Sherlock and Joan get caught up in the Rat Race…

The episode opens with Joan (Lucy Liu) revealing Sherlock’s secret to Captain Gregson (Aidan Quinn), that he is a recovering drug addict and that she thinks he may have relapsed after not hearing from him in three hours. Sherlock (Johnny Lee Miller) is in an even more dangerous situation however as we see he’s handcuffed and being taken somewhere. We go back two days earlier and see what lead to these events. 

Sherlock’s services are called upon by a Wall Street bank to investigate the disappearance of one of their executives and in no time Sherlock finds him. Trouble is he’s dead. It looks as though he died from an accidental drug overdose but Sherlock deduces that it was in fact murder, just by looking in his fridge. Sherlock unearths more mysterious deaths within the company and he figures out that the secretary Donna (Molly Price) has been bumping off other people who were in line to take a promotion, that she hoped her boss would get as being secretary to him get’s her a pay rise and stock options. She tazers Sherlock and takes him out somewhere quiet to get rid of him. Sherlock is rescued at the last minute when the police turn up after the secretary sent a text to a worrying Joan as Sherlock, with perfect grammar saying he’s fine. Sherlock likes to use text speak and complicated acronyms so she immediately sensed he was in danger. Sherlock is made aware that Gregson knows his secret and pays him a visit to explain. Gregson already knew but is so impressed with his work that he didn’t make it an issue. This was a very good scene, Gregson seems to be the only character that he can lose the bravado and act naturally around showing him more respect than other characters.

This episode featured a sub plot involving Joan being set up with a married man and she discovers that hanging around with Sherlock has enabled to spot when someone is lying. I can’t help but feel Liu isn’t as good on her own as Miller though when they are together it does work. I find it hard to imagine Miller’s Sherlock being with a male Watson so I guess that having a female Watson wasn’t just a gimmick. This episode had some good character development but it’s not as strong as last week’s episode “The Balloon Man“, that had some very nice twists and an intriguing case.

As detective shows go Elementary is shaping up to be just as good as some of the others that the US are so good at producing with it’s case of the week format, gradual character development and charming lead it is an enjoyable 45 minutes that I see myself sticking with for however long it runs.