As the episode begins, Patricia Colman Jones (Olivia Grant) is confronted by a group of angry locals. Alice (Eileen O’Higgins) and Watson (Royce Pierreson) catch up with her and escort her to safety. Watson explains they think the people are under some form of hypnosis and that is why they’re trying to kill Patricia. Alice grabs one of the would-be killer’s arms and says they need to get to Sherlock. Meanwhile, Sherlock watches a woman on stage speaking about the attacks on the performers in the West End. The woman on stage dedicates her performance to the victims. An entranced Sherlock (Henry Lloyd-Hughes) approaches the stage. When he says he likes the song, she explains there is something she needs him to do for her.

She wants Sherlock to kill himself and he agrees to do so. When Alice bursts through the door, Sherlock admits he didn’t hear the performer because he had wax in his ears. He injects the woman before Watson confirms they got to Patricia in time. Back to the present, Bea (Thaddea Graham) helps Sherlock walk as he repeatedly says Snowdonia Hawkweed. She tells him that Mrs. Hudson says the room is on their account. Sherlock urinates on the floor before she can grab the bedpan. After the intro, Sherlock wakes up and thanks Bea for not taking him back to 221B. Bea admits she doesn’t care about Sherlock, but she wants information about her mom and the Rip.

Bea returns to the cellar and finds Leopold (Harrison Osterfield) up and out of bed. She offers to clean his wound, but he won’t let her. He claims he did it to himself when he fell. Leo confesses people didn’t want him to leave so he ran for it. She tells him to get some rest and that she’ll be back later. She immediately returns to Sherlock who tries to change Bea’s opinion of him. He tells her he was the youngest person to ever be recruited as a consultant by Scotland Yard. He goes on to tell Bea how John Watson got involved in his first case of Jefferson Hope. Sherlock tells her how they decided to form an agency together before a darkness came to London. They decided to find out why. We return to the past and Holmes tries to convince Watson that they need to recruit Alice to help.

Sherlock wants to solve the case and become famous, but he promises not to talk to her if Watson doesn’t want him to. Watson relents and agrees to talk to her. Sherlock visits Alice’s place and runs into a young Beatrice. He immediately catches her in a lie and she realizes he is there to discuss the rat man. Bea returns to Jessie (Darci Shaw) and invites her to come listen to Sherlock talk about their mother who he calls captivating. Jessie decides to stay since the linen man told her the nightmares may show her where the rip is. She wants to go back into her nightmares and find out where the rip is located. As Bea leaves, Billy (Jojo Macari) and Spike (McKell David) watch her leave. Spike encourages Billy to talk to the nearby girls.

He tries to but runs into an odd man and decides to follow him. The man eventually disappears but Billy can’t shake his feeling. Back in the past, Sherlock gives tattoos to Alice and John. Sherlock tells Bea that Watson backed out because he said he felt lightheaded. Back in the past, Sherlock tells the others why he knew the woman’s song was hypnotizing people. As he talks, Alice steps out of the room and he soon follows her. He tries to convince her to stay but she is tired and wants to go home. She asks him if he ever gets tired of having to explain his brilliance. She believes they’re standing on the brink of something without order or reason. She thinks he is arrogant. Sherlock says he has nothing to lose.

Seconds later, Watson finds them kissing but doesn’t say anything. Sherlock tells Bea that they loved each other but she doesn’t believe it and accuses him of tortured her mother. He denies it and says they were rituals. He says they all did it in hopes of finding the rip. Alice’s screaming and getting sick were blamed on something else. Then, he tells Bea about Alice’s nightmares before we join one of Jessie’s. She walks through the cavern in hopes of finding more about the rip. A person grabs her leg and pulls her to the ground. She hears circle over and over before coming to reality. Bea finds her out in the street. Bea comforts her and says the nightmares might be visions like their mother had.

Bea wants her to listen to Sherlock, but Alice doesn’t want to do that. Jessie agrees to think about it but wants to be left alone for a while. Spike finds Billy in the pub and asks him about the guy he saw earlier. Spike wonders if it could be Billy’s dad but Billy explains it is Vic Collins (Alex Ferns) who used to master the workhouse when they were there. He admits that Collins used to beat him unconscious. Billy says someone will do him in if there is any justice. Spike tries to convince him not to do anything stupid because he could get into trouble. Seconds later, Bea enters and notices the bruises all over Leo’s body. He doesn’t want her to see him broken so she agrees to turn around. She tells him that she used to dance with Jessie to get money.

She sings and teaches him how to dance. They nearly kiss but stop and begin talking about their insecurities. Bea claims there might be too many demons before leaving in a hurry. Sherlock tells Bea that Alice had figured out that a Rip had opened. She knew she could find its location in her nightmares but they were getting worse. He admits the question was whether she could survive the horrors long enough to decipher them. He says the cases were taken a toll on all of them. Then, Gregson brought them a barbaric case and they didn’t know it’d be the last one they’d work together. Alice tries to talk Sherlock out of taking the case and says something about John worries her. They’re introduced to Mr. Lowe who had his left arm stolen. As for Mr. Walsh, he had his right arm stolen.

