Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Roger Llewellyn.

Sherlock Holmes has long since retired and his greatest friend Dr. John Watson has died, quietly and without fuss, the way he always would. Thus begins the last tale of Victorian England’s finest detective, however, as with all great last tales, the memories and the vestige of a story that has captivated millions since Arthur Conan Doyle, is always worth re-telling from the person’s own perspective. So the history of Sherlock Holmes is captured by writer David Stuart Davies and the towering, looming presence of Roger Llewellyn.

The Last Act starts with Sherlock Holmes in his once familiar surroundings of 221b Baker Street but this is a home, an England that is alien to his thinking, to his reasoning and his intellect. The memories of his life with his greatest friend, his love and respect for that friend who was invalided out of the British army and the cases they solved together are tempered by the thoughts of a brutal war raging over Europe. The sound of gunfire echoes round the room from Holmes’ less interesting days, his melancholy times in which his intellect was not being tested. In this setting Holmes confesses finally all to Watson. The subject of many of Watson’s tales finally finds his voice in which to give his account. The focus of Watson’s stories becomes the narrator and throughout it all Roger Llewellyn captures the essence of the man, he frames him with the words of a man seeking redemption and closure and the tale is magnificent.

Although surely impossible to have missed at least one version of Holmes’ life, no matter the actor, no matter the story or tale of crime and murder, this is perhaps the best way to enjoy the master detective at his best, direct from his own thoughts, the hesitancy, the grandeur, the voice of a man who fought Professor Moriaty, who struggled for his intellectual feelings for Irene Adler and who throughout it all is the bench mark for great British detective stories. David Stuart Davies script is near perfect, almost faultlessly delivered that in the end, The Last Act, is merely the beginning.

Sherlock Holmes: The Last Act Produced by Big Finish is available to buy from Worlds Apart on Lime Street, Liverpool.

Ian D. Hall