SH Guide #1: The Blind Banker

The Blind Banker is the mid-series story of the first season of BBC1's Sherlock which sees Conan Doyle's classic characters updated to the 21st century. Although not directly based on any single original Holmes story it does contain elements of The Sign of the Four, The Valley of Death and The Dancing Men.

Credits

Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes
Martin Freeman as John Watson
Zoe Telford as Sarah Sawyer
Una Stubbs as Mrs Hudson
Louise Brealey as Molly Hooper
Gemma Chan as Soo Lin Yao
Al Weaver as Andy Galbraith
Bertie Carvel as Sebastian Wilkes
Daniel Percival as Eddie Van Coon
Paul Chequer as Detective Inspector Dimmock
Howard Coggins as Brian Lukis
Janice Acquah as Museum Director
Jack Bence as Raz
John MacMillan as Community Police Officer
Olivia Poulet as Amanda

Written by Stephen Thompson
Directed by Euros Lyn

First Broadcast 1 August 2010


Synopsis

An old university colleague of Sherlock's calls the Consulting Detective to a high-class bank where a portrait of a banker has been defaced with graffiti across the eyes (hence the title). Simple stuff for our hero surely? However, the portrait was on the fifth floor and must have appeared within 60 seconds. 'How did it get here?' 'What does it mean?' are the questions people are asking but, as Sherlock points out: 'Who was it meant for?'
The mystery leads Sherlock and John, with his new girlfriend Sarah, on an adventure involving an acrobatic assassin, an ancient Chinese crime syndicate and an ASBO...


Villains

The Black Lotus  - Lead by General Shan, they are a international smuggling organisation who specialising in selling historial Chinese antiques that survived Mao's communist 'cultural revolution' to Western countries illegally. They emply smugglers to work for them who bear the Lotus' tatoo on their heel. Soon after both Van Coon and Lukis, two of their smugglers had been on an errand for them they noticed one of their antiques, the Empress' hairpin, worth nine million pounds, had been stolen and so they came to London to reclaim the item, aided in the shadows by the mysterious Moriarty. To ensure their secrecy, the Lotus doubles as a travelling Chinese circus, the Yellow Dragon.

Review

Although perhaps not quite as impressive as the first and last episodes in the series, this is still a rollocking good adventure with an intricately clever and original plot while still feeling very Sherlockian.  8/10


For Dr Watson's own notes on the case click here.

Young Sherlock Holmes - Think you know him? Think again.

With the support of the Conan Doyle estate, Andrew Lane's series of novels featuring a teenage Sherlock can be seen as official accounts of the Great Detective's early years. Although aimed at young adult readers, the books are always a corking good read as the fourteen-year old Sherlock and his friends, street boy Matty, the feisty Virginia, his elder brother Mycroft and his tutors, Amyus Crowe, the big American logician and, Rufus Stone, his Irish violin teacher, face terrific puzzles and dreadful terrors.

1. Death Cloud

Two dead bodies. One unforgettable. The beginning of a legend.

The year is 1868, and Sherlock Holmes is fourteen. His life is that of a perfectly ordinary army officer’s son: boarding school, good manners, a classical education – the backbone of the British Empire. But all that is about to change. With his father suddenly posted to India, and his mother mysteriously ‘unwell’, Sherlock is sent to stay with his eccentric uncle and aunt in their vast house in Hampshire. So begins a summer that leads Sherlock to uncover his first murder, a kidnap, corruption and a brilliantly sinister villain of exquisitely malign intent.

A dead man walking. A scarred face. A crime that shattered a country.

Sherlock knows that adults keep secrets. But he didn’t expect to find the world’s most famous assassin, apparently living in Surrey when he’s meant to be dead – and his own brother somehow involved.
When no one will tell you the truth, sometimes you have to risk all to discover it for yourself. So begins an adventure that will lead Sherlock to America, to the centre of a deadly web – where life and death are cheap, and truth has a price no sane person would pay

Sherlock believes his brother is innocent. But can he prove it?

The year is 1868 and fourteen-year-old Sherlock Holmes faces his most baffling mystery yet. Mycroft, his older brother, has been found with a knife in his hand, locked in a room with a corpse. Only Sherlock believes that his brother is innocent. But can he prove it?
In a chase that will take him to Moscow and back, Sherlock must discover who has framed Mycroft and why…before Mycroft swings at the gallows.

The next cracking instalment in this brilliant book series is out soon, entitled:

For any more information please go to the official Young Sherlock site.