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{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox television episode
{{Infobox television episode
| series = [[Sherlock (TV series)|Sherlock]]
| Title= The Blind Banker
| image = The Blind Banker.png
| Series= [[Sherlock (TV series)|Sherlock]]
| image_size = 250
| Image=
| caption = Title card of the episode
| Caption=
| Series no= 1
| series_no = 1
| Episode= 2
| episode = 2
| Writer= [[Stephen Thompson]]
| writer = [[Stephen Thompson (writer)|Stephen Thompson]]
| based_on = {{Based on|"[[The Adventure of the Dancing Men]]"|[[Arthur Conan Doyle]]}}
| Director=[[Euros Lyn]]
| director = [[Euros Lyn]]
| Producer=
| Music= [[David Arnold]]<br />[[Michael Price (composer)|Michael Price]]
| music = {{Plainlist|*[[David Arnold]]
*[[Michael Price (composer)|Michael Price]]}}
| photographer = Steve Lawes
| Photographer=
| editor =
| Editor=
| production =
| Production=
| Airdate= {{Start date|2010|08|1|df=y}}
| airdate = {{Start date|2010|08|1|df=y}}
| Length= 90 minutes
| length = 88 minutes
| guests = * [[Louise Brealey]] as Molly Hooper
| Guests=
* [[Zoe Telford]] as Sarah Sawyer
| Season list=
* [[Gemma Chan]] as Soo Lin Yao
| Prev= [[A Study in Pink]]
* [[Paul Chequer]] as D.I. Dimmock
| Next= [[The Great Game (Sherlock)|The Great Game]]
* [[Bertie Carvel]] as Seb Wilkes
| Episode list=
* [[Daniel Percival]] as Eddie Van Coon
* [[Al Weaver]] as Andy Galbraith
* Howard Coggins as Brian Lukis
* Janice Acquah as Museum Director
* Jack Bence as Raz
* [[John Macmillan (actor)|John MacMillan]] as Community Police Officer
* [[Olivia Poulet]] as Amanda
| prev = [[A Study in Pink]]
| next = [[The Great Game (Sherlock)|The Great Game]]
| episode_list = List of Sherlock episodes
}}
}}
'''The Blind Banker''' is the second episode of the television series ''[[Sherlock (TV series)|Sherlock]]'' and was first broadcast on [[BBC One]] and BBC HD on 1 August 2010.
"'''The Blind Banker'''" is the second episode of the television series ''[[Sherlock (TV series)|Sherlock]],'' first broadcast on [[BBC One]] and [[BBC HD]] on 1 August 2010. It was written by [[Stephen Thompson (writer)|Stephen Thompson]] and directed by [[Euros Lyn]].


''Sherlock'' is a loose adaptation of [[Arthur Conan Doyle]]'s ''[[Sherlock Holmes]]'' stories, set in the modern day. "The Blind Banker" follows Sherlock ([[Benedict Cumberbatch]]) and [[List of Sherlock characters#Dr. John Watson|John Watson]] ([[Martin Freeman]]) as they investigate a series of ciphers representing numbers in an ancient [[Suzhou numerals|Chinese numeral system]] which have been left by a Chinese smuggling ring who are intent to kill to retrieve an item one of them stole.
==Synopsis==
At the National Antiquities Museum, Chinese pottery expert Soo Lin Yao ([[Gemma Chan]]) demonstrates a tea ceremony to a group of visitors. Afterwards, as closing time approaches, her co-worker Andy Gilbraith asks her out for a drink, but she turns him down and says that he wouldn't like her very much if he knew her. Soo Lin then tells him to stop asking her out. That night, Soo Lin is working late when she hears someone moving. She goes to investigate and finds a statue covered with a cloth. When she pulls the cloth away, she stares in shock at what's underneath.


It attracted 8.07 million viewers on BBC One and BBC HD. Critical reception was generally positive, though some reviewers felt it was inferior to the first episode. The episode was also criticised for its orientalist clichés.
[[John Watson (Sherlock Holmes)|John Watson]] is trying to buy groceries at the supermarket, but the machine gives him problems and refuses to accept whatever form of payment he tries to use. Meanwhile, at home, [[Sherlock Holmes]] battles a robed swordsman and finally knocks him out. When John finally comes home, he complains that he had a row with a machine, and that Sherlock hasn't moved all date. Sherlock admits that he turned down a case about a diamond and gave the messenger a refusal. As he does, he shoves a sword beneath the chair. John notices that Holmes is using his computer to check his e-mail. John asks for money, and Sherlock says he has to go to the bank, in actuality a big financial powerhouse.


==Plot==
There Seb Wilkes ([[Bertie Carvel]]), an old university acquaintance of Holmes', asks for help. He explains that someone broke into their former chairman's empty office the night before and sprayed an apparently meaningless set of symbols on a wall and across the head of the chairman's portrait. Sebastian shows them the room, and two symbols, one on a painting and one on the wall nearby. The building is sealed and the CCTV shows that the vandal did the deed within a 60 second period between 11:33 PM and 11:34 PM. He offers to pay Sherlock to find the hole in their security. Sherlock turns down the money, but John quickly accepts.
At the National Antiquities Museum, Chinese pottery expert Soo Lin Yao sees something frightening and disappears. Meanwhile, Sherlock takes John to a high-powered international finance house. There, Sebastian Wilkes, an old university acquaintance of Sherlock's, asks for help. A break-in occurred in which a seemingly meaningless pair of symbols were spray-painted onto a portrait of a banker. Sherlock realises it was a message meant for one man – Edward van&nbsp;Coon of the Hong Kong desk – who has not come to work. Sherlock breaks into van&nbsp;Coon's locked flat and finds him dead. The police, under Detective Inspector Dimmock, regard it as a suicide, though Sherlock sees it as murder. Soon, journalist Brian Lukis (Howard Coggins) is killed inside his locked flat. Sherlock and John investigate, and in a library where Lukis had been, they find the same mysterious symbols painted on a shelf.


