Dickensian–A Twist on Sherlock Holmes?

Dickensian is a 2016 BBC  historical drama mini-series that  borrows from several of Charles Dickens’ novels to present his characters’ personalities in a murder mystery, Sherlock Holmes style.    The creator, Tony Jordan, repositions some of the most well-known characters from The Christmas Carol, David Copperfield, Great Expectations, Bleak House, and Oliver Twist among others.

In the opening of Dickensian, moneylender Ebenezer Scrooge and his partner, Jacob Marley, are plotting how to collect more money from the desperate residents of Victorian London.  The interest rates the two charge are usury.  Then Marley is murdered.  

Other familiar characters to Dickens readers are introduced:  Tiny Tim, Little Nell, Fagin (Anton Lesser, the great character actor of “Wolf Hall”, “The Crown” and “Game of Thrones”, among others), Miss Havisham (Tuppence Middleton), and Inspector Bucket (Stephen Rea, whose breakout role was in “The Crying Game”), who takes the role of a detective like Sherlock Holmes.  However, no matter how familiar or unfamiliar the viewer is with Dickens, the characters and their stories are original and unexpected.  There is a real sense of being transported to the time of Dickens where characters from separate novels convincingly interact in ways resonant with their novel’s personalities but woven into a murder mystery:  Bleak House , with a liberal sprinkling of David Copperfield and Christmas Carol. Inheritance disputes always make for highly charged family drama spanning, at times,  generations in never-ending betrayal and broken promises. 

Everyone within this high-caliber ensemble cast performs exceptionally well, perhaps invigorated by the creator’s mastery of the craft of writing. Enough of the foundation of the murder mystery is laid in the first episode to maintain interest throughout. Puzzling clues and a large number of characters who feel like they stepped out of Dickens’ novels, a marvel of central casting, support the building of a Dickensian London.

Thanks in no small part to Stephen Rea’s portrayal of Inspector Bucket, there is a  richly reimagined Sherlock Holmes sensibility to the murder mystery, with a  convoluted plot twist requiring careful attention from the viewer for the collage of characters.   Dickensian  is a cohesive, brilliant, and utterly addictive series.  

Availability:  BritBox

Note: The portrayal of Fagin made this reviewer uncomfortable, in its stereotyping, anti-Semitic characterization of appearance, similar to Shylock in The Merchant of Venice.  Anton Lesser gives an extraordinary performance, however.