It will be a great 2016 for Sherlock fans as the British crime drama television series, "Sherlock," is set to release a one-off Victorian episode to kick off the year.
In a recent tweet by Masterpiece PBS, the network spilled both the release date and title of the one-off special, building Sherlockians’ excitement. According to the tweet, the Victorian special is titled "The Abominable Bride" and will premiere on Jan. 1, 2016.
#SherlockPBS: The Abominable Bride premieres 1/1 & encore 1/10 MASTERPIECE @PBS. NEW pics - https://t.co/3az8JwUINo pic.twitter.com/Fi9YrHk7uz
— Masterpiece PBS (@masterpiecepbs) October 24, 2015
"The Abominable Bride," which is a separate episode from "Sherlock" season four, will have similarities with the series' source material written by Sir Arthun Conan Doyle. The show's executives, Steven Moffat, Mark Gatiss, Sue Vertue and Amanda Abbington sat down with Digital Spy to reveal more about the Victorian-themed holiday special that "Sherlock" promises to deliver.
“[It] is mostly an original story, inspired by a reference in one of the [Doyle] stories to one of the ones that Dr Watson never wrote about," says executive producer Mark Gatiss.
"Sherlock" co-creator Steven Moffat also described what fans could expect in "The Abominable Bride," saying, “There are loads and loads of details from the original stories, and there is a case referenced in the story about ‘Ricoletti with the club foot and his abominable wife’, so this is broadly speaking, that.”
Apart from the episode title, air date and the trailer released last week, most details about the "Sherlock" special is still under wraps. Even the synopsis from Entertainment Weekly, courtesy of PBS, only spilled the setting of the special, but did not reveal much information. The synopsis read as:
“Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game) and Martin Freeman (The Hobbit) return as Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson in the acclaimed modern retelling of Arthur Conan Doyle’s classic stories. But now our heroes find themselves in 1890s London. Beloved characters Mary Morstan (played by Amanda Abbington), Inspector Lestrade (Rupert Graves) and Mrs. Hudson (Una Stubbs) also turn up at 221b Baker Street.”
In a previous report from Slashfilm, Steven Moffat revealed that the Victorian episode could be a ghost story. Moffat told the news outlet, “The main difference I would say, the only temperature change moving it from Victorian and Modern is ghost stories work better in the Victorian setting. Doyle stories that are scary chillers we haven’t done much. Victorian era gives us a chance to do a creepy one, a scary one.”
"The Abominable Bride" will be aired on BBC One and PBS Masterpiece on Jan. 1, 2016. Sherlockians may also catch the standalone special in cinemas across the U.K., per Digital Spy.
