Elementary: The Eternity Injection (3x09)

Wow, what a great episode for Sherlock and Joan! I had forgotten how much I missed their partnership. Kitty doesn't get sidelined completely, though. Let's start with the plot.

An old colleague of Joan's from the hospital shows up to say that a friend of hers (another hospital employee, a nurse) has gone missing. Shortly after, Sherlock, Joan, and Kitty discover this missing person's body. DNA under her fingernails leads them to the killer, but it looks like he's been murdered by someone as well.

Eventually, they discover what links these two people. Each had been paid a lump sum by a mysterious company that turns out to be an illegal drug trial. The point of the drug is to create in the minds of human beings the illusion that more time is passing than it really is. So, for example, you could get a week's worth of living done in a single hour. The woman who was murdered was one of the nurses who was administering the drug. The second victim was one of the people who was testing the drug. Turns out, it doesn't work correctly - it causes severe brain damage.

Several of the other trial members also turn up dead, and they realize that the people behind this whole thing are trying to cover up their mistakes. Eventually, they are able to find a patient of the drug trial who is not dead. He was given a smaller dose than others, and seems to be still partially sane. He is able to help them find the man in charge of the drug trial. Turns out, this man was trying to find the drug to help an old mentor of his, who had a terminal illness and wanted to experience more life than he had left to live. Before they can arrest this old man along with his pupil, they find that he has taken the drug. They are left to wonder if anything will be left of his mind when he awakens.

While all of this is going on, Sherlock is helping Alfredo with a particularly difficult car alarm. He is also avoiding his meetings, which concerns Alfredo, who is his sponsor, and also Joan. Eventually, Sherlock talks to Joan about what he's going through: his sobriety seems really tedious to him, and he's not sure what to do about it. Joan offers to stick around for a while if it helps, but Sherlock assures Joan that he'll be fine. In the end, Sherlock agrees to go back to meetings, because of his respect for Alfredo and Joan. He still doesn't necessarily think that the program has anything left to offer him.

I honestly don't think there's anything to complain about here. This was an excellent episode in an excellent season of an excellent show. I guess I can just lodge my most common complaint, which is that Bell and Gregson become more and more irrelevant as time passes. Joan, Kitty, and Sherlock get all of the attention, and they should. But if you spend the earlier part of a show developing characters like Gregson and Bell, you can't just awkwardly push them to the periphery now. It's strange.

Let's talk about the good stuff, though.

First of all, the case itself was very interesting. In the early scenes, when all the information was coming out, I was seriously confused. I had no idea where it was going. Now, this can be a bad thing sometimes, if the answer turns out to be convoluted or idiotic. Luckily, here that was not the case. When the answers started to be revealed, I was really interested and drawn in to everything that was happening. I love how Elementary sometimes pushes the bounds into slightly-speculative or even science-fiction. This drug, as far as I know, isn't something that is anywhere close to existing yet. I loved the creativity here. Also, I loved the lack of a clean resolution. We'll never get to know if that old man was really in suspended time, or whatever you call it. (I do, however, still remain bitter about the lack of answers about Bella, the AI doll from before).

I loved the humor in this episode, particularly when Sherlock employs the help of "Everyone," the internet anarchists he sometimes uses to help with cases. As payment, "Everyone" requires Sherlock to perform embarrassing tasks. This time around, he's required to write an essay about why Bella should have chosen Jacob instead of Edward in Twilight. He says that he thinks they could have come to an arrangement to suit all three of them. While at first I was just laughing at this, it suddenly struck me that there's actually something rather insightful going on here in terms of Sherlock's state of mind - his suggestion that the famed love triangle from Twilight could have found a way to peacefully coexist as a threesome is really telling of the way he views his own relationships with Kitty and Joan. Not in a romantic or a sexual sense, of course, but in a deeply affectionate and personal sense. I know I'm not the only one who was scared that there was going to be some petty rivalry between Joan and Kitty as they fought over Sherlock. Instead, we get this really amazing relationship between all three of them. It's the best possible outcome.

I love that Kitty made Joan a key to the Brownstone, and I love that Sherlock learns to play the bugle just to wake Joan up in the morning - a routine he has missed. I also loved Sherlock and Joan being overbearing with Kitty as she tries to pick a lock. So much great material between the three of them. This show really hit on something special with their relationship.

On a more touching note, Sherlock and Joan were so attentive to each other's feelings in this episode. You can see how Sherlock has changed over the years based on his behavior towards Joan. When he finds the body, instead of getting straight to business he takes the time to say "I'm sorry, Watson." Later, he checks up on her and asks if she's okay, since Joan did know the deceased. Joan also takes the time to worry about Sherlock and ask him about his meetings and about how he's doing with his sobriety. She even offers to make a sacrifice by moving back in to the Brownstone for a while if that will help him, but he declines out of consideration for Joan's feelings.

I loved seeing Alfredo again. I wish we could keep up some of these guest characters such as Miss Hudson and Alfredo with a bit more consistency, but it's still always nice to see him. The talking car alarm named Odin was pretty great.

As always, giving Johnny Lee Miller a delicious speech to sink his teeth into is a sure sign of a winning scene. He does such a great job with Sherlock's continual struggle with drug addiction. I'm so glad to see a version of Sherlock Holmes that actually focuses on this and tries to tease out all of the complexities. His speech about monotony was really well done, and it frightened me - will we ever see Sherlock relapsing? Routine is a dangerous thing for Sherlock Holmes, and yet how else is he supposed to stay away from drugs?

I think I'll stop there before I speculate any further. I'm loving this season so much. I can't wait to see where we go from here.

9.5/10