The Geek Teamups of Sherlock Holmes, From Batman to Doctor Who

Few characters have the staying power of London's Great Detective, who recently exploded back onto the big screen in a blockbuster movie starring Robert Downey Jr. Even people who have never read a Holmes story in their life know about his skills as a sleuth, about his friend and chronicler Dr. John Watson, his arch-enemy Moriarty and even about some of his most famous stories such as "The Hound of the Baskervilles."

But thanks to his prominent role in pop culture, Holmes has moved far beyond those original tales by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and has teamed up with other characters comics, movies, and television in other universes and time periods. He's fought menaces both sci-fi and supernatural, and in some cases, he's even been aware of his status as a fictional character. Read on and you'll see what I'm talking about.

As a fan of both the Great Detective and the immortal Count of Transylvania, I was very nervous about picking up this book. To my amazement, "Sherlock Holmes Vs. Dracula" (by Loren D. Estleman) is a great, character-driven story that takes place parallel to the original Dracula novel by Bram Stoker. Just as Stoker's novels showed us newspaper articles that alluded to the Count's presence, this book has Holmes directly investigating those same news stories, causing him to make enemies not only with Dracula but with Prof. Van Helsing as well.

Holmes has never believed in the supernatural, but when confronted with a truth he can't deny he puts his fears aside and is determined to protect England from the lord of vampires. This is also a very strong story for Watson, as he proves just why he has the very rare privilege of being able to call himself Sherlock's best friend.

There have been other stories that have pitted Holmes and Dracula in the same story, but Sherlock Holmes VS Dracula still holds up as the best of them. The BBC did a great radio adaptation. Why hasn't this been made into a film already?

Sherlock Holmes VS Mr. Hyde

She did a wonderful book featuring Holmes and Dracula, so why not try again? In "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Holmes," author Loren D. Estleman delivers a story in which Holmes is asked to investigate the murder of Sir Danvers Carew. This killing, of course, occurred in the pages of Robert Louis Stevens' original novella The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, so who the culprit is will not surprise the reader.

What's interesting here is how Holmes comes to his conclusions about the connections between Jekyll and Hyde and what he does once he's solved the mystery. This story explains that Stevens wrote his story based on what he knew but now you, the lucky readers, are allowed to see what REALLY happened to bring Hyde's reign of terror to a close. A fine book.

Sherlock Holmes and the Ghostbusters

Yeah, you heard me. Sherlock Holmes and Watson appeared as spirits in "The Real Ghostbusters" episode "Elementary, My Dear Winston." But it isn't what you might expect. The cartoon didn't claim that either of these characters had ever been real people and the Ghostbusters were confused how they could be ghosts if they'd never been alive. Turns out that enough kids had believed in Holmes over the near-century since his creation that it actually brought him to life.

But that wasn't all, kiddies. Moriarty also showed up as a telekinetic ghost, accompanied by the demonic Hound of the Baskervilles. The villainous Moriarty succeeded in opening up the Ghostbusters' containment unit, unleashing every single ghost they had ever captured so that he could absorb the released energies and become a real person. Since the heroes' weapons couldn't affect something that technically wasn't a ghost, it was up to Holmes to face his old enemy again. Without hesitation, Holmes sent both himself and his arch-enemy into the containment unit. As Moriarty pleaded "You'll kill us!", Holmes simply replied "We were never alive!" A strangely sad and layered story for what was considered to be a kid's show.

Moriarty VS The Master

When the "Doctor Who" production team created the Master, an evil Time Lord who had known the Doctor since childhood, they intended him to be a Moriarty-like character. It was quite fitting then when the Master faced the criminal mastermind in a comic strip in "Doctor Who Magazine." Entering the Land of Fiction, a place the Doctor had visited before where imaginary characters are real, the evil Time Lord faced and killed a secret society of villains that included Shere Khan, Dracula, the Phantom of the Opera, and others. Finally, he confronted Prof. James Moriarty and did not hide the fact that he was unimpressed, criticizing him as a one dimensional character who had been created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle simply because he'd grown tired of Sherlock Holmes stories and wanted to kill him off. If Moriarty had a plan to defeat the Master, it never reached fruition because a moment later the "Napolean of Crime" was incinerated by tripod Martian warriors the Master had recruited from "The War of the Worlds." Ouch.