There have been extra movies about Sherlock Holmes than virtually some other character within the historical past of cinema. Similar to iconic display screen heroes like Robin Hood, King Arthur, Tarzan, Zorro, and the Three Musketeers, Sherlock Holmes belongs within the public area, which means that any filmmaker or studio could make a movie about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s beloved detective. Holmes has appeared in lots of nice movies, together with classics like Billy Wilder’s The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes and Bill Condon’s underrated current undertaking Mr. Holmes. However, the sequence of movies by Guy Ritchie that starred Iron Man himself, Robert Downey Jr., because the beloved non-public eye turned a number of the largest blockbusters ever made in regards to the character. Despite the success of the primary two movies within the sequence, a 3rd installment appears to be simply as elusive as one in every of Holmes’ instances.
What’s simple to neglect is that within the early twenty first century, Robert Downey Jr. was not the identical star that he’s at this time. While roles in critically acclaimed movies like Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and Zodiac earned him extra reward than he had acquired in years, Downey was not thought of to be a field workplace commodity by any stretch of the creativeness. This all modified in 2008 due to the mixed energy of Jon Favreau’s first Iron Man movie and Ben Stiller’s present enterprise darkish comedy Tropic Thunder. Iron Man earmarked that Downey can be the lead of an upcoming franchise that may develop bigger than only one character, and Tropic Thunder earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. In lower than a 12 months, Downey had reworked from a dangerous guess to the largest actor in Hollywood.
By 2009, Robert Downey Jr. gave us his tackle the traditional detective Sherlock Holmes in Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes. The movie turned a shock field workplace hit, because it turned the historically simple premise of a Holmes movie into a way more thrilling action-adventure epic. Although Ritchie’s intelligent dialogue and idiosyncratic filming strategies had been largely chargeable for the movie’s success, a lot of Sherlock Holmes relied upon the chemistry between Downey and Jude Law, who co-starred as Professor John Watson. The two actors have nice chemistry within the movie and managed to generate curiosity from a common viewers round making a sequel. Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows noticed Holmes and Watson dealing with off in opposition to Professor James Moriarty (Jared Harris), essentially the most depraved of all of the Holmes antagonists. Like its predecessor, A Game of Shadows earned each stable evaluations and a decent field workplace complete.
Among the perfect moments in A Game of Shadows is a closing scene that teases the way forward for the sequence. While Watson initially believes that his greatest good friend sacrificed himself so as to defeat Moriarty, Holmes reveals himself to be alive, hiding in plain sight in Watson’s front room. This confirmed that the 2 buddies can be free to go on extra adventures collectively ought to the movie ever encourage extra sequels. It appeared that Warner Brothers was simply as eager to see the 2 get again collectively, as Iron Man 3 screenwriter Drew Pearce was employed shortly after A Game of Shadows’ preliminary launch to work on a draft for Sherlock Holmes 3. Unfortunately, Downey’s obligations to his function as Tony Stark within the MCU meant {that a} third journey for Holmes turned a second precedence for him.
Law would affirm in 2013 that there was an “idea” for a 3rd movie, however that no official screenplay had really been written. The following 12 months, Downey’s spouse Susan (who served as a producer on the undertaking) stated, “There’s an idea, there’s an outline, there is not a script yet.” She acknowledged, “When you come back and you do a third one, there’s gotta be something there that really warrants putting it back on the screen again.” She revealed that after the looks of Moriarty within the second movie, the inventive group was in search of one other solution to elevate the stakes for a 3rd installment. After a sequence of extra delays, Warner Brothers dated Sherlock Holmes 3 for a Christmas 2020 launch date. While releasing a brand new installment ten years after its predecessor appeared like a preposterous thought, it might turn into a date that Warner Brothers would once more fail to truly meet.
An announcement that the movie can be pushed again one other 12 months got here with shocking information about its director; Ritchie would get replaced because the movie’s director by Dexter Fletcher, who was sizzling off the success of the 2019 biopic Rocketman. Downey’s schedule was now freed up, as Avengers: Endgame had marked his closing look as Tony Stark within the MCU. While it appeared that Sherlock Holmes 3 would possibly really begin transferring ahead, the movie was pushed as soon as extra because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Although it’s now been over a decade since Downey final performed Holmes, his collaborator Amanda Burrell confirmed earlier this 12 months {that a} third movie within the sequence was nonetheless a “priority” for him.
What makes the undertaking notably fascinating are the plans for the movie to not simply proceed Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law’s tales, however to include different characters as effectively. It was introduced in 2020 that Warner Brothers would start growing two tv sequence set within the Sherlock Holmes universe that may be launched on to HBO Max. Although plans had been made to create a “Marvel-style universe” at the moment, no phrase has been made on these reveals’ standing.
One of essentially the most thrilling issues in regards to the finish of Downey’s tenure as Tony Stark is attending to see him tackle initiatives exterior of the MCU; it’s simple to neglect that Downey is one in every of cinema’s best actors, and Oppenhemier actually proved that he nonetheless had it in him to provide a very authentic efficiency. Perhaps the goodwill that Downey has amassed after his work in Oppenhemier was so acclaimed will encourage him to lastly return to one in every of his greatest characters.