John, seeking financial security, obtains a job as [[locum]] at a local surgery run by Dr.&nbsp;Sarah Sawyer. Later, Sherlock and John discover a link between the two men; both had just returned from China, and both went to an oriental curio shop, "[[Maneki Neko|The Lucky Cat]]". There, Holmes learns that the symbols are ancient Chinese [[Suzhou numerals|Hangzhou numerals]] (correctly Suzhou numerals). Sherlock notices that Soo Lin's flat is empty and snoops around, where he finds an intruder; a brief fight ensues, but the attacker flees. At the museum, they then discover the same symbols on a statue. Then, with the help of [[Graffiti|graffiti artist]] "Raz", Sherlock and John find more symbols graffitied on a wall and struggle to decode the message. Back at the museum, Holmes surprises Soo Lin in hiding, who explains the code is linked to the criminal ring "Black Lotus [[Tong (organization)|Tong]]", of which she was once a member. Unfortunately, before she can fully decode the message, she is killed by her brother, another criminal gang member. Sherlock realises Van Coon and Lukis were members of the Tong, involved in smuggling valuable antiquities to sell in London. They were killed because one of them stole something.


Sherlock knows the message is in the form of a [[book cipher]], and he and John spend the night going through the first two victims' books, trying to find the solution. John's first day at work does not go well, but Sarah covers for him, and they organise to go out on a date. Sherlock arranges tickets to a travelling [[Chinese variety art|Chinese circus]]. While John and Sarah enjoy the classic [[escapology]] and [[acrobatics]] acts, Sherlock snoops around backstage and is attacked, but with Sarah and John's help, the three escape. While Sherlock continues to search for the solution to the book cipher, John and Sarah are kidnapped; John is mistaken for Sherlock by the villains, who want him to reveal the location of the missing "treasure" in return for Sarah's life.
Sherlock takes photos of the symbols in the room and then steps out on the balcony and considers the street far below. He then walks through the office, figuring out who has a line of sight to the chairman's office. He finds one office and removes the name sign of Edward Van Coon, of the Hong Kong division. As he leaves with John, he explains that the graffiti was a message to someone, and Van Coon was the only one who could see the room where the message was left -since he trades with China, he probably works at night and the message was intended for someone who came in at that time.


Fortunately, Sherlock cracks the code using an [[Geographer's A–Z Street Atlas|''A-Z London Street Atlas'']] guide, and rescues John and Sarah. He also realises the elusive "treasure" has been in plain sight all the time: A [[jade]] [[Hairpin (fashion)|hairpin]] belonging to the Chinese royal family, worn by van&nbsp;Coon's secretary/mistress Amanda, who had received it as a gift from van&nbsp;Coon. However, Shan, the Black Lotus Tong's leader, escapes and contacts a person via online "chat" identified only by the initial "[[Professor Moriarty|M]]" who had helped the gang to get a foothold in London. The episode ends a moment before a sniper shoots Shan after "M" types that Shan will not fail again.


==Allusions==
Holmes and Watson go to Van Coon's apartment. To try to get in to the apartment, Sherlock buzzes the apartment directly above Van Coon's and asks the woman who lives there if he can use her balcony. He jumps down to Van Coon's balcony and then enters the apartment that way. Ignoring Watson's attempts to have Holmes buzz him in, Holmes looks around the apartment, and finds Van Coon's dead body in the bedroom.
According to Moffat, the episode takes the concept of coded messages from "[[The Adventure of the Dancing Men]]" (using pictorial messages),<ref>{{Cite web
|url= https://twitter.com/steven_moffat/status/20070229167
|title=Steven Moffat: "Cos people have asked: tonight's Sherlock ("The Blind Banker") is loosely based on The Dancing Men."
|work=twitter.com
|accessdate=6 December 2010
}}{{Dead link|date=May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdkeFAVKajk |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211215/WdkeFAVKajk |archive-date=2021-12-15 |url-status=live|title=Steven Moffat tells us about 'Who' vs. 'Sherlock' |publisher=Digital Spy |date=22 July 2010 |format=YouTube video}}{{cbignore}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Hale-Stern|first=Kaila|title=Benedict Cumberbatch and Steven Moffat share secrets of Sherlock season 2!|url=https://io9.gizmodo.com/5907824/benedict-cumberbatch-and-steven-moffat-share-secrets-of-sherlock-season-2|work=[[io9]]|date=May 4, 2012|accessdate=December 29, 2017}}{{Dead link|date=May 2024}}</ref> a story feature directly referenced later, in the series 4 episode ''[[The Final Problem (Sherlock)|The Final Problem]].''


