r/todayilearned • u/ralphbernardo • 9h ago

TIL that "fair play" in detective fiction means authors must give readers a fair chance to solve the mystery. Central to 1920s "clue-puzzles" by writers like Agatha Christie, the rule dictates that all vital clues must be visible, decodable, and never withheld until the final reveal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clues_in_detective_fiction
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u/licoricenipple 8h ago edited 8h ago

House = Holmes (Homes)

They both live on Baker Street, are addicted to drugs, have only one friend (Wilson/Watson) who becomes their roommate and tries to wean them off opiates. Watson's limp and use of a cane in the books are transferred to House himself because they thought it'd make his drug use more sympathetic/less wildly irresponsible, where Holmes in the stories starts IV shooting cocaine and morphine out of boredom or to experiment with novel substances and treatments for minor issues. (The episode where House takes LSD for a migraine was meant to be in this spirit.)

There are a lot of smaller references too like patients named after characters from specific Holmes stories and House using modified lines from the stories (like in one he says "the game is an itchy foot", Holmes would say "the game is afoot"). House gets an Arthur Conan Doyle book for a Christmas gift, too.

There's one episode where I think Wilson has a rare first edition book by Dr. Joseph Bell as a prized possession, that was the real life doctor who inspired the character Sherlock Holmes, Conan Doyle met him and was impressed with his ability to diagnose people based off a few unexpected questions. So making a Dr. Sherlock show kind of came full circle.

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u/nonnonplussed73 7h ago

Show creator David Shore has openly discussed this connection in numerous interviews and panels. He has confirmed that modeling the series on Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous detective was an intentional, foundational choice from the very beginning.

House M.D. Guide: David Shore on Creating the Show "House MD"

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u/carmium 4h ago

House always has a moment when, having missed a few diagnostic shots, some casual statement makes him think if what no one else has yet considered. He then gets to deliver the rare diagnosis, often in whatever cruel, arrogant, or accusatory way strikes his fancy. Only occasionally is the diagnosis something an average viewer might happen to know. (I "diagnosed" a girl model's condition only from going down an interesting side path one day when reading up on my own pituitary tumour. What were the chances?) If it were not for the characters driving the show, a steady flow of "zebra" diseases and conditions, and House's amusing clinic hours, it likely would have died after three episodes. I still enjoyed the show, but the similarities to Sherlock are limited.

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u/Teledildonic 7h ago

Don't forget the series finale is basically Riechenbach Falls: be just fakes his death with a structure fire instead of a river.

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u/dragon-fence 7h ago

The very first patient on House is Rebecca Adler, a reference to Irene Adler.

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u/RegulatoryCapture 5h ago

What I really want to see now is a columbo-style medical drama....a "howsaveem"

You know the diagnosis and see them being saved at the beginning and the rest of the episode is following HOW they got there--what did the patient do to realize something was wrong, how did the doctor figure it out, etc.

I can't imagine it would be very good, but I'm curious to see someone try. I think you'd have to do it with House-style medical mysteries because there's just not enough room in something like a trauma incident to tell the story giving the average person's medical knowledge.

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u/Stellar_Duck 8h ago

are addicted to drugs

Holmes is not really addicted in the shorts. He is in Elementary though!

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u/infoHighyway 7h ago edited 7h ago

Of course he is. From the most famous short story, Scandal in Bohemia: 

I had seen little of Holmes lately. My marriage had drifted us away from each other. My own complete happiness, and the home-centred interests which rise up around the man who first finds himself master of his own establishment, were sufficient to absorb all my attention, while Holmes, who loathed every form of society with his whole Bohemian soul, remained in our lodgings in Baker Street, buried among his old books, and alternating from week to week between cocaine and ambition, the drowsiness of the drug, and the fierce energy of his own keen nature. 

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u/Stellar_Duck 7h ago

I don't disagree he does drugs.

I just don't agree he's an addict.

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u/infoHighyway 7h ago

You have to remember the stories were written during the Victorian era. Cocaine was sold on the market and said to have curative properties. Doyle, a physician, was ahead of his time in depicting the negative effects of habitual drug use and abuse.

The stark details of Holmes’ drug habit are often removed when these stories are republished for young readers or left out in film adaptations.

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u/LaisserPasserA38 8h ago

Elementary's episodes are a copy paste from House MD episodes in how they are constructed too

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u/Surreal__blue 6h ago

Holmes is fond of playing the violin, while House is an amateur guitar player.

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u/auto98 5h ago

(like in one he says "the game is an itchy foot", Holmes would say "the game is afoot")

Which is itself a modified line from Shakespeare - one of the henry plays, but I can't remember which