steffern

Another decent series weighed down by terrible female characters trying to be larger than life bossy queens with zero reasoning skills and emotional regulation. Certainly not period correct, but most of all annoying to endure and only serve as distractions and hindrances from the progression of the plot.

It's the age old drama plot of a strong man who sacrifices his life for the women in his life, and through grit and adaptability he manages to greatly improve the lives of these women. While the women, on the other hand, dedicate their lives to make his life as difficult and miserable as possible through their childish whims, emotional immaturity, bitterness, and general manipulative behaviour. This causes all the drama, chaos and challenges that lead to the fluctuations and hardships of the story, at the expense of the man, as per usual.

In short, it's a perfectly adequate drama series for the bored and emotionally unfulfilled housewife, but I, for one, would have preferred to cut out the romance, as well as all the female characters.

The plot is ok and the story decent, with a setting and costumes that go a long way in setting up the atmosphere and authenticity of the given premise. The characters, however, are not reminiscent of anything from the universe of Sherlock Holmes, which is made infinitely worse by the poor acting. Or, should I say, lack thereof, because the acting is so mundane that it's as if they are just reading the script out loud at a first rehearsal. It's reminiscent of a sitcom pilot where the dynamic and chemistry between the actors is not yet in place to bring out the best in each other, which then emerges over the course of the following few episodes. Here, however, it does not, and it seems like the casting is just all wrong across the board, with the exception of a few side characters.