REVIEW: ‘Young Sherlock’ Shows That Guy Ritchie Just Gets Sherlock Holmes

Guy Ritchie is no stranger to Sherlock Holmes. Serving as director on all eight episodes and as executive producer, Young Sherlock was created by Matthew Parkhill and takes a look at the genius’s life before we often see him in pop culture. The series also features Tricia Brock, Dennie Gordon, and Anders Engström as directors across the eight episodes of Young Sherlock Season 1 and is adapted from Andy Lane‘s series of books of the same name. 

Packed with action and stuffed with intrigue and family drama, the Prime Video original offers audiences a different kind of story than we expect. In the series, audiences meet a youthfully defiant Sherlock Holmes (Hero Fiennes Tiffin).

When his brother Mycroft Holmes (Max Irons) springs him from jail (for deciding to play the role of the Artful Dodger) and gives him a job as a scout at Oxford, Sherlock meets James Moriarty (Dónal Finn) and forms a quick friendship with the Irishman. 

Young Sherlock zeroes in on a new part of the iconic character’s life.

Intrigued by the Qing Dynasty Princess Gulun Shou’an (Zine Tseng) staying at the university, Sherlock’s attention is taken from a crush and studying Mandarin, and into his first case when he’s framed for murder. As professors begin to die, bombs begin to explode on the campus, and his family starts to be pulled in, Sherlock takes on his first-ever case.

Sherlock Holmes and James Moriarty work together to find out who is killing professors, why they’ve become targets, and to get to the bottom of a decades-old Holmes family mystery that their questions dig up. Between the two of them, no matter how much Sherlock’s family comes into play, Moriarty works to ground our titular character. 

Spanning multiple countries, including mid-Revolutionary France, Sherlock has to uncover a globe-trotting conspiracy that leads him into an explosive showdown that alters the course of his life. Young Sherlock embodies Victorian England beautifully, from set design to costuming, but it’s the anarchic adolescents’ antics that really drive the story home. 

Hero Fiennes Tiffin as Sherlock Holmes is perfection in this Prime Video Original series.

Hero Fiennes Tiffin as Sherlock Holmes is perfection. Intelligent, heartfelt, and incapable of steering anyone in the wrong direction, his young version of Sherlock is absolutely a breath of fresh air. With clear insight from previous adaptations of the character, young Sherlock is indeed someone different. Innocence marks many of his choices, and even the parts of his life that land him in jail can be looked at through the lens of youth. 

Consistently throughout the series, you can see moments on Tiffin’s face where he is weighing the logical answer against the one he wants to be right about. Charismatic, endearing, and absolutely the right amount of young and dumb, this version of Sherlock Holmes is easily one of my favorites. 

This version of Sherlock offers defiance intelligence in equal measure, just the way you would expect the character to. However, it has to be said that there is a certain unquantifiable something in Tiffin’s performance that is hard to describe. Maybe it’s the inherent wide-eyed nature of some of the early episodes, or the connection that he has with his mother, but this Sherlock balances between knowing everything and needing to learn in the best way possible. 

Dónal Finn as James Moriarty is an absolute standout in Young Sherlock.

Next to Hero Fiennes Tiffin as Sherlock, Dónal Finn as James Moriarty is one of the best to ever play the role. Shown as a scrappy Irishman on scholarship at Oxford, his quick friendship with Sherlock works to highlight all the ways that the iconic duo is similar. 

Their friendship becomes core to highlighting the youth of both characters. But as the story continues, it’s how Moriarty’s path begins to deviate that Finn does his most substantial character work. Throughout the series, you see James Moriarty draw his lines in the sand, scrap with anyone he thinks deserves it, and be an abject womanizer. And all of it is somehow still extremely charming. 

As he begins to exhibit the steely coldness the character is known for, his apathy and lack of empathy stand in direct opposition to Sherlock. Where Sherlock fights against his emotions to take the logical path he knows, Moriarty takes the world as it is, even if it’s ugly. The air of hope and naivete that clings to Sherlock is in stark contrast to James, whose world has clearly been ruined more times than we know.

Additionally, the subtext added by his class and Irish identity is often used to land some of the best jokes at the expense of the British elite. As a character, he consistently adds comic relief but keeps just enough of a rough edge to balance the humor.  

The addition of Shou’an to the narrative makes the plot more intriguing.

When you add Zine Tseng as Shou’an to the narrative, it becomes even more interesting. A superb fighter in her own right, Shou’an is fighting with her own sense of justice guiding her. Shou’an sees a kinship in both Moriarty and Holmes, but no matter how much she begins to see them as friends, her mission comes first and foremost. This offers a clever take when in conversation with the primary characters, but she’s never overshadowed by them. 

While much of her character reveals too many spoilers to dive into, her strength and steadfast belief in herself are epic, to say the least. Driven, calculating, and just great to watch in a fight scene, Tseng’s performance is one to celebrate. Also, her costuming choices make her infinitely cooler to see on screen. Often in a Victorian dress but with a collared shirt and tie underneath, she consistently plays to stereotypes to exploit the self-aggrandizing British men around her.

Much of the time, her ability to toy with the men in the story while never venturing into full romantic or sexual scenes is excellent and a break from expectations for a series set in this time period. She is just powerful, and that’s why she works. 

Young Sherlock is an outstanding series because every part of it works in harmony.

Additionally, the extended cast that features Natascha McElhone as Cordelia Holmes (Sherlock’s mother), Max Irons as Mycroft, Joseph Fiennes as Silas Holmes (Sherlock’s father), Colin Firth as Bucephalus Hodge, and Iris Li as Mei Yi Liu adds ample excitement to the series.

Each character has perfect chemistry with the next, with some members of the ensemble cast making me want more of them, particularly Mycroft and Cordelia Holmes. However, not letting any character get lost in this big a story with this many twists is a testament to the narrative’s design. 

Mycroft’s dearest brother’s relationship with Sherlock is as good as it’s ever been. With just enough headbutting and trust between the two of them, every time Irons’ Mycroft pops up, you can’t help but get excited to see what’s next. Then, there is Cordelia, the Holmes family matriarch; her movement from qualudes-addled grieving wife to a force to be reckoned with is the perfect role for the powerful Natascha McElhone.

Guy Ritchie just gets Sherlock Holmes and James Moriarty.

Young Sherlock’s success is due to all its parts. The performances are exciting, engaging, and endearing when necessary. The series’s set designs are decadent but perfectly matched to the tone. Young Sherlock‘s costuming never fails to impress; everyone is dressed to the nines, and every suit is tailored to perfection. But most importantly, this series understands what it is like to highlight a character as peculiar as Sherlock when he is still learning all of the eccentricities that make him who he is in popular culture. 

The series’s ability to balance family drama and impactful mystery commands an essential understanding of the source material and honors the character that has come to mean so much to so many. While some elements do become convoluted in the last two episodes, particularly around Sherlock’s father and sister, the family drama remains juicy without being too melodramatic. 

This is a different look at a character audiences know all too well, and, rather than being derivative, Young Sherlock finds the spark to sustain itself outside the shadow of any existing adaptation. Yes, even Ritchie’s own take on the character with Robert Downey Jr. 

To put it simply, Guy Ritchie just gets Sherlock Holmes. But more importantly, Young Sherlock is expertly scored, with modern songs echoing alongside folk ones, and fights are sharply choreographed; this is one of the very few examples of how to use slo-mo effectively without becoming overwhelming. Young Sherlock is something that has earned being around for far more seasons to come. 

Young Sherlock is streaming now, exclusively on Prime Video.