Other men lost their legs. The case is being called The Case of the Collector. Alice finds a vial of something on the ground. Meanwhile, Sherlock begins using drugs while working on the case. He notices that the liquid’s base is alcohol. The only element that had him stumped was Snowdonia Hawkweed. He explains it only grows on one inaccessible cliff face on a mountain in Northern Wales. Sherlock believes they can use that to identify the collector, but Watson tells him they’re all worn out. Watson agrees to do it. Sherlock admits he had never been wrong before and can’t believe he was wrong now. Watson tells him he is wrong and that it is a dead-end.

Sherlock admits they have nothing to go on since they were wrong about the tincture. Watson invites him to the pub for a drink but Sherlock decides he should stay with Alice. Bea forces him to reveal that Alice was incapacitated by that point. He doesn’t want to tell her anything else until she gets him drugs. Bea refuses to do that. Meanwhile, Billy follows Vic but Spike stops him. Billy admits Vic beat up Bea and not him. He wasn’t big enough so he couldn’t stop it. Billy knocks Spike to the ground and says he is big enough to deal with it now. Bea gets drugs from Sherlock but only agrees to give them to him when he tells her the truth about Alice. We find out that Alice was pregnant and needed the midwife. Jessie walks in just in time to hear about her birth and Sherlock apologizes.

She wants to know what her mother saw in the nightmares so Sherlock tells her it was executioners from the 17th century. He also says triangles. Alice has another nightmare. When she wakes up, she tells Sherlock they need to leave London because something bad is going to happen. Sherlock doesn’t want to do that. She soon realizes that he is only interested in building his reputation by saving the world. When she tells him what he has to lose, he agrees to go with her. John Watson finds him packing his belongings and blames Alice. John believes he’ll change his mind now that he thinks he knows how to find the rip. He believes the barrier between their world and the next is thinnest at the site of great traffic.

He says it would be a place of great death. He thinks they should be searching for gallows. The only problem is that there are dozens of gallows sites in London. Sherlock knows Tyburn is the only one that is shaped like a triangle. In the present, he admits he had no choice but to ask Alice to go before pleading for the opium. Sherlock claims they were no different than Bea and her friends because they were only kids. They visit the gallows site and Alice sees a figure off in the trees. Alice tells Sherlock he doesn’t need to prove how brilliant he is and that Bea and Jessie belong to him now. Sherlock says the rip was small and they couldn’t see a great deal into it. He says it was the very fabric of the universe. Alice tells him that the world will warp and fold into itself if the rip widens. She claims she doesn’t need the incantations. As soon as she touched it, Sherlock knew it would take it. He tried to grab her but he wasn’t strong enough to stop it. Before they knew it, Alice and the rip were gone.

Jessie says she has heard enough and leaves. Bea ridicules Sherlock for leaving them in the workhouse. He knows he has made mistakes but he denies that what happened to Alice was his fault. Sherlock still can’t wrap his head around the idea that Watson found out how to find the rip. He asks Bea to give him the opium. She pours it out onto the floor and admits it isn’t opium. Billy sneaks into Vic’s house. Vic knows he is there and asks him what he is waiting for. Billy tells him he is there to hurt him. Vic says Billy likely deserved his beatings. He puts on his glasses and admits he remembers Billy and his mother. Vic tells the truth about his mom being a prostitute and not wanting him. He claims Billy wasn’t the first or last of her kids they took in. Billy doesn’t believe it until Vic tells him his name.

He tells Billy that he always cried at night and he needs to get out of his house. Billy drops his weapon and stumbles out of the house. In the morning, Bea tells Jessie about going off on Sherlock. Bea apologizes for making her go see Sherlock but Jessie says she doesn’t care about him. Bea thinks Watson knows more about what is going on and she is going to find out and end it. Jessie tells her not to give her strength away by hating Sherlock because he isn’t worth it. Bea returns to Sherlock moments later and gives him a drink. He says he loved Alice dearly and Bea believes that. Bea and Sherlock agree he wishes he’d never met her because the last decade of his life has been a living hell. He says he’d do it for another 100 years to spend one more moment with Alice.

He gives her advice before she leaves. Later, she returns to Leo and asks to see his body. He takes his shirt off and lets her look at his bruises. They kiss and Bea tells him she doesn’t want him to hide his body from her anymore. They make out as the episode ends.

 

The Irregulars Review

The 5th episode of The Irregulars wasn’t the best, but I guess it was a necessary evil. The show needed to tell us about Alice and her relationship with Sherlock. We got that and we also learned how Alice died. I understand what they’re doing with the show, but this episode really weakened the Holmes character.

It is hard to deny that Henry Lloyd-Hughes acted it great as he always does, but it is hard to appreciate the pathetic character of Sherlock Holmes. Can the character be redeemed? I suppose he can be and I hope he is. Still, it is going to be difficult to overlook the fact that he was beneath his legendary status.

The episode was good because it told us more about the backstories of the characters. Otherwise, not a lot was going on. Although not bad, it wasn’t great either. The episode scores a 6.5 out of 10. More recaps of The Irregulars can be found on Reel Mockery here. Please excuse any mistakes above. I was a bit distracted and less than enthralled by the episode.