original books have also been dramatised, notably the Granada Television adaptation.
Cartoons were quick to pick up on the potential, so Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty appear in both the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon series, in the 1987 episode "Elementary, My Dear Turtle" and in the The Real Ghostbusters episode entitled "Elementary, My Dear Winston", in which Holmes, Watson, and Moriarty are literally brought to life by a strong belief held in them by the world's population. Though not ghosts, they do not have physical bodies. The timing of both this episode and the above Ninja Turtles example may have been a factor in the brand war in which the two series were engaged, and alludes to the cultural power of Holmes as a character.
Even CSI got in the act, with a story entitled "Who Shot Sherlock?", where the crime scene investigators solve the murder case of a man who plays Holmes in a re-enactment club devoted to the character. Such references are not so overt however, and the medical drama House makes much of the fact that the protagonist, a brilliant doctor solving medical mysteries of his patients, has a drug addiction, a man named Moriarty shoots House in the second season, the name Adler appears frequently through the series, has a similar name to Holmes and that he lives at apartment 221B.
On Batman: The Brave and the Bold episode, "Trials of the Demon!" Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson appeared to meet Batman that Sherlock finished Jason Blood's magic spell that brought Batman to 19th century after the mob put Jason Blood a.k.a. Etrigan on the blame of "missing souls" of the women. After the rescue of Jason Blood, Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, Batman and Etrigan hunt for Gentleman Ghost who was responsibility for missing souls. At first, Dr. Watson suggests that maybe James Moriarty is responsible.
In the Prison Break (season 4) episode entitled, Eagles & Angels (Prison Break), Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell pretends to be Cole Pfeiffer, a top salesman for a corporation called GATE. He is assigned a corner office with the room numbered 122B. The numbers 122 are the reverse of 221, a sly reference by the episode's screenwriters to T-Bag's Holmesian powers of reasoning and deduction, yet whose powers have been twisted and corrupted toward evil ends. Ultimately, T-Bag is a cleverly created anti-Sherlock Holmes, a stock character whose personality is shaped (in certain key facets) to be the polar opposite of Holmes. Indeed, T-Bag is a modern-day descendant not of Holmes, but of Holmes archnemesis Professor Moriarty.
On 7 October 2010, a Japanese anime began airing called "Tantei Opera Milky Holmes" about a girl named Sherlock "Sherly" Holmes and her 3 friends, who are based on other famous detectives, and how they retrieve their toys, or special powers, as they attend a detective academy. The anime has spawned a video game, trading card game, and a manga.
On 15 April 2011, a Japanese anime called "Hidan no Aria", produced by J.C. Staff, began airing. The story is about a girl named Kanzaki Holmes Aria, also known as Holmes the IV needs to work together with Kinji Toyama to solve mysterious attacks lead by the Butei Killer, Rika Mine, who was then revealed to be Lupin the IV.
Some of the earliest films use Holmes as a character, notably the early films of William Gillette, the American actor who played Holmes in various plays, and an early 'talkie' was produced in 1929 called The Return of Sherlock Holmes. During the Second World War American producers linked Holmes with the Allied war effort, defeating Nazi villains and Moriarty who sells his skills to the Germans, e.g. Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror (1942).[5] Later films would blur the lines between canon and non-canon however. In the sci-fi film Time After Time, H.G. Wells uses a time machine to go to 1979 America; he tries to use Sherlock Holmes as a false name, thinking that the literary character would be forgotten by then. From 1984 to 1985, Japan's Tokyo Movie Shinsha and the Italian TV station RAI released 26 episodes of Sherlock Hound, a show featuring anthropomorphic dogs in various roles in the Sherlock Holmes world. On July 2, 1986, Walt Disney Pictures released The Great Mouse Detective. where the character of Holmes is borrowed by a ... mouse. The name "Basil" is no mere coincidence: the actor Basil Rathbone was one of the first to portray Holmes on film. Continuing the print tradition of good natured irreverence the 1988 comedy Without a Clue presents the premise that Holmes was a fictional creation of John Watson's, who was the true deductive genius. Once the character becomes popular, Watson is forced to hire an out-of-work actor to play Holmes.