Alan Kistler of [[Newsarama]] has pointed out other potential inspirations such as the use in ''[[The Valley of Fear]]'' of a code "based on a book that many people would own."<ref name="newsarama">{{cite web|last=Kistler|first=Alan|title=BBC's new SHERLOCK Annotations: Episode 2, 'Blind Banker'|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160305203523/https://www.newsarama.com/6576-bbc-s-new-sherlock-annotations-episode-2-blind-banker.html|work=[[Newsarama]]|date=December 1, 2010|accessdate=December 29, 2017}}</ref> A murder victim found inside a [[Locked room mystery|locked room]] accessible only by climbing might be an allusion to ''[[The Sign of the Four]]''.<ref name="newsarama"/>
The police, under Detective Inspector Dimmock ([[Paul Chequer]]), are prepared to regard it as a suicide, though Holmes sees it as murder - among other things, there is a black paper lotus flower in the victim's mouth, and the fact that the bullet hole entered the victim from the right despite the fact that Van Coon was left-handed. He explains that Van Coon had been threatened and was waiting for the killer, and he fired a shot at the killer, who came in through the open window. Sherlock tells Dimmock to check that the bullet is determined to not have come from Van Coon's [[SIG-Sauer P226]] handgun.


==Broadcast and reception==
That night, journalist Brian Lukis is seen running down a busy street, fleeing from someone. He scrambles into his apartment, locking the doors behind him, and finds that his place has been searched. He turns and stares in horror at something.
"The Blind Banker" aired on [[BBC One]] on 1 August 2010. Overnight figures showed that the episode had been watched by 6.442 million viewers on BBC One, a 25.6% audience share, while 210,000 watched on [[BBC HD]] an hour later.<ref>{{cite web|first=Jason|last=Deans|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/2010/aug/02/sherlock-bbc1-tv-ratings|title=Sherlock on the case with 6.4m|work=[[The Guardian]]|date=2 August 2010|accessdate=5 May 2012}}</ref> Final consolidated figures rose to 8.07 million, with both BBC One and BBC HD taken into account.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.barb.co.uk/viewing/weekly-top-30?|title=Weekly Top 30 Programmes|publisher=[[Broadcasters' Audience Research Board]]|accessdate=5 May 2012}}</ref>


===Critical response===
The episode received mixed to positive reviews from television critics. Sam Wollaston of ''[[The Guardian]]'' thought that "The Blind Banker" was better than the series opener, calling the plot "more satisfying ... clearer and more self-contained". He particularly praised the relationship between Sherlock and Watson.<ref>{{cite web|first=Sam|last=Wollaston|url=https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2010/aug/01/sherlock-alan-titchmarsh-walks|title=TV review: Sherlock, Alan Titchmarsh's Walks of Fame and Come Dine with Me Down Under|work=[[The Guardian]]|date=1 August 2010|accessdate=5 May 2012}}</ref> ''[[Radio Times]]'' reviewer David Butcher wrote that the episode "didn't have the scripting pizzazz of the others, but it did have one big advantage: [[Zoe Telford]]. She played a love interest for Martin Freeman's Dr Watson and briefly threatened to bring a strong female character into the mix — only to be wasted on damsel-in-distress duties. We can only hope creator Steven Moffat will bring her back for the second run".<ref>{{cite web|first=David|last=Butcher|url=http://www.radiotimes.com/episode/c6zwz/sherlock--series-1---2-the-blind-banker|title=Sherlock: Series 1-2. The Blind Banker|work=[[Radio Times]]|accessdate=5 May 2012}}</ref> [[IGN]]'s Chris Tilly rated the episode 7 out of 10, describing it as "a lacklustre effort that fails to do justice to that smart and sophisticated start". He praised Lyn's directing and the character developments, especially of Watson, but Lestrade did not appear and the plot "fails to fully engage, the story feeling like 60-minutes of material dragged out over 90".<ref>{{cite web|first=Chris|last=Tilly|url=https://www.ign.com/articles/2010/08/02/sherlock-the-blind-banker-review|title=Sherlock: "The Blind Banker" Review|publisher=[[IGN]]|date=2 August 2010|accessdate=5 May 2012}}</ref>


=== Critic rankings within overall series ===
The next day, Andy is working at the museum when the director informs him that Soo Lin has resigned. Andy goes to her apartment in Chinatown and knocks on the door, but doesn't get an answer. He writes a note on museum stationary and places it in the mail slot.
Over the first few years (2017–2022) after the series first aired, assessments ranking the 13 episodes of the series against each other placed this episode 11th or 12th on their lists.<ref>{{cite news |title=With "Captain Marvel," Gemma Chan is Demolishing Hollywood's Aversion to Color-Blind Casting |first=Adam B. |last=Vary |date=2019-03-08 |website=[[BuzzFeed News]] |url=https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/adambvary/captain-marvel-gemma-chan-crazy-rich-asians |access-date=}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Every 'Sherlock' Episode Ranked Worst to Best |first=Rachel |last=Ulatowski |date=2022-10-29 |website=[[The Mary Sue]] |url=https://www.themarysue.com/every-sherlock-episode-ranked-worst-to-best/ |access-date=}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |title=Sherlock: Every Episode Ranked from Best to Worst |first=John |last=Nugent |date=2017-01-17 |work=[[Empire (magazine)|Empire]] |url=https://www.empireonline.com/movies/features/sherlock-best-episodes/ |access-date=}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=What's the best Sherlock episode? We rank all 13 (And a ½) episodes |first=Morgan |last=Jeffery |date=2018-04-09 |website=[[Digital Spy]] |url=https://www.digitalspy.com/tv/cult/a819392/sherlock-episodes-ranked-best-to-worst/ |access-date=}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |title=Every Sherlock episode Ranked |first=Sarah |last=Doran |date=2018-02-17 |magazine=[[Radio Times]] |url=https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/every-sherlock-episode-ranked/ |access-date=}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Ranking every 'Sherlock' episode so far |first=Rob |last=Keeling |date=2018-02-22 |website=[[Yahoo! Movies]] |url=https://uk.movies.yahoo.com/movies/ranking-every-sherlock-episode-far-170356558.html |access-date=2024-05-04}}</ref>


