Sherlock Holmes (1984)

	Also Known As: Meitantei Holmes (original), Sherlock Hound (English)
	Year of first release: 1984
	Director: Kyôsuke Mikuriya, Hayao Miyazaki (Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, Porco Rosso)
	Actors (voices): Taichirô Hirokawa, Kousei Tomita, Yôko Asagami
	Country: J
	Genre: Animation, Adventure
	Conditions of visioning: February-June 2014, DVD, Home Cinema
Synopsis: In the England of the late 19th century, the gifted Sherlock Holmes and his assistant Doctor Watson investigate the most curious cases that Scotland Yard cannot solve.
Review: My motivations to watch this 30-years old Japanese TV-series are triple. First, I have recently read a good part of the original Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle so I am now quite familiar with it. Second, this TV-series was created and partly directed by Hayao Miyazaki, whose movies as director I am currently (re-)discovering ; in particular I have come to Sherlock Holmes after watching The Castle of Cagliostro. Finally, I remember watching and loving the series when I was a kid, so nostalgia is my third motivation, and also the reason why I bought the collector DVD-set in French. The dubbing in my mother tongue brings an additional level of comedy because even if not true to the original voices, it was made in a funny way that also reminds me of the French version of City Hunter. The poor quality of the first image of the opening credits made me fear the worst but actually the video quality is good (but not as good as for a film). The colors are a bit pale but I could fix that with the auto-adjust function of my projector (mainly increasing the contrast). The sound is a bit muffled but acceptable. The DVD box-set comes with an informative booklet. The series consists of 26 episodes that were aired between 1984 and 1985. The idea of having all characters with dog faces could seem odd in the first place, but turned out to greatly help make the success of the series, also thanks to a mix of comedy, adventure and steam-punk action. The first episode The Four Signatures is quite cheap-looking and very slow, with long pauses and static shots on the faces of the characters, but I guess it is the fate of pilot episodes. The quality improves dramatically with the following episodes (The Crown of Mazalin, A Small Client, ...) thanks to a more detailed story, more action, more characters on screen and the general energy that I remembered from the series. Some episodes have been written and directed by Miyazaki himself and you can feel his influence because they are a little more complex and feature much more flying and diving machines, in particular the episode 8 Treasure Under the Sea involving boats and submarines and episode 9 The White Cliffs of Dover with its plane races. In general throughout the series I liked the good design of Moriarty steam-punk machines. Towards the end of the series some episode depart from the usual scheme and cross-over with other universes: episode 16 The Secret of the Sacred Cross Sword takes place at Stonehenge and reminds strongly of an Indiana Jones adventure although in the heart of England. And episode 17 The Adventure of the Thames Monster is definitely inspired by Jules Verne's 20000 Leagues under the Sea. But apart from those two special episodes, the stories are quite repetitive: a mystery occurs, Scotland Yard fails, Holmes intervenes and solves it all with few clues. It is already a bit the case in the original books, but the wonderful writing by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle makes of each adventure something new. However the single bad thing I found about the TV-series is that Moriarty is the villain in every episode, making it too repetitive after a while. I wouldn't ask for a mysterious villain appearing from nowhere in each episode (like if is often the case in the book, or in the Scooby Doo animated TV-series), but a bit of variety would have been welcome. In spite of those reservations, it is a pleasant TV-series to watch and I recommend it.
Rating: 6 /10