Robert Carlyle will be the latest actor to play the legendary Sherlock Holmes. He’s set to join the second season of Watson, the CBS medical drama starring Morris Chestnut as Dr. John Watson. Carlyle will appear in a recurring guest role.
“We are thrilled to have the mighty Robert Carlyle join the cast of Watson in Season 2,” said Craig Sweeny, executive producer and showrunner of Watson. “The man has played iconic roles in projects like Trainspotting, The Full Monty and 28 Weeks Later, and now he steps into the shoes of the most iconic detective of all, Sherlock Holmes. When Watson’s best friend and former partner makes a shocking reappearance in his life, Watson is forced to confront their shared past — and a secret that may lie buried within Watson’s own body.“
Watson follows Dr. John Watson as he resumes his medical career as the head of a clinic dedicated to treating rare disorders, but Watson’s old life isn’t done with him.
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The first season took place one year after Holmes’s apparent death at the hands of his archenemy Moriarty at Reichenbach Falls, so his reappearance is a surprise. Although it always seemed inevitable that Holmes would show up, Sweeny had previously said that there were no immediate plans to feature the character in the series.
“If you have Watson front and center, to allow that character to shine, you definitely don’t want him competing with the most famous character in all of literature, so a very natural construction for me was to begin with the death of Holmes at Reichenbach Falls,” Sweeny said in January. “Now, of course, even in Conan Doyle’s stories, Sherlock is not truly dead. My belief is that Holmes is gone. I don’t want to be held to that if there’s some great story that presents itself, but I don’t believe that we’re ever going to feature Sherlock as an ongoing character in the show, Watson at this time.“
The second season of Watson will premiere on October 13 on CBS and streaming on Paramount+.