Alright guys I’m back
Did you miss me?
I did not miss you
I was on a farm and it was great and we had chickens
oh also guess what,
due to popular demand I am going to be making more Norse Crisis Flowchart Shirts
but I wanna pick a new color
so tell me what color you want the shirts to be!
OKAY
SHERLOCK HOLMES
we have spoken of him before on this here internet website
but it was not me who was talking about him
and my friends, I have some shit to say.
the story I am going to tell you today was originally titled A STUDY IN SCARLET
but it is better known as DRUG-ADDLED SOCIOPATH SOLVES ALL THE CRIMES
wait that’s just my title for ALL the Sherlock Holmes stories
but when our story begins, Sherlock Holmes is nowhere in sight
because we are way the hell over in Afghanistan with this doctor named Watson
he’s a pretty good doctor
but it turns out that what he’s really good at is getting shot with bullets
and then flying back to London with a bad case of the PTSD
except that when he gets back to London
and checks into a hotel with all his army dollars
it turns out that PTSD actually stands for PARTY TIL SUN-DOWN
(to forget the innumerable horrors of war)
and as we all know, THE SUN NEVER SETS ON THE BRITISH EMPIRE
so Watson is just straight up partying ALL THE TIME
and his army dollars are abundant, but they are not infinite
so after a brief stay in party central, he is obliged to find a cheaper apartment out in the party suburbs
and this is when unlucky watson suddenly gets very lucky(?)
because he’s hanging out in one of his favorite bars, when this dude runs up to him like YO WATSON
I REMEMBER YOUR ASS FROM MEDICAL SCHOOL
ARE YOU LOOKING FOR AN APARTMENT?
THERE’S THIS DANGEROUS PSYCHOPATH I KNOW WHO IS ALSO LOOKING FOR AN APARTMENT
and Watson is like “does he mind sudden midnight screaming fits brought on by the traumas of war?”
and his friend is like “probably he is the cause of a lot of those”
and Watson is like SOLD
so they go over to the chemisty lab where Watson’s friend works
and this is where we finally get to meet Mister SHERLOCK HOLMES
notice that I used the title MISTER and not DOCTOR
because although this is a medical laboratory
Sherlock Holmes possesses NO ACCREDITATION WHATSOEVER
he just shows up to this chemistry lab every day
and beats dead bodies with golf clubs and fails to produce any credentials
and they all just LET HIM COME
in fact, when Watson arrives, Sherlock is busy MUTILATING HIS HANDS WITH A KNIFE
in order to prove that this liquid he made knows what blood is
and then he gets introduced to Watson and he’s like HEY MAN YOU JUST CAME BACK FROM AFGHANISTAN
and Watson is like duh I already know that
I struggle with the trauma of that experience every minute of every day
but it’s kind of weird that you know that about me.
Let’s be roommates!
So they move in together
and aside from some weird postmodern violin shit
and the fact that he spends three days out of every month coked to the tits
Sherlock Holmes is a pretty fine roommate
and Watson
who is too lazy to get his own job
spends all his time trying to figure out what Sherlock Holmes does for a living
COME ON, WATSON
HE’S SHERLOCK HOLMES
WHAT DO YOU THINK HE DOES
but anyway he never really figures it out so Sherlock Holmes just tells him
he’s like “I’m a consulting detective
which means that I don’t actually get paid and I don’t have a job
my money comes from that same mysterious vortex where most well-dressed english dudes get their money.
I’m pretty much just the working detective’s equivalent of the odd-numbered problems in the back of a math textbook
basically people walk into my house and I solve their problems
I hope you are okay with people dragging their big sloppy problems into our house all the time”
and watson is like “As long as you are okay with me occasionally mistaking them for enemy combatants!”
then they go off to solve crimes!
