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The Sign of Three started as the last episode finished: badly. The first third of the episode was awful and the second third poor, but the last part returned to the exciting, fast paced and intelligent drama that made Sherlock so good in the first place. The show seems to have lost its way during the two year break between series two and three, and I’d like to take a look at what’s gone wrong. The episode spun around John’s wedding to Mary Morstan, climaxing with the reveal that two recent cases Sherlock had been working on were linked to a plan to kill John’s former army commander during the reception. Sherlock solved the case before disappearing into the night, leaving John and his new wife with the knowledge that a third Watson would soon be on the way. Too much of the episode was given over to broad comedy. Sherlock is not a sitcom; it’s a drama with comedy elements. The show works best when it builds jokes into the dialogue, humanising the characters and providing some relief from the often scary drama. This episode though started like a jokey sitcom about the awkward but loveable Sherlock. At one point, Sherlock interrogated the wedding party, which is something I could see him doing, completely unaware of how inappropriate it would seem, but the scene crossed a line into ridiculous camp. ‘Do you have anything to say in your defence,’ he asked Mary’s ex-boyfriend. That’s the type of punchline a sitcom character – The Big Bang Theory’s Sheldon Cooper maybe – would say, with a laugh-track over the top. The Sherlock of this series is too different from the character in previous series; jokey and playful, not aloof or arrogant enough. At one point, Mary manipulated Sherlock into taking a case in order to assuage his wedding nerves. So Sherlock is now someone who can be fooled by an ordinary person? She even gives a thumbs up to both John and Sherlock at the same time, without the latter noticing. This is the same guy who is so perceptive he can tell that someone is having an affair by the state of their clothes alone. It’s okay – indeed necessary – for a character to change over time, but some of these changes are occurring too fast, without proper motivation, or are contradictory to Sherlock’s core attributes i.e. his incredible intelligence. A lot of this episode focused on Sherlock’s idiosyncrasies and people’s reaction to them, such as a strange series of flashbacks showing characters appalled at the idea of Sherlock giving a best man speech. I think the Sherlock writers have fallen in love with their character a little too much. Or maybe they are playing to the gallery. The Guardian’s TV critic Mark Lawson wrote a great article about the show, arguing that it risks becoming skewed towards an audience of obsessive fans who are in love with Sherlock and his quirks. It’s becoming professional fanfiction, bordering on self-parody.

It’s not a coincidence that the episode improved once it started focusing on plot: the cases Sherlock and John investigated. The scene with Sherlock surrounded by the women from one case, trying to work out the connection between them all – making mistakes along the way – was a return to what this show used to be about: Sherlock’s intelligence, smart screenwriting and innovative directing, production and editing. This second act still wandered into bad comedy territory – Sherlock and John’s drunken adventures went on way too long – but it was certainly better than the first.