Entertainment world is ready for a female Sherlock Holmes

A little more than a month ago, FOX debuted its newest pilot Backstrom, starring Rainn Wilson in a role entirely different from that of his Dwight Schrute in NBC’s comedy The Office. In the show, Wilson plays Det. Lt. Everett Backstrom, a genius detective in Portland, Oregon. On the poster, Wilson’s character is billed as “BRILLIANT DETECTIVE. TOTAL D*CK.” Backstrom is also described as “offensive” and “irascible,” and according to Brian Lowry — a TV columnist for Variety — he is yet another “anti-social savant” that television executives love to churn out in droves.

Perhaps the most famous character that fits this detective archetype is that of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes. Hyper-intelligent and a bit of a recluse, Holmes has been reiterated into not one, not two, but three versions in recent years. Director Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes film starring Robert Downey Jr., BBC’s Sherlock television series that launched Benedict Cumberbatch into superstardom, and finally CBS’s Elementary starring Johnny Lee Miller, with the talented Lucy Liu in the gender-swapped version of Dr. Watson.

Holmes in all of the versions is smart, socially inept and undoubtedly the star. All three versions also happen to be smash hits, requiring more films and more seasons as the years push on. Downey has even taken the smug genius to another mythology with his character Tony Stark in Marvel’s Iron Man — a franchise that has earned over $2 billion to date. If we push further into the brainiac mythos, there’s FOX’s House M.D. starring Hugh Laurie as the irreverent, mean, rude and almost always right Dr. Gregory House (a character actually based on Sherlock Holmes). The popularity of the show catapulted it into eight seasons and remains one of FOX’s most successful series to date.

Clearly, this model has and does work. Not simply America, but the world at large enjoys watching a white male run around his chosen world solving mysteries. In his way, Sherlock is his own superhero — he “fights crime” and seems to have superhuman capabilities and pretty much always saves the day. In short, Sherlock Holmes sells. But it begs the question: where’s our female Sherlock? And no, I’m not settling for Lucy Liu as the female Dr. Watson.

Here’s why: Two days ago, Michelle Rodriguez — most notable for being the tough yet lovable car chick in the hyped-up, macho Fast and Furious franchise — told TMZ that minorities should “stop stealing all the white people’s superheroes.” Later, she cleared up her statement by saying: “Instead of trying to turn a girl character into a guy or instead of trying to turn a white character into a black character or a Latin character, I think that … people should make an effort in Hollywood to develop their own mythology.”

Like Rodriguez said, I don’t think we should have a literal female Sherlock on air. Her name doesn’t have to be Sharon Holmes and she doesn’t need to live in a cute London flat with her best girlfriend Joan Watson. But we do need a protagonist who is strong, smart, invaluable and also a woman. Yet, I feel as a culture we have a tendency to pigeonhole women who exhibit these qualities.

When asked about her “notorious sadist” boss in The Devil Wears Prada, Anne Hathaway’s character declared, “O.K., she’s tough, but if Miranda were a man, no one would notice anything about her, except how great she is at her job.” Despite the fact that this movie opened 10 years ago, this bias continues to extend into Hollywood’s female leads today. A woman who acts like a man, per se, isn’t readily accepted and is most often called derogatory names in order to pull her down from her high status. We have yet to open up the gender inequality in terms of smart women in television and film who are in charge and maintain control, yet whom audiences are also willing to respect, admire and (maybe most importantly in this extremely economic industry) give their dollars to.

In September, NBC premiered its show The Mysteries of Laura — a comedy pilot about a brilliant detective (played by Will & Grace’s Debra Messing) who attempts to balance her job with her “chaotic home life” of raising two boys and dealing with her ex-husband. While I feel this might be a step in the right direction, Messing’s character is by default defined by her feminine duties. Where is the character that need not be defined as a mom or a wife — two titles that are inherently linked with men — in addition to fighting crime, but defined as simply herself, imperfection and all?

Sherlock does not need a woman. In fact, he’s often described as asexual, and in one of Doyle’s novels he is cited as saying, “I am not a whole-souled admirer of womankind.” So then, if we were to create this Holmes-inspired woman, can we untether the female detective from her male binds? Could audiences handle it?

In the press, famous comedienne and actress Tina Fey has often come head to head with the apparent age-old question of whether women can be funny or not. In a Vanity Fair article entitled, “Who Says Women Aren’t Funny?” Fey is quoted as saying that though people still say women aren’t funny, “it’s just a lot easier to ignore [now].” Clearly, the culture has made way for women in the male-dominated comedy world.

Furthermore, in an op-ed in The New York Times, writer Maureen Dowd has declared the emergence of a phenomenon she named “Dirty Words from Pretty Mouths,” describing the trend of raunchiness from female writers and directors. Increasingly, women are seen exploring formerly taboo sexuality with more apparent ease and free will than ever before. These subjects are also used most frequently in the name of comedy — Lena Dunham’s Girls is the easiest example, as is the 2011 raunchy comedy mega hit Bridesmaids, written by two women: Kristin Wiig and Annie Mumolo.

So, if women have transcended the comedy-sexuality boundary — at least somewhat — and have officially declared that women can actually be funny and sexual, let’s make way for the woman who’s also smart, brash, solves crimes and yes, maybe, can be a little rough around the edges, but it doesn’t matter because the community desperately needs her for her powerful brains. We’re well into 2015, and I think we’re ready for Ingenious Words from Pretty Mouths, now — mouths that also can rake in $2 billion and counting.

Minnie Schedeen is a sophomore majoring in critical studies. Her column, “Film Fatale,” runs every other Tuesday.