John applies for a job at a surgery and admits to the doctor, Sarah, that he needs the money. She warns that it's mundane, but he insists that's fine and she hires him. He returns to Baker street and finds Sherlock contemplating the case. He shows John an online news article about Brian Lukis's death, and the [[locked room mystery]] surrounding it. They go to Scotland Yard to request to see Lukis's apartment, where they discover a black paper lotus lying on the floor, confirming that there is a link between Lukis and Eddie Van Coon. Sherlock realizes that the killer came in through the skylight, and is an expert climber - he ran along a ledge on the terrace to get into the bank and into Van Coon's apartment. Sherlock finds a book recently checked out from a nearby library. Sherlock and John go to that library to look for the books that Lukis checked out, and find more of the painted graffiti symbols of the type from the bank on the shelf.


Back at 221B, Sherlock and John try to piece together the clues. Sherlock realizes that the graffiti symbols are ciphers of an ancient code. He and John go to talk to an expert, a street graffiti artist named Raz, as he performs a job. Though warning them that he has only two minutes before the community police officers come around the corner and catch him, Raz identifies the paint but has no idea what the ciphers represent, and agrees to do some inquiries. The community officers come around and Raz and Sherlock run off, leaving John holding the bag with Raz's spray paint.

John returns home later, annoyed that he's been given community service. To find out what links Eddie Van Coon and Brian Lukis together, Sherlock traces Van Coon's footsteps on the day he was killed, while John follows addresses from Lukis's diary. Sherlock talks to Van coon's personal assistant, Amanda. She has all of his receipts, but notes that there is a gap in her boss's schedule.


Amanda admits that Van Coon wasn't appreciative of her, though Sherlock notices a bottle of expensive hand cream that he might have bought for her. Examining the receipts, Sherlock finds some very interesting details - Van Coon took a taxi to the [[West End]], but a ticket shows that he took the [[London Underground]] to get back, signifying that Van Coon was carrying something heavy. A receipt from a coffee shop shows that he stopped on his way. Sherlock goes to the street, following the receipts, and runs into John, who is retracing Lukis's steps. Sherlock starts to explain to John that Van Coon must have dropped off a heavy package, and John immediately points to [[Maneki Neko|The Lucky Cat]] Emporium, an oriental curio shop across the street, noting that Lukis went there. Inside, they discover that many of the goods have numbers on them, in the same symbols as the ciphers. They realize that the numbers are in [[suzhou numerals|Hang Zhou]], an ancient Chinese dialect only used by traders - Sherlock determines that the numbers at the bank are 15 and 1. As they leave, a woman takes photos of them.

Sherlock and John go to a restaurant across the street for lunch, and Sherlock tells John about a possible reason why both men were killed - he remembers Seb telling them that Van Coon lost five million pounds and managed to make it back in a week, and deduces that he smuggled goods into London to make easy money. The idea of Van Coon and Lukis both being smugglers isn't far fetched, given their careers (Van Coon a businessman making frequent trips to Asia; Lukis being a journalist writing about China), and both of them used the Lucky Cat as their dropoff. The two men were murdered because one of them stole something from his employer. Sherlock is distracted when he notices a wet phonebook package next to an apartment door adjacent to the Lucky Cat, an apartment that just happens to be Soo Lin Yao's. He climbs up the fire escape and goes inside through an open window, ignoring John's pleas to open the door. Going over the apartment, Sherlock realizes that the killer came in, and hasn't left. The killer ambushes Sherlock and chokes him almost to the point of unconsciousness, drops a black paper lotus on the floor, and then leaves. Sherlock staggers downstairs and opens the door for John. He says they need to find Soo Lin, and spots the note from Andy on the museum paper, though he is noticeably wheezy from his near-death experience.

Sherlock and John talk to Andy, who says that Soo Lin resigned and the last thing she did was demonstrate the tea ceremony. As Andy shows them her locker, Sherlock notices a nearby statue with two of the same ciphers on them. As the two men leave, the same woman from earlier watches them. Raz meets them and takes them to a tube station where someone has written more ciphers using the same paint. They spread out the search, and Sherlock finds a can of spray paint. John finds a wall with more of the graffiti. They go back home and John begins to pass out due to lack of sleep. Sherlock realizes the numbers are all in pairs, and that the killer left them on the wall to communicate with the thief and demand the return of the stolen item. They go back to the museum to ask Andy for more information. As they talk, Sherlock notices that one of the teapots has been polished since the last time they were there.

