The BBC officially announced today that Sherlock will be returning for a special as well as three new episodes.
Production on the special is set to take place in January 2015, and the fourth season will shoot later in the year. The special is expected to air during the holiday season, which means that we most likely won’t see the three new episodes until sometime in 2016.
Fans of the series shouldn’t be too surprised by the long wait, as the series has always been known to have long hiatuses. With Martin Freeman (Watson) as the face of The Hobbit films and Benedict Cumberbatch (Sherlock) working nonstop on a myriad of other projects, it’s hard to get everyone’s schedules to match up. Executive producer Sue Vertue put it best, saying:
“It’s taken a little while to get the dates sorted as none of the boys are exactly sitting back twiddling their thumbs, but there was unanimous goodwill to make this work so we’re thrilled that 221B is going to be inhabited again.”
It’s still way too early to know specifics about what the two main characters will be up to this time around, but to get your imagination running wild the show’s co-creator Steven Moffat said:
“…we’re reasonably confident that the very next thing to happen to Sherlock and John is the very last thing you’d expect…”
So there you have it, Sherlock and Watson will be going back in time to fight the dinosaurs.
