Rating: 
Summary: Faded But Still Has Life
Review: What a shame that the distributor of these Granada Sherlock Holmes DVDs did not re-master the prints before they issued them (like A & E did with the Avengers and the Prisoner releases). The stories, characters and films themselves continue to be first rate, but the quality of the picture and sound does show its 18 year old age. The reds are mushy and some blacks have gone green. Still it's first rate Holmes and Watson...but the directors, cinematographers and actors must be wincing.
Rating: 
Summary: Meet Mr. Sherlock Holmes!
Review: "Sherlock Holmes? Yup, I know all about him. Uses "elementry" every other word, smokes a pipe, wears a deerstalker cap in all weather, has a dumb friend named Watson, is always battling some guy called Moriarty...."This is the common opinion of Holmes and the only problem is that it is not true to the stories. As is the case with so many famous literary characters, the films about Holmes have tended to stray further and firther from the original. This 1980's series brings things back to their origins. Jeremy Brett simply IS Holmes. The same Holmes Victorian readers fell in love with. The brilliant, slobby, eccentric, cocaine using, prickly detective that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle invented some 120 years ago. Brett's portrayal is at once true to the books with some new spark added to the character that only a skilled actor can provide. (Movie Viewer Points to anyone who recognized him as the youthful, love struck Freddie from My Fair Lady) In the excitement over Brett, it is easy to forget David Burke who plays Dr. John Watson, Holmes's biographer and best friend. Burke's Watson is not the fawning bumbler that so many believed him to be. He is gentlemanly fellow, the epitomy of the normal middle aged Victorian man which is a sharp contrast to Holmes's fierce eccentricity. Burke and Brett convey deep brotherly friendship that was so clear in the stories. What is interesting is that unlike many other book adaptations, which have much to cut, thse shows actually have to ADD to Doyle's short tales in order to fill out the hour. The filler material is always in character and often adds much to the plot. Modern Hollywood adapters could learn much. This DVD has 4 episodes and of the four, the Naval Treaty is the strongest and best displays the varied talents of the actors. All of the episodes are very good, though, and you shall have to choose your own. In conclusion, check this out for a glimpse at Sherlock Holmes as his creator surely invisioned him (before he got sick of him anyway) If you buy this DVD, you are in for a real treat.
Rating:
Summary: Jeremy Can Box
Review: Watch Brett open a can of whoop a__ in The Solitary Cyclist. Scandal has "The Woman". Dancing Men shows Holmes cyrpto talents and Naval Treaty has one of those endings you hope for. This is by far the best out of the 3 collections. Get em all though.
Rating:
Summary: GREAT DVDs - Reported problems may be the Player not the DVD
Review: I was unsure about this DVD series due to the reports of defects in the DVD transfer. I bought all three for my wife, the real Holmes fan. They are fine. Picture is fine, sound is fine. I have two DVD players, one cheapie (<$150), which does not always play disks well, it jitters, maked noise, and at times will lockup or lose it's place on discs. The player we watched the Sherlock Holmes on is a Sony 3000, (1997 model), one of the best DVD players ever made. It has never had a problem. It has better video and audio quality than the cheapie one. I looked at the specs, and I suspect the problems folks had with this DVD series has more to do with the Player than the DVDs. I suspect these DVDs are not made in the US (although the packing does not state where they were made) and there may be manufacturing process differences. The Sony has a multi-spectrum laser, and some players do not. It has settings and auto compensation for jitter, sound flutter, Mono/Stereo conversion etc... that many players do not. Also, if there is an RF modulator used, instead of direct C or S vid, then that alone can cause problems on some DVDs. The lesson here could be to spend more than $200 to view that $1500 DVD collection... (The sony was $700, and well worth it) The Sherlock Holmes DVD series is awesome!! A must for any Holmes fan.
Rating:
Summary: Simply Brilliant
Review: I'm afraid not to be a true Sherlockian, still perhaps a true fan. However, though I read so far mostly 'Canon' stories from Conan Doyle - probably every single of them several times over the last 10 years - and therefore knew all of the plots, I do believe that the characters chosen for this TV serie are just about perfectly fitting. Jeremy Brett is unbelievably convincing as Holmes. If you like Holmes as much as I do, you can blindly buy this DVD and the rest from the serie. In fact, I can't wait for volume IV to be out.
