h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

In the section on Holmes drug use, the 1976 film "The Seven-Percent Solution" is referred to as a comic film. It is anything but comic, dealing as it does with Holmes descent into cocaine addicition and Freud's attempt to cure him of both his addiction and his delusional paranoia about a mathematics master he had at school (does the name Moriarity ring a bell?) being the 'Napoleon of Crime'

Nicholas Meyer wrote both screenplay based on his own novel. Nicol Williamson is excellent as a slightly manic Holmes and Robert 'I love the smell of Napalm in the morning' Duvall does a very credible turn as Dr. Watson with Alan Arkin as Freud.

I've pointed the Italics in this direction, so it should be fixed soon

thanks Danny
accuraccy is our watchwerd

Another slight correction: Holmes doesn't use opium, and he's not addicted to cocaine. He just uses it to escape from boredom.

or at least that's his story and he's sticking to it.
In "The Seven-Percent Solution" it is clear that he is addicted to cocaine. Mind you, this something that has been interpolated from the original Arthur Conan Doyle stories, not something that is stated explicitly. Thought using hard drugs to counter boredom is definitly a step down a slippery slope.

"The Seven-Percent Solution" isn't canon. I go by the canon.

no indeed it is not, but the entry refers to the 70's novel when discussing Holmes addiction, and resorting to hard narcotics to escape boredom still sounds perilously close to addiction, which is where the author of 'The Seven-Percent Solution' drew the inference from. If you go back and check the canon closely, you'll find that Holmes does a fair bit of coke in his off hours.
I'm not saying he's a junkie, but he does seem to have a bit of a habit.

Well, he did stop, without interference from anyone except Watson, so nyer. And he didn't use opium, so I'm still right there.

I'm not addicted to TV either, I can stop any time I want. If Holmes can cease his drug-usage so easily it is only because of the super powers he gleans from his Buddhist studies. No one can use opium and like that and not become addicted.

He didn't use opium, just cocaine and tobacco.

And I never said it was easy for Watson to get him to stop.

*He* didn't use opium, cocaine, tobacco, alcohol or prostitutes.

He was a fictional character...a figment of Arthur Conan Doyle's imagination.

Yes, we know, but don't spoil the illusion. I LIKE the illusion.

Good old illusion. You can't beat it.

I'd have to agree that he wasn't addicted to either drug; he was addicted to his work and mental stimulation. In "The Yellow Face" (YELL), Watson writes "Save for the occasional use of cocaine, he had no vices, and he only turned to the drug as a protest against the monotony of existence when cases were scanty and the papers uninteresting." Holmes also says in "The Sign of Four" (SIGN), Chapter One, " 'My mind rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the most abstruse cryptogram, or the most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper atmosphere. I can dispense then with artificial stimulants. But I abhor the dull routine of existence. I crave for mental exaltation.' " So it is shown that his real addiction was brainwork.

Also, there is no conclusive proof that he was addicted to opium or that he'd even used it, apart perhaps from chasing an enemy in an opium den in "The Man with the Twisted Lip" (TWIS). It wouldn't look right for him to go and not at least PRETEND to smoke it, and he is concealing his identity, so he has to at least do SOMEthing to suggest it. He is very good at acting and disguises. Notice also that he was not intoxicated in the least, although he had obviously been there for a while, as he left with Watson in tow a "short time" after, without having more time for observation. Holmes also adds,

“I suppose, Watson,” said he, “that you imagine that I have added opium-smoking to cocaine injections, and all the other little weaknesses on which you have favoured me with your medical views.”

So please don't say that Holmes was addicted to opium.

Sorry, slight correction on my slight correction. I said please don't say that Holmes was an addict, I meant please don't THINK. Assuming your mind may not have been changed. Sorry about that.

I wish I was a brilliant detective, then I could hang out at opium dens all day and pretend I'm after criminals. Ohh the monotony of all this daily master-criminal chasing, can you not see that I only use drugs because it's a logical solution to boredom?

Thank you, suki suna, for agreeing with me.