Cause see, it turns out a dude has been murdered
and the entire London police force is composed of fifty pound bags of salt in police uniforms
and two of these saltbags are important police detectives
named Lestrade and The Other Guy
and they have pretty much built their careers
on the fact that no one else needs to solve problems when Sherlock Holmes is around
cause lemme back up just a wee second:
Sherlock Holmes is the ultimate crime-solving engine
he has become this horrible thing through a combination of reading up on every crime ever committed
and forgetting all of the unimportant things
like that the earth revolves around the sun, or what a vagina looks like
he has done this in the interest of being able to call everyone he meets a fucking moron
while carrying a magnifying glass everywhere he goes and huffing bags of cocaine
okay, so Watson and Sherlock show up at this murder
a guy is dead in an abandoned house
blood is everywhere but it’s not his
you know, typical mystery shit
it’s not really that important
it’s just a bunch of opportunities for Sherlock Holmes to wave his braindick around
and then they find some chick’s ring on the floor, which Sherlock steals
SO FAR SO GOOD
then they talk to some other police officers, and then Sherlock Holmes goes to an opera
and then he puts an ad in the paper about the ring he stole
in the interest of making the criminal come to him
but instead of the criminal, some old-ass woman shows up
and after she leaves, Sherlock tries to tail her
but it turns out to be an olympic gymnast in an old lady suit
who bails out of a cab while Sherlock is riding on the back.
this is never fully explained.
So Sherlock is trying to come up with another way to catch the murderer
when ANOTHER dude gets murdered
this dude was the first dude’s secretary
and he got stabbed in his hotel room
because the killer actually brought a ladder and just climbed up in there.
okay guys, I don’t know about you, but if a dude with a knife was climbing up a ladder into my bedroom
I WOULD PUSH THAT SHIT OVER.
That secretary was too stupid to live, is what I’m saying.
The police search the room and they find a box with some pills in it
and Sherlock Holmes is like CALLED IT
THOSE PILLS ARE POISON
ALLOW ME TO PROVE IT
then he poisons his landlady’s dog to death with them.
SHIT YEAH, CONSULTING DETECTIVE.
So a dog is dead and a ring is stolen
and still no one has any idea who the murderer is
except for SHERLOCK HOLMES
who has hired an army of homeless orphans
to find a cab driver named Jefferson Hope, and bring him to his apartment
where he proceeds to handcuff him in front of both of those police detectives i mentioned
the ones whose job is to just be wrong all the time
so the murderer is caught, the case is closed
looks like this is the end OH NO IT’S TIME FOR AN OLD WEST FLASHBACK
WELCOME TO THE UTAH DESERT
A DUDE IS HERE WITH HIS DAUGHTER AND THEY ARE GOING TO DIE
his daughter is super stoked because she’s heard there are pancakes in heaven
but she is cruelly denied those heavenly pancakes when she and her father are saved by EVIL MORMONS
i mean it’s not evil that they rescue her
but 16 years later, when the daughter wants to marry this sexy hunter she found
Bringham Young is like OH NO YOU DON’T
MARRY ONE OF THESE TWO ASSHOLES I PICKED
THEY DON’T HAVE ENOUGH WIVES AND THEY NEED MORE WIVES
THE MAIN PROBLEM WITH BEING A MORMON IS CONSTANTLY RUNNING OUT OF WIVES
UNLESS YOU ARE A WOMAN
AND THEN THE PROBLEMS ARE PRETTY OBVIOUS
but the chick’s dad is like NO WAY, MY DAUGHTER IS GOING TO MARRY THAT SEXY HUNTER
and Bringham Young is like “How about a compromise
how about I give you 30 days
and if your daughter has not married one of the dudes I’ve picked by then, I kill you
and in the meantime, I send CRAZY MORMON GHOSTS to infiltrate your house
and pin numbers to all your stuff
to remind you how many days you have left?”
and the chick’s dad is like “That doesn’t sound like a compromise
that actually sounds like a horror movie”
but it’s too late, cause ghosts are already up in his shit!
but luckily that sexy hunter comes in and rescues them
but then it’s not really that lucky because he goes off to wrestle a bear
and while he’s gone the mormons catch up and kill the dad and marry the chick
and then she dies of a bad marriage
and all that’s left for the hunter to do
is to spend the rest of his life seeking REVENGE
SOUND LIKE A NONSEQUITUR?
WELL IT WON’T WHEN I TELL YOU WHAT THAT HUNTER’S NAME IS
IT’S JEFFERSON HOPE
the dude who just did all those murders
and the dudes Bringham Young picked to marry that chick?
those are the dudes that got murdered just now!
