Friday, December 2, 2016

Going controversial: The Cage match!

Okay, I'm not going to start a Twitter war over this, as I would surely lose, but the Baker Street Babes have gotten something very, very wrong for perhaps the first time in their illustrious Sherlockian hive-mind career.

Tonight, Amy Thomas rolled out a graphic hashtagged #HolmesunCAGEd that cast a Nicholas Cage-starring Sherlock Holmes movie. Her casting: Cage as Sherlock, the Rock as Watson, Sylvester Stallone as Moran, Arnold Swarzenegger as Moriarty, Megan Fox as Irene Adler, and Catherine Zeta-Jones as Mrs. Hudson.

The very thought of Nicholas Cage as Sherlock Holmes is brilliant, and why Hollywood never cast that man as Holmes is a crime against movie-making. No star in Hollywood burns with an intensity so Holmes-worthy as Nic Cage, and if there is a God, somebody better damn well be making that movie as we speak.

But let me put on the soundtrack to Gone in Sixty Seconds and explain to you where the fair sex went wrong in casting a movie that must be fueled by that hormone the Baker Street Babes are not nearly so soaked in as some of the rest of us: testosterone.

First, Watson. The Rock as Watson? No, no, too flamboyant, not nearly the key a Watson needs played in . . . Vin Diesel, however, whom was suggested as Mycroft in their feed? Now there's the Watson for Vin Diesel. Steady, simmering, and ready for action even when wounded.

But who then for Mycroft? Well, they have a gentleman named Arnold Swarzenegger down as the villain, but given that Mycroft was the government itself, Arnold is a much more solid establishment figure who fits naturally into the Mycroft role. (He's going to be the American government in this one, of course, because getting this cast to all do accents is definitely out of the question.)

Sylvester Stallone is no Moran . . . he's Lestrade, obviously, with Dolph Lundgren as Gregson.

But who are the bad guys, then?

Tommy Lee Jones as Moriarty. Kurt Russell as Moran.

But here's where it gets interesting . . . we do have to add a few ladies to this list, and for Mrs. Hudson, in an action movie of this level, there's only one place to go and that's back to Britain.

Helen Mirren as Mrs. Hudson.

And for Irene Adler . . . there can be only one name: Sigourney Weaver.

For Mary Morstan, I'm going to go with Milla Jovovich.

Since we don't want to throw children into this, I'm casting Wiggins with John Cusack. And his Irregulars are Colin Farrell, Mark Wahlberg, Matt Damon, John Cena, and Jason Statham.

Is that enough testosterone for one Nicholas Cage movie, the man who gave us one of the manliest movies of all time, Con Air? Probably so. But there's always room for debate in Sherlockian circles, and Amy Thomas poured out some excellent fuel for debate on this one.

It will always be one of my great disappointments that Lucy Liu was never allowed to release her full action-movie prowess in CBS's Elementary. (Giving her Jason Statham as Sherlock could have made that a completely different show.) And how we got a crazy action movie Sherlock Holmes that starred Robert Downey Jr., with all the other possibilities available, I shall never know.

But the movie and television industries aren't done with Sherlock Holmes yet, not by a long shot.

Hope springs eternal.

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