#anyway my point is that Irene isn't a lovesick girl who is also the bad guy trying to seduce sherlock

[bookphile]

As a a big cannon Sherlock Holmes fan, I’m not the the biggest fan of the modern adaptations. They always do a huge amount of disservice not only to Sherlock’s character - by making him cold and callous, instead of hungry to bring justice to those who get no help from the official police. But also to the mood of the stories in general because they first and foremost try to make it more modern and “gritty” and “realistic”, even though it was already gritty and realistic considering the subject matter and the fact that Canon Doyle knew what the hell he was talking about because he literally assisted the real Scotland Yard and often involved himself with real life case investigation. 

They also only ever seem to focus on the more popular and well-known stories that have been retold a dozen times, like Moriarty... even though Moriarty was neither the worst villain Sherlock ever faced, nor the scariest. Just the first and the most well known. 

If they wanted to create a more modern and gritty Sherlock Holmes (looking at you Guy Richie), why not focus on stories like The Valley of Fear? Sure, it’s not as well know, but everyone knows Sherlock Holmes - you don’t need to keep reintroducing him, considering at any given time there’s some sort of adaption coming out - in multiple countries. 

Valley of Fear is set in the still somewhat Wild continental United States, in which a policeman goes undercover to bust a super dangerous gang that has been terrorizing towns surrounding it. It’s all about the violence and the drama, brotherhood, heck there’s even a little bit of romance in there. And guess what, plot fucking twist, as in the end the dangerous criminals escape, and the police officer has to run across continents to escape as they make it their life mission to hunt him down and kill him. So now it’s all about vengeance and high stakes chasing and shoot outs. Heck, they could even make it about Sherlock being the one to infiltrate them - since disguises and infiltration are sort of his forte. There’s your freaken thriller. 

And don’t even get me fucking started on what they keep doing to Irene. Why do they insist on making the only actual canon story about a kick ass woman and 1. having her lose 2. making her fall in love with him ? The whole point of the story was that Sherlock was so arrogant and so sure of himself that he never thought he’d lose, much less to a woman (the man was really sexist - even by Victorian standards). Not only did it teach him a valuable lesson in humility, it also made him rethink his approach to women. It’s not even that hard to make it into a modern story? 

Imagine this: *modern times*

Sherlock is hired by a conservative political candidate who’s about to run for the highest office to recover a compromising video from Irene, whom he leads Sherlock to believe is a crazy/vengeful/ ex-girlfriend set on ruining his campaign. Because he’s running as a conservative with certain views, that video would ruin not just his campaign but possibly his entire career. Irene is an ultra glamorous actress/socialite, so Sherlock immediately thinks he’s got it in the bag. 

Except, Irene is adept at escaping paparazzi, stalkers, bloggers, stans, etc for years and so her bullshit radar and danger radars are super fine and the second Sherlock shows up trying to con her, she’s on to him. She also has no idea who Sherlock is, just that he’s someone that her ex hired to steal the one piece of protection she has against him.  Irene did date the Ex back when her career was just starting, but their relationship was secret, because his position/family forbade him from dating a nobody - but  she was a young woman trying to make it big being taken advantage of by an older man who promised to help her make it. Then he dumped her, Irene’s career took off anyway. They had no contact for years until Irene accidentally mentioned knowing him in an interview and what an asshole he is,  which terrifies the Ex since now she too has power, so he starts threatening her not to even think about revealing their relationship because he’d deny it and do all he can to ruin her. Irene’s possession of the video is literally the only thing that’s keeping her safe from him declaring all out war. 

Irene was planning on retiring anyway and moving away to live with the love of her life in some small town, where she can finally have some peace and quiet. So while she’s finalizing her retirement plans, she decides not only to take revenge on her Ex but have fun with Sherlock too, since she thinks he’s some asswipe working for her bastard ex. Now imagine Sherlock and Irene as they try to outwit each other. Sherlock keeps trying to rob her or con her, or hack into her tech, while Irene rolls her eyes at this amateur, while penning her goodbye letter. Irene realizes who Sherlock is before he realizes he’s met his match. Especially because Irene keeps asking her friends to either accost him with interviews, write scathing articles about him, or embarrass him in public in various ways. (Meanwhile John is all, ‘you dumb asshole I told you not to work for that conservative bastard, this is your own fault’) He’s putting the puzzle pieces together, especially since Irene stays one step ahead of him the entire time and it drives him insane, but he realizes that she’s not just some dumb actress. And just as  as he’s about to get her, she’s all “Goodnight, Mr. Holmes” and gets the fuck out of there. 

Once she’s safely away and hidden, she contacts Sherlock and explains everything. Sherlock realizes he’s not only been outwitted, finally puts the pieces together and realizes just how badly he almost fucked up. John is all ‘I told you so’. Or I don't know, maybe at the end of the movie they team up to expose the asshole ex without compromising Irene in the process. The end credits consist of Irene accepting a “thank you for all you do for us” award in the small town theater where she and her girlfriend live, and her eyes meeting Sherlock’s in the audience and for a moment you can see her panic, but Sherlock just winks and raises a glass to toast her victory. As the credits roll we see screenshots of newspaper article about the ex’s fall from grace and eventual arrest for embezzling funds. End.