Elementary producer Craig Sweeny to cut Sherlock out entirely with new medical drama Watson
The new CBS project takes place after Sherlock Holmes has died and Watson has started solving medical mysteries
CBS’ Elementary premiered a few years after BBC’s Sherlock, when the Benedict Cumberbatch-starring series was still an unimpeachable masterstroke of Britishness and not an impenetrable mess of Tumblr-courting gibberish (which was still somehow extremely watchable and sometimes still inexplicably very good), and both shows managed to find their own versions of success—proving that there’s plenty of room in the world for concurrent contemporary Sherlock Holmes-adjacent TV dramas.
That’s especially good news for Elementary executive producer Craig Sweeny, because he has an idea for another one: It’s called Watson, and instead of being a general mystery show, it’s a medical mystery show (like House, but we’ve established that it’s okay for two TV shows to be similar). Deadline explains that Watson takes place in a different contemporary Sherlock Holmes universe, one where the famous detective has already been killed by his nemesis, Moriarty.
With no opium-addicted detective’s coattails to hang off of, Watson becomes “the head of a clinic dedicated to treating rare disorders.” But don’t get too comfortable, because Deadline goes on to say that “Watson’s old life isn’t done with him, though—Moriarty and Watson are set to write their own chapter of a story that has fascinated audiences for more than a century.” That means it’s a medical drama… with an evil villain involved in some way! That’s not a bad hook!
Of course, proper Baker Street Irregulars will know that Sherlock Holmes getting killed Moriarty is a thing from the original Sir Arthur Conan Doyle stories, and the only thing more famous than Sherlock Holmes getting killed in one of the stories is that Sherlock Holmes came back in one of the other stories. It happened in Sherlock, it happened in the Robert Downey Jr. movies, it happened in Sherlock Holmes In The 22nd Century, it even happened on Elementary! So, you know, don’t be surprised when he eventually comes back on Watson as well.
Watson is currently in development at CBS, and in addition to Sweeny, its team of executive producers includes Shäron Moalem, a real geneticist and physician who apparently discovered hypotrichosis-lymphedema-telangiectasia-renal defect syndrome and nephronopthisis-associated ciliopathy. We don’t know what that means and we won’t look it up, but it sounds like the kind of résumé detail that will be helpful if he’s working on a show about medical mysteries.