The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes: Set 1

This 1971 Thames Television series offers hour-long adaptations of detective stories written at roughly the same time Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was churning out his tales of the shamus of Baker Street. The first season's 13 episodes introduce 11 of Sherlock Holmes' fictional contemporaries, including Dr. Thorndyke (John Neville), a pioneer in forensics; Horace Dorrington (Peter Vaughan), an unscrupulous private investigator who uses his practice to fill his pockets; Simon Carne (Roy Dotrice), a phony hunchback who sheds his fake deformity and dons an elaborate disguise to play detective; Romney Pringle (Donald Sinden), more con man than PI; and Bernard Sutton (Robert Lang), a jeweler to high society. On the other hand, the sole female, Lady Molly of Scotland Yard (Elvi Hale), isn't terribly interesting, except for her proto-feminism; society gadabout Dixon Druce (John Fraser) is bland; and partners Martin Hewitt (Peter Barkworth) and Jonathan Pride (Ronald Hines) are just businesslike gumshoes, albeit clever ones. Dullest are the blind Max Carrados (Robert Stephens), who's stuck in a tale in which he's captive most of the time; and Carnacki (Donald Pleasence), who specializes in mysteries with a supposedly supernatural twist (the low-tech video production here makes his case involving an invisible horse seem ludicrous). Perhaps repeated encounters with these turn-of-the-century detectives would allow their eccentricities to flourish and make them more vivid, but based on this initial set, it's easy to see why they didn't have Sherlock's staying power. Optional. (F. Swietek)