Rating: 
Summary: DVD quality defects
Review: The DVD has some quality issues. On our cheapie DVD player and TV, we noticed two specific problems: (1) In dark scenes, the dark background "flickers," on all four episodes. It is noticeable perhaps 2% of the time. Slightly annoying and distracting. (2) Sometimes the audio sounds like it is muffled, but I would say that happens about 1% of the time. This is the only DVD we've ever watched with these problems. However, neither of these problems detracts materially from the Holmes experience. Interestingly, we have the VHS version of "the Blue Carbuncle" and it is of better quality than this DVD...neither of the two problems above occurs on our VHS tape. I bought this for my wife last Christmas, and our whole family has loved watching all 4 episodes again and again, despite the DVD quality problems.
Rating:
Summary: THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOMES - VOLUME 1!
Review: JEREMY BRETT stakes his claim to the all-time best SHERLOCK HOLMES in this quartet of episodes from the celebrated BRITISH television series! In the colonies we got to see these originally on PBS' "Mystery"! DAVID BURKE co-stars as DR. WATSON in these four tales adapted from the work of ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE! "A Scandal in Bohemia" finds Holmes and Watson trying to recovering an INCRIMINATING PHOTOGRAPH for the King of Bohemia! My favorite is "The Dancing Men," where some harmless looking chalk drawings get Holmes involved in a deep dark mystery! "The Naval Treaty" has Holmes searching for a secret treaty between England and Italy lost by one of Watson's old school chums! Then in "The Solitary Cyclist" Holmes tries to discover who is the strange man on a bicycle who is stalking a young music teacher! Of course, Holmes always succeeds and always succeeds BRILLIANTLY! The EXTRAS are not much, but we are here for HOLMES at his BEST and that is what this DVD offers!
Rating:
Summary: All right but not great...
Review: This DVD was nice but it wasn't quite what i expected it to be. The quality is rather poor but the actors are extremely well picked. I have read the original Sherlock Holmes story and the series follows these stories quite well. I would give it two stars if it was any other series, but because it is a Sherlock Holmes series for appreciaten of the stories and the author i can't give it below three. Not worth buying unless you're a true Sherlock Holmes fanatic.
Rating:
Summary: Poor Sound Quality is Blasphemy
Review: Many people have become fans of the PBS Mystery series that hosted Jeremy Brett in the role of Sherlock Holmes. Portraying one of the more eccentric and less compassionate characterizations, this series has become a must see for Holmes aficionados. The story lines, well known, and the actors are all five star. That being said, these DVDs are produced with mediocre video and very poor sound quality. This would be understandable if I were watching Basil Rathbone, but not Jeremy Brett. The broadcast TV series was better quality. Hopefully, further efforts will overcome these production flaws and a newer version will be released. When it is, I will purchase it and trash the copy I have now.
Rating:
Summary: It's elementary, my dear...
Review: For better or for worse, the Granada "Sherlock Holmes" made Jeremy Brett the canonical Holmes for those who watched the series in the 80s and 90s. At least some devout Holmesians have declared themselves sharply anti-Brett, and even those who don't agree can occasionally sympathize: as the series went on, Brett's performance became increasingly mannered, full of twitches and tics. The mannerisms, however, are fully restrained in these early episodes, and Brett was certainly at his best before going over the Falls. However, perhaps the most significant contribution here is not Brett's but David Burke's. As the first of Granada's two Watsons, Burke is a trifle hot-headed, admiring but not subservient, fit, and masculine. (Like Brett, he is also about 15-20 years too old, but that's par for the course for just about any Sherlock Holmes adaptation.) The episodes included here largely adhere to the canon. Here, as throughout the series, the writers employ the conceit that Watson-the-writer might have deliberately downplayed his own intellect in order to better showcase Holmes's; as a result, Watson regularly gets some of Holmes's lines. (One of the side effects of this approach is that Granada's Watson does make a believable "author.") "A Scandal in Bohemia" is the best of the set; "The Solitary Cyclist" is the least satisfactory (especially the not-altogether-believable fight sequence). But, good heavens, this DVD is of poor quality. Sound wobbled on a regular basis, and I had to turn the volume all the way up in order to hear all of the dialogue. Perhaps worse still, the picture was sometimes fuzzy and, in a couple of places, marred by scratches and dropouts.
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