In a bedsit somewhere in London, John Watson is having a nightmare. He is reliving his Army days and his team is under fire somewhere abroad. A colleague cries out his name as the gunfire continues. Finally he jolts awake and sits up in bed wide-eyed and breathing heavily until he realises that he is safe and a long way from the war. Flopping back onto his pillow, he tries to calm his breathing as he continues to be haunted by his memories. Eventually, unable to stop himself, he begins to weep.



Some time later he has sat up on the side of the bed and switched on the bedside lamp. It’s still dark outside. John sits quietly, wrapped up in his thoughts, and looks across to the desk on the other side of the room. A metal walking cane is leaning against the desk. He looks at it unhappily, then continues to gaze into the distance. He will not be sleeping again tonight.

DAY TIME. The sun has finally risen and John, now wearing a dressing gown over his night wear, hobbles across the room leaning heavily on his cane. In his other hand he has a mug of tea and an apple, both of which he puts down onto the desk. The mug bears the arms of the Royal Army Medical Corps. Sitting down, he opens the drawer in the desk to get his laptop. As he lifts the computer out of the drawer, we see that he also has a pistol in there. Putting the laptop onto the desk and opening the lid he looks at the webpage which has automatically loaded. It reads, “The personal blog of Dr. John H. Watson”. The rest of the page is blank.



Later he is at his psychotherapist’s office and he sits in a chair opposite her.

ELLA: How’s your blog going?

JOHN: Yeah, good. (He clears his throat awkwardly.) Very good.

ELLA: You haven’t written a word, have you?

JOHN (pointing to Ella’s notepad on her lap): You just wrote, “Still has trust issues.”

ELLA: And you read my writing upside down. D’you see what I mean?

(John smiles awkwardly.)

ELLA: John, you’re a soldier, and it’s gonna take you a while to adjust to civilian life; and writing a blog about everything that happens to you will honestly help you.

(John gazes back at her, his face full of despair.)

JOHN: Nothing happens to me.

–

This is an excerpt from the transcript of “A Study In Pink,” pilot episode of the British Broadcasting Co.’s TV show “Sherlock,” a modernized retelling of Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Episode written by Steven Moffat.