That night, Sherlock and John discover Soo Lin in hiding, who explains that the code is the work of the criminal "Black Lotus [[Tong (organization)|Tong]]", of which she was once a member. She explains that the killer is Zhi Zhu, "The Spider." She shows them a Tong tattoo on her foot, and explains that everyone who smuggles items for them bears the mark. The Black Lotus Tong employed her after her parents died and she had no other way to survive. She gave up the life and came to London, but Zhi Zhu tracked her down after five years. He asked for her help finding what was stolen, but she refused. When John asks how well she knows Zhi Zhu, Soo Lin explains that he's her brother. He became a puppet of the Tong in the power of Shan, the Black Lotus General. When she refused to help him, he accused her of betraying him, and left the ciphers.


Unfortunately, before she can decode the message, Zhi Zhu strikes again and kills her, leaving a lotus flower in her hand. John and Sherlock talk to Dimmock, who demands proof before he pursues the case. At the morgue, Sherlock awkwardly flirts with Molly to get her to show him the bodies of the two smugglers - specifically their feet. They find the Tong tattoo on Brian Lukis's right foot, and the same applies for Eddie Van Coon, proving that both victims were connected, and Sherlock asks Dimmock for all of the books from both victims' apartments.

Sherlock and John go over the books, looking for the book that both of them had and has significant words that match the two numbers, page and word. Dimmock returns the photo of the wall, and Sherlock explains that they thought Soo Lin Yao would decipher them. Examining all recently discovered Chinese artifacts on the web, Sherlock finds that two [[Ming vase]]s have recently arrived in London and are being auctioned off by an anonymous source. He deduces that Van Coon and Lukis each brought back one of the vases when they returned on their latest trips to China.


Sherlock is unable to find the proper book, and tells John they should go out to get some air. John tells him that he's going out on a date, and Sherlock gives him a pair of circus tickets in his name. However, when they arrive there, they discover Sherlock is there, and has bought a third ticket in his name. He explains to John that the Tong are using the circus as a cover to get the killer out of China, and he needs John's help to look around. John is more interested in getting off with Sarah.

They go inside and the circus matron first gives a demonstration of classic Chinese [[escapology]], using a giant crossbow designed to fire at the escape artist when the weight of an emptying sandbag activates it. Sherlock sneaks off while the next act begins: a masked acrobat who "flies" on silk robes. Backstage, Sherlock spots the acrobat and realizes it's Zhi Zhu. The matron comes backstage and Sherlock hides until she leaves. He finds a can of the spray paint and confirms it's the same type, and then the escape artist attacks him with a sword. The fight bursts onto the stage, and John and Sarah comes to Sherlock's aid. Sarah knocks him out with a stick and Sherlock confirms he has a Tong tattoo on his foot.

The trio returns to 221B and Sherlock figures that the Tong will have gone back to their hideout, the key to which rests within the ciphers. Sarah suggests that she should go and Sherlock agrees, but John hastily say she should stay and tries to find some food. Meanwhile, Sarah tries to make conversation with Sherlock without success. Mrs. Hudson brings in some food, while Sarah notices that some of the ciphers are already solved - Soo Lin started translating two of the words and wrote them on the photograph they gave her. The two words are "Nine Mill," and Sherlock realizes it's the value of the stolen object.

He leaves for the museum restoration room to find the book that she used, while at Baker Street, John suggests to Sarah that they get takeaway. The deliveryman arrives quickly and John answers the door. The man demands to know where the treasure is, and knocks John out when he says he has no idea where it is.

Meanwhile, Sherlock tries to hail a taxi without success, and notices a pair of German tourists who are using an ''A-Z London'' guide. He remembers seeing it in a stack of books at Van Coon's apartment, and deduces that both Van Coon and Lukis had the same book, as it is one that everyone would use, and the answer to the code lies in the first entry on page 15. He uses the tourists' copy to start translating the ciphers, leaving this resulting message: '''"Nine mill for jade pin. Dragon den black tramway."''' He returns to 221B and discovers that John and Sarah have vanished, and their abductors have left more ciphers. Sherlock goes over the maps of London to find the black tramway.


John and Sarah wake up and find themselves in an abandoned tramway tunnel. The matron from the circus introduces herself as Black Lotus General Shan, and mistakenly assumes that John is Sherlock. When he denies it, she points out that he has Sherlock's credit card, Sebastian's check to Sherlock, and the circus tickets in his name. Shan points out that they tried to kill him three times and failed, but that was deliberate so that he would search for the treasure. Shan demands to know where the Empress' pin can be found. When John says he has no idea, they use the circus crossbow to threaten Sarah, and cut open the sandbag weight to activate the trigger. Sherlock arrive, knocks out one of her guards, and warns that her shot could easily ricochet. He kicks over the barrel to provide light and tries to untie Sarah, but Zhi Zhu strangles him with one of his silk ropes. John manages to knock himself over and jar the crossbow, which instead shoots and kills Zhi Zhu. Shan runs off and Sherlock frees Sarah, while John assures her that their next date won't be the same. When the police arrive, Sherlock lets Dimmock takes the credit, and Dimmock realizes who he owes.

