I don't know that they'll be following the canon that closely. Most likely they'll take the two lead characters and then drop them into the standard CBS-drama template. Granted this is more from expectation rather than observation, however I think it's fairly clear that the vast majority of the show's focus is going to be on Holmes and Watson. There will be screentime for the other characters obviously, but I doubt that they'll receive anywhere near as much screentime as JLM or LL. Racism or classism? Why are we limited to that? Surely there's more to ethnicity than skin colour and social divides. Cultural idiosyncrasies - a black Holmes would defacto have the same cultural background and values as a white Holmes? They should get those opportunities. Of course they should. Personally though, it thoroughly fails to impress me when such changes are made for change's sake. Have the writers made this change to benefit the series and the stories that they'll be able to tell? Or is it a cheap grab for a certain audience that they know they'll be able to lock in? Hopefully it's the former, but it wouldn't surprise me if it's the latter. Guess we'll find out. Perhaps it's just the shows that I watch, but it seems more common than uncommon that shows with a couple of leads generally tend to eventually flirt with shippers if not going down that route completely. I'm bored with that. At least try and be different if you're going down that route. Sherlock obviously has the running gag about Holmes and Watson as a couple - play is straight (pardon the pun), be different. I'd rather they did that than go down the route that many shows have been before. Again though, never going to happen as it would alienate a certain element of the audience. CBS is the most-watched network and it's not hard to see why - their vanilla product rarely ventures past what it perceives to be safe. I think it's fair to say that the archetypal interpretation of the story is going to lead to the expectation that Holmes and Watson are male. I doubt that many heard the news that there was going to be a new Sherlock Holmes series and instantly concluded that this would probably feature a male Holmes and female Watson. Why would they? Besides The Return of Sherlock Holmes, there was also the later movie Sherlock Holmes Returns, with Debrah Farentino. Although she wasn't playing Watson, or a variant of Watson, it did represent another example of them trying to work a male/female dynamic with the story. Both of the examples above changed the fundamental dynamic of Holmes/Watson, both transplanted the action to America, and both moved the story into the modern era. Neither story met with much success. I see that Moffet's already raised a similar concern regarding Elementary; Perhaps CBS should have gone down the route of having Holmes be blind, and Watson could have been his guide dog. Sounds emminently more interesting than what they look like they're going to be serving up here.