Jefferson Hope chased them all the way to England
and then he got one of them drunk and murdered him in a house
with those poison pills
(actually he gave him a choice between a poison pill and a placebo
but jesus came down and made him pick the poison or something)
and then he just straight stabbed the other guy
oh yeah and that blood from earlier was from Jefferson’s nose
because he was so excited about murders
oh and then as soon as he tells everyone about the evil mormon’s and shit
his heart explodes
thus conspicuously preventing justice from being served
except I guess justice has been served
because those mormons had it coming
and no one even thinks it’s odd
that Sherlock Holmes solved this mystery with a combination of cocaine, dog-poisoning, and child labor
So the moral of the story
…
is a fucking mystery.
The end.
I love Sherlock Holmes and you have captured him perfectly. Welcome back!
“and forgetting all of the unimportant things
like that the earth revolves around the sun, or what a vagina looks like
he has done this in the interest of being able to call everyone he meets a fucking moron
while carrying a magnifying glass everywhere he goes and huffing bags of cocaine”
So basically he’s got the perfect life, is what you’re saying.
Hooray! You’re back! And with mysteries? As much as I appreciated your comics, this is what we’re all here for. We have missed you terribly, sir.
Welcome back from the farm, good sir!
Missed you, dude.
I have actually read A Study In Scarlet, and this was an excellent re-creation. I was really confused when it got to the Mormon Flashback part–I was like “Who shoved a Western story into this Sherlock Holmes book?!”
Dangerous cocaine-huffing psychopaths are the best crime fighters. Or the best supervillains. (Actually, do a Google search for “Snowflame.” Literally the crackiest supervillain EVER.)
and as we all know, THE SUN NEVER SETS ON THE BRITISH EMPIRE
so Watson is just straight up partying ALL THE TIME.
Man, don’t tell just say it out loud like that, everyone will want one now.
Is “Moby-Dick; or, The Whale” on your list of stories, by any chance?.
Holy crap yes I missed you so much! I am glad that you had fun with your chickens, though.
Oh my Thor I am glad you are going to be making more Norse Crisis Flowchart shirts, I was going to demand that you make more, I did not know that I was going to be popular in doing so. For serious, though, I need one of those for my LIFE, like, the way Thor needs his hammer.
Way to come back with an explosion of awesome, that Sherlock Holmes, man, he is a crazy drugged-up dude.
I’m thinking that’s gonna be my sister’s birthday present.
Also I vote pink or purple, if we’re still taking votes.
Purple flowchart shirts!
Green shirts with the words in gold. Channels Asgard no?
Hooray! You’re back! PLUS SHERLOCK HOLMES. Lots of approval.
There is no cocaine in A Study in Scarlet
There totally is. You just need to learn to read between the lines. OF COCAINE.
HEYO
I haven’t laughed this hard since before i went to rehab
I have just discovered the brilliance of this awesome website! The glory of this retelling here is that it works perfectly well for both the original story *and* the BBC Sherlock version. More or less.
This story neatly serves as a reminder that Victorian England and the Wild West happened at roughly the same time!
Wait, so the guy’s heart explodes? Hmmmmm. I have a feeling that Sherlock Holmes may not be the greatest detective of all time, but in fact the greatest murderer. Cheers. Thanks for the post. Really enjoyed it.
“but it turns out that what heโs really good at is getting shot with bullets
and then flying back to London with a bad case of the PTSD
except that when he gets back to London
and checks into a hotel with all his army dollars
it turns out that PTSD actually stands for PARTY TIL SUN-DOWN
(to forget the innumerable horrors of war)
and as we all know, THE SUN NEVER SETS ON THE BRITISH EMPIRE
so Watson is just straight up partying ALL THE TIME”
THAT was actually pretty brilliant.
PTSD as Party Till Sun-Down?
“The Sun never sets on Britain”?
Damn, you’re clever!
So I gotta be all annoyed by things and the fact that this book misrepresents Mormons is gjg;hdhjdkfh.
The retelling was gorgeous. I am cracking up all over the place.
I’m angry at the book ๐