The next day, Sherlock and John go back to the bank, while Sherlock explains to John that Eddie Van Coon stole a jaded hairpin worth nine million pounds. As Seb hands John a check for finding the hole in their security, Sherlock talks to Amanda again. He explains to her that he's figured out that she and Van Coon were having an affair - he remembers seeing an almost empty bottle of scented hand soap in Van Coon's bathroom, and it is the very same brand as the hand cream Amanda has on her desk. She admits to Sherlock that she ended the affair because Van Coon often took her for granted and they planned to go somewhere for the weekend, only he then left on trips for China on short notice. Sherlock notes that Van Coon bought her a present to make up for his abandoning her, and asks for the hairpin that he gave her. When she hands it over, she mentions that Van Coon claimed to have purchased it at a street market, though Sherlock says that he more likely pinched it - he never knew of its real value, but only the fact that it would suit her. When he tells Amanda the value of her hairpin, she runs off in shock.


At 221B, John realizes that Sherlock is upset that General Shan has escaped. He figures they've cracked the code, but Sherlock warns that all Shan has to do is get another book. As he looks out the window, John sees a Chinese street tagger writing another cipher on the wall opposite.


Back home, Shan talks to her benefactor, "M", on her computer, and thanks him for his help in getting them passage into London. She worries that his safety is compromised, but "M" assures her that her actions can't be traced to her. When Shan says that she won't betray him, "M" has a sniper kill her.

==Source material==
This episode takes the concept of coded messages from ''[[The Valley of Fear]]'' and ''[[The Adventure of the Dancing Men|The Dancing Men]]''.<ref>{{Cite web
|url= http://twitter.com/steven_moffat/status/20070229167
|title=Steven Moffat: "Cos people have asked: tonight's Sherlock ("The Blind Banker") is loosely based on The Dancing Men."
|work=twitter.com
|accessdate=6 December 2010
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |people=Steven Moffat |url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdkeFAVKajk |title=Steven Moffat tells us about 'Who' vs. 'Sherlock' |publisher=Digital Spy |date=22 July 2010 |format=YouTube video}}</ref>


Retrospective criticism also focused on gender politics, racial stereotypes and a patronizing [[Orientalism]] in the episode.<ref>{{cite web |title=Retrospective Review #2: The Blind Banker |author=Prof. Jenn |date=25 September 2015 |website=sherlockshome.net |url=https://sherlockshome.net/2015/09/25/retrospective-review-2-the-blind-banker/ |access-date=}}</ref> [[Laurie Penny]], writing for ''[[The New Statesman]]'', stated she was "tired of stories about clever white men", and characterised the plot as "booga-wooga yellow peril exotic chinky slaughter emporium".<ref>{{cite web |title=Laurie Penny on the BBC's Sherlock: I'm tired of stories about clever white men and how special they are |first=Laurie |last=Penny |author-link=Laurie Penny |date=3 August 2010 |work=[[The New Statesman]] |url=https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/tv-radio/2010/08/sherlock-holmes-british |access-date=}}</ref> Kayti Burt, writing for ''[[Collider (website)|Collider]]'', rated the episode an eighth-best middle of the pack for the series, but noted its "seriously lazy Orientalism."<ref>{{cite web |title=Sherlock Episodes Ranked Worst to Best |first=Kayti |last=Burt |date=2019-03-05 |website=[[Collider (website)|Collider]] |url=https://collider.com/sherlock-episodes-ranked/ |access-date=5 March 2019}}</ref> Jaine Chemmachery, a lecturer in Postcolonial Literatures at [[Sorbonne University]], wrote in a 2020 paper that: "The tropes of unassimilable otherness and unfathomable mystery are repackaged into a London Chinatown which is explicitly Orientalist," referring to both the series as a whole and this episode directly.<ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.4000/polysemes.7382 |title=Orientalising London and the Victorian Era: Questioning Neo-Victorian Politics and Ideologies |year=2020 |last=Chemmachery |first=Jaine |journal=Polysèmes |issue=23 |s2cid=225669151 |url=http://journals.openedition.org/polysemes/7382 |access-date= |doi-access=free}}</ref>
==Cast==
* [[Benedict Cumberbatch]] &mdash; [[Sherlock Holmes]]
* [[Martin Freeman]] &mdash; [[Doctor Watson|Dr. John Watson]]
* [[Una Stubbs]] &mdash; [[Mrs. Hudson]]
* [[Zoe Telford]] &mdash; Sarah
* [[Louise Brealey]] &mdash; Molly Hooper
* [[Gemma Chan]] &mdash; Soo Lin Yao
* [[Al Weaver]] &mdash; Andy Galbraith
* [[Bertie Carvel]] &mdash; Seb Wilkes
* [[Daniel Percival]] &mdash; Eddie Van Coon
* [[Paul Chequer]] &mdash; Detective Inspector Dimmock
* [[Howard Coggins]] &mdash; Brian Lukis
* [[Janice Acquah]] &mdash; Museum Director
* [[Jack Bence]] &mdash; Raz
* [[John MacMillan]] &mdash; Community Police Officer
* [[Olivia Poulet]] &mdash; Amanda


==References==
==References==
{{reflist}}
{{reflist|2}}


== External links ==
==External links==
*{{BBC Online|programmes/b00t4pgh|title=''Sherlock''}}
{{wikiquote|Sherlock (TV series)}}
*{{BBC episode|b00tc6t2}}
*[http://www.hartswoodfilms.co.uk/programmes/dra_sherlock.html ''Sherlock''] at [[Hartswood Films]]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20101201085327/http://www.hartswoodfilms.co.uk/programmes/dra_sherlock.html ''Sherlock''] at [[Hartswood Films]]
*{{imdb title|id=1664529|title=Sherlock - The Blind Banker}}
*{{IMDb title|id=1664529|title=Sherlock - The Blind Banker}}


