I just watched this film for the first time after recording it recently on the Sleuth channel. Some years ago, there were two much better productions where the "real" Holmes was brought back in the modern world and both of these TV movies had much better quality scripts, both for good drama and for humor.

The key in the good Holmes stories are the many times Holmes astounds us with keen observations. Here, these observations really were elementary. Almost every clue he uncovered was painfully obvious to anyone. A key turning point involved the bad guy using an old plot in one of the original stories and it was so obvious I was calling it out to my wife before Holmes even started to recognize the same thing.

More troubling was the way Hagman's character believed he was Holmes, yet he wasn't troubled by the fact that his friend Watson was now a female, nor that his flat at 221 B Baker Street was now in Los Angeles. If he thinks he's THE Sherlock Holmes, than he ought to want to return to London. Or, at least NOT be expecting his old apartment to be in Los Angeles. The script was full of illogical matters like this, which rather kept it from being all that funny to me.

Another big hole-- (Here's my big spoiler, partially disguised) Someone in a courtroom scene sets off a smoke bomb, then slips into a bailiff's uniform to shoot someone. He was counting on witnesses claiming "The bailiff shot the man." How could he count on them seeing the bailiff's uniform clearly enough, but not seeing his own face through the smoke? If you can see the TV film "Return of Sherlock Holmes", you'll find it ten times as interesting and funny, with far fewer holes in the way the plot unfolds.