The BEST episodes of Sherlock Holmes (1984)
Every episode of Sherlock Holmes (1984) ever, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Sherlock Holmes (1984)!
Sherlock Holmes is one of the world’s most popular fictional detectives, famed for his legendary powers of observation and deduction. Adapted from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s original novels, this classic series by Granada Television starred Jeremy Brett as the definitive Holmes, with David Burke and later Edward Hardwicke as his able assistant Dr. Watson.
#1 - The Dying Detective
Season 7 - Episode 2 - Aired 3/14/1994
A man dies suddenly of a mysterious fever, and Holmes suspects murder.
#2 - The Hound of the Baskervilles
Season 4 - Episode 6 - Aired 8/31/1988
Sir Charles Baskerville is found dead on Dartmoor, with his face contorted in terror and the footprints of a huge dog near his body. On arrival in England, Sir Charles's American heir, now Sir Henry Baskerville, engages Holmes to come to Devon and get to the bottom of the age-old legend of the Hound of the Baskervilles - a phantom which kills.From the outset, Holmes is convinced there is a human murderer at work and he lays a deep plan to foil him.
#3 - The Priory School
Season 3 - Episode 2 - Aired 8/13/1986
The Duke of Holdernesse needs Holmes's help when his son, Lord Arthur Saltire, is kidnapped from the Priory School. Holmes finds the connection between an old mystery and a teacher who has also gone missing.
#4 - The Master Blackmailer (2)
Season 6 - Episode 2 - Aired 1/2/1992
Concluding the case of Charles Augustus Milverton, king of blackmailers, who has given Holmes a good run for his money.
#5 - The Red-Headed League
Season 2 - Episode 5 - Aired 9/22/1985
A notice in a newspaper seeks red-headed men, inviting them to join a league which will pay them well - and Jabez Wilson, a pawnbroker who responds, finds he is hired and paid generously for spending four hours a day copying an encyclopedia in long hand. When the league is suddenly dissolved, Holmes is asked to find out what has been going on, and he quickly suspects crime. Indeed, behind this curious arrangement lurks Holmes's arch-enemy, Professor Moriarty.
#6 - The Last Vampyre
Season 6 - Episode 3 - Aired 1/27/1993
Holmes investigates a killing which has all the hallmarks of the worst kind of Ruritanian vampire. He is sceptical (to say the least) about the possibility that the undead are up to their mischief just a short train journey from his rooms in Baker Street. If a local resident really found his South American wife sucking blood from their young son, what might it signify?
#7 - The Boscombe Valley Mystery
Season 5 - Episode 4 - Aired 3/14/1991
Alice Turner sends for Holmes when her lifelong friend farmer William McCarthy is killed and police suspicion falls on his son, James. James McCarthy admits quarrelling with his father, but he will not explain what their argument was about.
#8 - The Problem of Thor Bridge
Season 5 - Episode 2 - Aired 2/28/1991
Maria Gibson, the wife of a gold-mining millionaire, is found shot dead at their country house. Gibson asks Holmes to find his wife's killer and thus to clear the name of his children's governess, Miss Dunbar, who has been charged with the crime. Is Gibson acting as a kindly employer, and what are the hidden depths of the case?
#9 - The Golden Pince-Nez
Season 7 - Episode 3 - Aired 3/21/1994
The police are baffled by the murder of Willoughby Smith, and Inspector Hopkins looks to Holmes to solve the case.
#10 - The Cardboard Box
Season 7 - Episode 6 - Aired 4/11/1994
When Susan Cushing first consults Holmes about the disappearance of her sister Mary, he shows little interest in the case. But then, at Christmas, Susan receives an alarming present in a cardboard box, and Holmes is quickly on the trail of a dangerous criminal.
#11 - The Six Napoleons
Season 3 - Episode 7 - Aired 8/20/1986
Holmes is curious about a series of attacks on figures of the French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte around London. One such incident leads to a violent death, and he investigates. Lestrade sees an Italian connection and proposes to focus Scotland Yard's attention on the Italian quarter of London, but Holmes is more interested in Chiswick.
#12 - The Man with the Twisted Lip
Season 3 - Episode 6 - Aired 8/6/1986
Neville St Clair works in the City of London and is a man of very regular and respectable habits. One day, his wife goes into town for lunch and is shocked to see her husband in the window of an opium den. That evening, he fails to return home, and Mrs St Clair decides to consult Holmes.
#13 - The Resident Patient
Season 2 - Episode 4 - Aired 9/15/1985
Dr Trevelyan calls on Holmes on behalf of his friend Blessington, after a Russian father and son vanish during a consultation. Blessington knows of no one who wishes him ill, but he is found hanged the next day. Holmes investigates, with advice from Watson.