{{DEFAULTSORT:Sherlock (Tv Series)}}
{{Sherlock}}
[[Category:2010s British television series]]
[[Category:2010 British television programme debuts]]
[[Category:Crime television series]]
[[Category:BBC television dramas]]
[[Category:Sherlock Holmes television series]]
[[Category:Television series by Hartswood Films]]


{{DEFAULTSORT:Blind Banker, The}}
[[fr:Le Banquier aveugle]]
[[Category:2010 British television episodes]]
[[Category:Sherlock (TV series) episodes]]
[[Category:Television episodes written by Steve Thompson (writer)]]
[[Category:Television episodes about organized crime]]

Latest revision as of 20:45, 10 September 2024

"The Blind Banker"
Sherlock episode
Title card of the episode
Episode no.Series 1
Episode 2
Directed byEuros Lyn
Written byStephen Thompson
Based on"The Adventure of the Dancing Men"
by Arthur Conan Doyle
Featured music
Cinematography bySteve Lawes
Original air date1 August 2010 (2010-08-01)
Running time88 minutes
Guest appearances
Episode chronology
← Previous
"A Study in Pink" 		Next →
"The Great Game"
List of episodes

"The Blind Banker" is the second episode of the television series Sherlock, first broadcast on BBC One and BBC HD on 1 August 2010. It was written by Stephen Thompson and directed by Euros Lyn.

Sherlock is a loose adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, set in the modern day. "The Blind Banker" follows Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) and John Watson (Martin Freeman) as they investigate a series of ciphers representing numbers in an ancient Chinese numeral system which have been left by a Chinese smuggling ring who are intent to kill to retrieve an item one of them stole.

It attracted 8.07 million viewers on BBC One and BBC HD. Critical reception was generally positive, though some reviewers felt it was inferior to the first episode. The episode was also criticised for its orientalist clichés.

Plot

[edit]

At the National Antiquities Museum, Chinese pottery expert Soo Lin Yao sees something frightening and disappears. Meanwhile, Sherlock takes John to a high-powered international finance house. There, Sebastian Wilkes, an old university acquaintance of Sherlock's, asks for help. A break-in occurred in which a seemingly meaningless pair of symbols were spray-painted onto a portrait of a banker. Sherlock realises it was a message meant for one man – Edward van Coon of the Hong Kong desk – who has not come to work. Sherlock breaks into van Coon's locked flat and finds him dead. The police, under Detective Inspector Dimmock, regard it as a suicide, though Sherlock sees it as murder. Soon, journalist Brian Lukis (Howard Coggins) is killed inside his locked flat. Sherlock and John investigate, and in a library where Lukis had been, they find the same mysterious symbols painted on a shelf.

John, seeking financial security, obtains a job as locum at a local surgery run by Dr. Sarah Sawyer. Later, Sherlock and John discover a link between the two men; both had just returned from China, and both went to an oriental curio shop, "The Lucky Cat". There, Holmes learns that the symbols are ancient Chinese Hangzhou numerals (correctly Suzhou numerals). Sherlock notices that Soo Lin's flat is empty and snoops around, where he finds an intruder; a brief fight ensues, but the attacker flees. At the museum, they then discover the same symbols on a statue. Then, with the help of graffiti artist "Raz", Sherlock and John find more symbols graffitied on a wall and struggle to decode the message. Back at the museum, Holmes surprises Soo Lin in hiding, who explains the code is linked to the criminal ring "Black Lotus Tong", of which she was once a member. Unfortunately, before she can fully decode the message, she is killed by her brother, another criminal gang member. Sherlock realises Van Coon and Lukis were members of the Tong, involved in smuggling valuable antiquities to sell in London. They were killed because one of them stole something.

Sherlock knows the message is in the form of a book cipher, and he and John spend the night going through the first two victims' books, trying to find the solution. John's first day at work does not go well, but Sarah covers for him, and they organise to go out on a date. Sherlock arranges tickets to a travelling Chinese circus. While John and Sarah enjoy the classic escapology and acrobatics acts, Sherlock snoops around backstage and is attacked, but with Sarah and John's help, the three escape. While Sherlock continues to search for the solution to the book cipher, John and Sarah are kidnapped; John is mistaken for Sherlock by the villains, who want him to reveal the location of the missing "treasure" in return for Sarah's life.

Fortunately, Sherlock cracks the code using an A-Z London Street Atlas guide, and rescues John and Sarah. He also realises the elusive "treasure" has been in plain sight all the time: A jade hairpin belonging to the Chinese royal family, worn by van Coon's secretary/mistress Amanda, who had received it as a gift from van Coon. However, Shan, the Black Lotus Tong's leader, escapes and contacts a person via online "chat" identified only by the initial "M" who had helped the gang to get a foothold in London. The episode ends a moment before a sniper shoots Shan after "M" types that Shan will not fail again.

Allusions

[edit]

According to Moffat, the episode takes the concept of coded messages from "The Adventure of the Dancing Men" (using pictorial messages),[1][2][3] a story feature directly referenced later, in the series 4 episode The Final Problem.

