10 Secret Worst Heroes In TV

3. Sherlock Holmes - Sherlock (BBC)

Sherlock Holmes is really not that great a detective. Now bear with us here... The major problem in all of fiction with writing about genius detectives is that you€™re attempting to write stories about the prowess of someone far, far smarter than you are. Firstly, it can be argued that it€™s actually not possible to get into the head of a character with greater intelligence than your own€ but the greater issue here is that it€™s simply not practical to write about a detective€™s investigative skills when the character is an order of magnitude smarter than the person writing them. In the BBC TV series, Sherlock is forever using abductive reasoning to analyse facts about people and events, and then relying on his results as conclusive in and of themselves. What€™s abductive reasoning? Without going into too much fiddly detail, it€™s when you take observed facts and formulate a hypothesis that satisfactorily explains them: a wrestler lies on the mat, another wrestler standing over him with a folding chair. Hypothesis? The second wrestler has hit the first wrestler in the head with the chair. If, like Sherlock, you€™re lightning fast in perceiving and analysing the facts available, and you€™re knowledgeable enough to understand and discard the many likely explanations of those facts to arrive at the most likely, then it may well appear as though you€™ve magically grabbed the correct result out of thin air. Of course, you€™re equally likely to be completely wrong (what if the first wrestler threw the folding chair to the second wrestler and himself to the mat, feigning unconsciousness to have his opponent disqualified?), especially if, like Sherlock, you become complacent about always being right. Rarely, if ever, does he wait to find out whether his hypothesis is accurate before acting upon it. However, since he€™s being written by someone of only average intelligence with no background or interest in genuine problem solving and logical puzzle techniques, an environment is created whereby, despite the massive fallacies involved, Sherlock is pretty much always right. It€™s a magic trick, sleight of hand to distract the viewer and make them believe that the character is an extraordinary detective. It doesn€™t work if you remove that artificial environment of success, though: take any scene of brainy, detectivey brilliance from an episode of Sherlock, and without the context in the fiction (that Sherlock is actually correct), ask yourself whether there could be another hypothesis that also explains the facts being observed. Nine times out of ten, you€™ll come up with another one, maybe more. But that€™s the problem with writing someone smarter than you are. You just can€™t do their huge brain justice.