'Young Sherlock' Turns Heated Rivals Into Kick-Ass Partners

"One can love Nicholas Meyer's assertion in The Seven-Per-Cent Solution that Holmes never fought Moriarty at Reichenbach, or Nancy Springer's take that Holmes and Mycroft had a secret sister named Enola. Hell, Benedict Cumberbatch's 2010 Sherlock came right on the heels of Robert Downey Jr.'s steampunk Sherlock Holmes in 2009, and both are still beloved today."

"Young Sherlock retains the Victorian setting of the classic early Holmes stories written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle but is decidedly earlier in the life of Sherlock Holmes. Instead of the 1881 setting of the first Holmes novel, A Study in Scarlet, the events of Young Sherlock take place in the 1870s, and chronicle Sherlock as he's sent to Oxford, not as a brilliant student but as a delinquent given menial labor chores."

"Quickly, he is befriended by a cocky student named James Moriarty, and the pair quickly fall into a partnership that involves working as ad hoc detectives, drinking in pubs, getting into scraps, and generally being the kind of duo that Holmesian pastiches don't always depict: Holmes having adventures not with Watson but with someone who is his intellectual equal in every way."

Sherlock Holmes fans are surprisingly accepting of varied interpretations and adaptations of the character, contrary to expectations of strict canon adherence. Multiple versions coexist harmoniously, including Nicholas Meyer's reinterpretation of Moriarty's fate, Nancy Springer's addition of a secret sister, and contemporary adaptations like Benedict Cumberbatch's modern Sherlock and Robert Downey Jr.'s steampunk version. Guy Ritchie's Young Sherlock continues this tradition, set in the 1870s at Oxford rather than the canonical 1881 London. The show depicts a younger Holmes as a delinquent assigned menial labor, who befriends James Moriarty and forms an equal intellectual partnership. This portrayal offers fresh dynamics by pairing Holmes with an intellectual peer rather than the contrasting Watson dynamic traditionally depicted.

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