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Arts & Culture

MASTERPIECE MYSTERY! Sherlock, Season Two - A Scandal In Belgravia

Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock and Martin Freeman as Watson in season two of MASTERPIECE MYSTERY! SHERLOCK.
Courtesy of ©BBC/Hartswood Films for MASTERPIECE
Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock and Martin Freeman as Watson in season two of MASTERPIECE MYSTERY! SHERLOCK.

Airs Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 6:30 p.m. on KPBS TV

The struggle goes on in 21st-century London as the updated team of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson battle the worst that modern criminality has to offer, including a computer-savvy arch-villain who wants to rule the world. MASTERPIECE MYSTERY! presents SHERLOCK, Season Two, airing in three thrilling episodes "A Scandal In Belgravia" (repeats Aug. 30, 2015 at 6:30 p.m.), "The Hounds Of Baskerville" (repeats Aug. 30, 2015 at 8 p.m.) and "The Reichenbach Fall" (repeats Aug. 30, 2015 at 9:30 p.m.).

Benedict Cumberbatch ("War Horse," THE LAST ENEMY) returns as the world’s foremost consulting detective, with Martin Freeman ("The Hobbit," THE OFFICE UK) as the stalwart, if edgy, Dr. John Watson, and Andrew Scott ("Lennon Naked") as the unassuming mastermind of evil, Jim Moriarty.

Guest stars for the new season include Lara Pulver (TRUE BLOOD) as Irene Adler, the only woman who ever kindled the embers of passion in Holmes; and Russell Tovey (LITTLE DORRIT) as the character who speaks the immortal line, “Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound!” Except the hound he means is not just big.

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The returning cast includes Rupert Graves (THE FORSYTE SAGA, "God on Trial") as Inspector Lestrade, the man nominally in charge of crime solving in London; Mark Gatiss (SENSE & SENSIBILITY) as Sherlock’s cloak-and-dagger older brother, Mycroft; and Una Stubbs (TILL DEATH US DO PART) as Sherlock’s infinitely patient landlady, Mrs. Hudson.

Each of the three episodes in the new season is pegged to a classic Sherlock Holmes story by Arthur Conan Doyle—delightfully, weirdly, wittily, and briskly updated, of course.

"A Scandal In Belgravia" airs Sunday, Aug. 30 at 6:30 p.m. (originally aired May 6, 2012) - How Sherlock manages to survive snipers, explosives, and a poolside face-off with his insane arch-nemesis Moriarty — or end up in Buckingham Palace's inner chambers, clad only in a sheet — are just the initial tantalizing questions answered when Sherlock returns with its gripping second season opener.

The central enigma concerns Irene Adler, a beautiful entrepreneur whose special relationship with the rich, powerful and royal has allowed her to amass coveted information powerful enough to topple the government. A worthy match for the aloof detective, Adler masterfully maneuvers her many assets in a game that Sherlock is ill-prepared to fight: love.

Two brilliant minds lock together, producing a heat that brings a blush to John's cheek and a potential change to a celibate, cerebral detective. But who will come out on top?

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