#14 - The Sign of Four
Season 4 - Episode 1 - Aired 12/29/1987
For years after her father's disappearance, the beautiful Miss Mary Morstan receives anonymously every year one large and valuable pearl. When, finally, an invitation arrives to meet the mysterious pearl-giver, Mary Morstan seeks Holmes's advice, and he begins to unravel some remarkable clues, including a poison dart and a man with a wooden leg. What Holmes finds is an old soldier who is determined to punish those who betrayed him and his friends by stealing their oriental treasure.
#15 - Wisteria Lodge
Season 4 - Episode 4 - Aired 4/20/1988
On a visit to Wisteria Lodge, Scott Eccles gets a strange reception. A mysterious note arrives for his host, Garcia, and the next morning Garcia and his servants have vanished without trace. Eccles consults Holmes, who decides to treat the case as a murder investigation, but it appears that Holmes and Watson are on a wild goose chase.
#16 - The Illustrious Client
Season 5 - Episode 5 - Aired 3/21/1991
Colonel James Damery calls on Holmes when the rich and beautiful Miss Violet Merville announces her engagement to Baron Gruner, a dangerous Austrian. Gruner has persuaded Violet that he is not a killer, and Holmes has to establish the truth and foil the powerful baron.
#17 - The Empty House
Season 3 - Episode 1 - Aired 7/9/1986
Three years on from Holmes's fatal fall into the Reichenbach Falls, Watson wrestles with a murder case under his own steam. But who is the enigmatic stranger in the Coroner's court, listening intently to all the evidence?Holmes returns home and explains how he escaped death at Reichenbach, while Moriarty lost his life. Holmes and Watson must now bring a partner of Moriarty's to justice, by proving he is a murderer.
#18 - The Bruce Partington Plans
Season 4 - Episode 5 - Aired 4/27/1988
The body of one Cadogan West is found in an underground tunnel near Aldgate Station, with his skull smashed, and Holmes is puzzled by the interest his brother Mycroft is showing in the case. Mycroft explains that the top secret plans for a new submarine were in the dead man's pocket, but three of the ten pages were missing when the body was found. Mycroft, on behalf of the British Government, asks his brother to find the missing pages.
#19 - The Musgrave Ritual
Season 3 - Episode 4 - Aired 7/30/1986
Holmes and Watson are staying with Reginald Musgrave, the head of an ancient Sussex family, when his butler, Brunton, suddenly disappears. Brunton (something of a ladykiller and a highly educated man) had been taking an interest in an ancient family tradition called 'the Musgrave Ritual', which centres on a Carolingian riddle. And then a second member of the household vanishes, equally suddenly. The old riddle proves to be the key to tracing the butler's body and finding the treasure the dead man was after - the crown jewels lost in the English Civil War. And as so often, it's a case of 'cherchez la femme'.
#20 - The Devil's Foot
Season 4 - Episode 2 - Aired 4/6/1988
Reluctantly, after an illness, Holmes takes a holiday in Cornwall, with Watson for company. Then one day he finds himself investigating a mysterious death... after a quiet evening at home playing cards, three local inhabitants have been found in the morning in a terrible way: the two brothers overtaken by sudden mental illness, babbling incoherently, and their sister dead, with her face twisted into a look of terror. Holmes is delighted with the chance to bury his holiday boredom by taking on the case.
#21 - The Norwood Builder
Season 2 - Episode 3 - Aired 9/8/1985
A young solicitor, John Hector McFarlane, seeks Holmes's help after retired builder Jonas Oldacre dies in a fire. McFarlane, who benefits from Oldacre's will, is suspected of murder and asks Holmes to clear his name. Holmes looks for another motive and another killer, and dresses up as a tramp to get the information he needs about the Oldacre household. The surprising answer he finds is that Oldacre is not exactly dead.
#22 - The Red Circle
Season 7 - Episode 4 - Aired 3/28/1994
Mrs Warren, a London lodging-house keeper, comes to Holmes with a curious story of a reclusive and eccentric tenant. Mrs Warren's husband has been abducted and then quickly released again, perhaps a case of mistaken identity. Holmes decides the case is more important than it appears.
#23 - The Mazarin Stone
Season 7 - Episode 5 - Aired 4/4/1994
The Mazarin Stone, a famous jewel, acts as a magnet for crime. Holmes investigates the latest and perhaps most curious episode in its adventures.
#24 - The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax
Season 5 - Episode 1 - Aired 2/21/1991
Watson, on holiday in the Lake District, meets the enigmatic Lady Frances Carfax, who is being haunted by the ghost of a horseman. Holmes decides to come up to join Watson, but by the time he arrives Lady Frances has vanished without trace. Holmes investigates and becomes very curious about the ghost.
#25 - The Master Blackmailer
Season 6 - Episode 1 - Aired 1/2/1992
Holmes and Watson are called in to deal with a blackmailer. A dazzling young lady is about to be married, and Charles Augustus Milverton, the slithery king of all blackmailers, has letters she wrote to another man. Watson is astonished when Milverton calls at Baker Street at the invitation of Holmes, who has a plan to thwart him. As ever, things are not quite as they appear to be.