Benedict Cumberbatch’s Sherlock Could Return, But There’s One Problem
Could it happen?
Though we’ve seen several on-screen iterations of the brilliant detective Sherlock Holmes and his partner Watson, the portrayals from Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman are certainly amongst the best. The two played the characters in the critically acclaimed and fan-favorite BBC series Sherlock for four seasons before the show ended in 2017. But it appears that quite a few members of the production team would be willing to come back for more, as long as the two leads wanted to come back too.
In a recent interview with RadioTimes.com Steven Moffat, one of the creators of Sherlock, said he’d be willing to come back tomorrow. Moffat said “I’d do Sherlock again tomorrow, why ask me? Mark would do it tomorrow, Sue [Vertue, producer] would do it tomorrow – we’d all just do it again. It’s down to Benedict and Martin. They were very loyal to that show over a very long while when it was out, when it definitely became their lowest paying job. And I don’t think that’s necessarily what they want to do now – fair enough, absolutely fair enough. But if anyone thinks I’m the one getting in the way, I will confidently tell you I would start writing it tomorrow, if everybody else did too.” The other creator, Mark Gatiss, would echo these thoughts in a separate interview. They have a good point — would Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman want to come back to these roles after all this time?
It’s very possible that Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman are happy where they left things. Since Sherlock started, both of their careers have gone into the stratosphere. Benedict Cumberbatch was recently nominated for Best Actor at the Academy Awards for his work in The Power of the Dog. Cumberbatch also has a massive role in the MCU, which undoubtedly takes up a lot of his time. He played the titular sorcerer in Doctor Strange in 2016, before his final season of Sherlock aired in 2017. Since then he has appeared in Avengers films, Spider-Man: No Way Home, and the animated What If…? The Avengers movies and the Spider-Man movie are some of the highest-grossing films of all time, so Cumberbatch is definitely in a different position now than when he first started playing Sherlock Holmes. He also has the upcoming sequel Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness coming out next month.
Martin Freeman has stayed plenty busy too. He has his own, albeit smaller, role in the MCU as Everett K. Ross. He appeared in Captain America: Civil War and Black Panther and is set to reprise the role in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and the upcoming Disney+ series Secret Invasion. Martin Freeman also starred as Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit movies, where Cumberbatch also appeared as the Necromancer and Smaug the dragon. They both have more movies and TV shows on the docket for the rest of 2022 and beyond.
It looks like even if Martin Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch wanted to come back for more Sherlock episodes, they might not have the time. At least, not in the near future. Who knows though? Maybe further down the line, they’ll be able to come back to the beloved roles that helped make them household names. Fans can always keep their fingers crossed!
