Elementary: The Diabolical Kind (2x12)

Moriarty returns! It was smart to hold back on using this fascinating character so that we could all get excited to experience her all over again. I'm just going to do the briefest of plot summaries.

A girl has been kidnapped, and Sherlock recognizes the voice of the kidnapper as a man who worked with Moriarty. Moriarty is brought in to work on the case, and in the end it turns out she wasn't involved in the kidnapping, at least not the way everyone suspected. The kidnapped girl was actually Moriarty's daughter. She escapes her confinement and kills the man responsible, but she is gravely injured. After talking with Sherlock, she allows herself to be taken back into custody. We learn throughout the course of the episode that Sherlock and Moriarty have been writing letters back and forth for some time now. In the end, Sherlock can't bring himself to get rid of the letters just yet, since, as he tells Joan, he has been harboring the hope that maybe Moriarty could change.

Okay, so let's run this down... I'm really pleased that they decided to go a new direction with Moriarty. Instead of just casting her as the criminal mastermind once again, this time they put her in a position of extreme vulnerability and showed that although she's smart, and although she's able to play on the same field as Sherlock Holmes, she is also human and has her weaknesses. The best part of Moriarty's return was her creepy fascination with Joan. I just loved how disturbed she was by Joan's partnership with Sherlock, and how obviously jealous she was of it. I also loved that Joan held her own against this insane woman.

Sherlock's character got a lot of heavy stuff this week of course, as he has to deal with the return of his true love/mortal enemy. I loved the way that Sherlock acknowledged that he wasn't on his A game. He tells Joan that given the nature of his relationship with Moriarty, he cannot give a totally objective analysis of her. He also admits to Joan that he still has feelings for Moriarty, in a warped sort of way.

Gregson and Bell didn't get much screen time at all. Gregson did a generally great job of respecting Sherlock's complicated emotions surrounding this situation, which I thought was a good way of reminding the audience that these men truly do respect one another. Bell was only very briefly shown in a shooting range, where his hand shook so badly he couldn't fire the gun. It looks like he's trying to get back in the game, but he's not there yet.

Now, there is one other thing I want to talk about. I'm not sure if you could call this a problem I had with the episode, more like... a question. Moriarty has a daughter that she's given up for adoption. Does she still see this kid? Why is it that a frankly sociopathic woman like Moriarty would care especially for a biological child that is not a part of her life? I'm not trying to be heartless, here, at all. But she risked quite a bit for that girl, and I felt like the episode didn't give us enough to justify it. I did love the line towards the end, though, where Moriarty asks Sherlock if he "became one of them" by learning to care what other people thought of him. Sherlock's response? "I'm not sure I am one of them." Chills. I sincerely hope we get to have more of this character dynamic in the future.

Well... that was a bit short, wasn't it? I'm sorry for not writing much, because this really was quite the brilliant episode. Despite some slight qualms I have about Moriarty's daughter and the lack of real development there, it was a thrill to have this character back on the screen.

8.5/10