Alan Kistler of Newsarama has pointed out other potential inspirations such as the use in The Valley of Fear of a code "based on a book that many people would own."[4] A murder victim found inside a locked room accessible only by climbing might be an allusion to The Sign of the Four.[4]

Broadcast and reception

[edit]

"The Blind Banker" aired on BBC One on 1 August 2010. Overnight figures showed that the episode had been watched by 6.442 million viewers on BBC One, a 25.6% audience share, while 210,000 watched on BBC HD an hour later.[5] Final consolidated figures rose to 8.07 million, with both BBC One and BBC HD taken into account.[6]

Critical response

[edit]

The episode received mixed to positive reviews from television critics. Sam Wollaston of The Guardian thought that "The Blind Banker" was better than the series opener, calling the plot "more satisfying ... clearer and more self-contained". He particularly praised the relationship between Sherlock and Watson.[7] Radio Times reviewer David Butcher wrote that the episode "didn't have the scripting pizzazz of the others, but it did have one big advantage: Zoe Telford. She played a love interest for Martin Freeman's Dr Watson and briefly threatened to bring a strong female character into the mix — only to be wasted on damsel-in-distress duties. We can only hope creator Steven Moffat will bring her back for the second run".[8] IGN's Chris Tilly rated the episode 7 out of 10, describing it as "a lacklustre effort that fails to do justice to that smart and sophisticated start". He praised Lyn's directing and the character developments, especially of Watson, but Lestrade did not appear and the plot "fails to fully engage, the story feeling like 60-minutes of material dragged out over 90".[9]

Critic rankings within overall series

[edit]

Over the first few years (2017–2022) after the series first aired, assessments ranking the 13 episodes of the series against each other placed this episode 11th or 12th on their lists.[10][11][12][13][14][15]

Retrospective criticism also focused on gender politics, racial stereotypes and a patronizing Orientalism in the episode.[16] Laurie Penny, writing for The New Statesman, stated she was "tired of stories about clever white men", and characterised the plot as "booga-wooga yellow peril exotic chinky slaughter emporium".[17] Kayti Burt, writing for Collider, rated the episode an eighth-best middle of the pack for the series, but noted its "seriously lazy Orientalism."[18] Jaine Chemmachery, a lecturer in Postcolonial Literatures at Sorbonne University, wrote in a 2020 paper that: "The tropes of unassimilable otherness and unfathomable mystery are repackaged into a London Chinatown which is explicitly Orientalist," referring to both the series as a whole and this episode directly.[19]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "Steven Moffat: "Cos people have asked: tonight's Sherlock ("The Blind Banker") is loosely based on The Dancing Men."". twitter.com. Retrieved 6 December 2010.[dead link‍]
  2. ^ "Steven Moffat tells us about 'Who' vs. 'Sherlock'" (YouTube video). Digital Spy. 22 July 2010. Archived from the original on 15 December 2021.
  3. ^ Hale-Stern, Kaila (4 May 2012). "Benedict Cumberbatch and Steven Moffat share secrets of Sherlock season 2!". io9. Retrieved 29 December 2017.[dead link‍]
  4. ^ a b Kistler, Alan (1 December 2010). "BBC's new SHERLOCK Annotations: Episode 2, 'Blind Banker'". Newsarama. Retrieved 29 December 2017.
  5. ^ Deans, Jason (2 August 2010). "Sherlock on the case with 6.4m". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 May 2012.
  6. ^ "Weekly Top 30 Programmes". Broadcasters' Audience Research Board. Retrieved 5 May 2012.
  7. ^ Wollaston, Sam (1 August 2010). "TV review: Sherlock, Alan Titchmarsh's Walks of Fame and Come Dine with Me Down Under". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 May 2012.
  8. ^ Butcher, David. "Sherlock: Series 1-2. The Blind Banker". Radio Times. Retrieved 5 May 2012.
  9. ^ Tilly, Chris (2 August 2010). "Sherlock: "The Blind Banker" Review". IGN. Retrieved 5 May 2012.
  10. ^ Vary, Adam B. (8 March 2019). "With "Captain Marvel," Gemma Chan is Demolishing Hollywood's Aversion to Color-Blind Casting". BuzzFeed News.
  11. ^ Ulatowski, Rachel (29 October 2022). "Every 'Sherlock' Episode Ranked Worst to Best". The Mary Sue.
  12. ^ Nugent, John (17 January 2017). "Sherlock: Every Episode Ranked from Best to Worst". Empire.
  13. ^ Jeffery, Morgan (9 April 2018). "What's the best Sherlock episode? We rank all 13 (And a ½) episodes". Digital Spy.
  14. ^ Doran, Sarah (17 February 2018). "Every Sherlock episode Ranked". Radio Times.
  15. ^ Keeling, Rob (22 February 2018). "Ranking every 'Sherlock' episode so far". Yahoo! Movies. Retrieved 4 May 2024.
  16. ^ Prof. Jenn (25 September 2015). "Retrospective Review #2: The Blind Banker". sherlockshome.net.
  17. ^ Penny, Laurie (3 August 2010). "Laurie Penny on the BBC's Sherlock: I'm tired of stories about clever white men and how special they are". The New Statesman.
  18. ^ Burt, Kayti (5 March 2019). "Sherlock Episodes Ranked Worst to Best". Collider. Retrieved 5 March 2019.
  19. ^ Chemmachery, Jaine (2020). "Orientalising London and the Victorian Era: Questioning Neo-Victorian Politics and Ideologies". Polysèmes (23). doi:10.4000/polysemes.7382. S2CID 225669151.
[edit]
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