More than a year after after CBS first announced a straight-to-series order for the next take on Sherlock Holmes, Watson is finally set to premiere in the 2025 TV schedule. As anybody familiar with Holmes lore can guess from the title, the twist this time around is that the premise centers on Dr. John Watson rather than his detective friend, and it fits into the medical drama genre. Morris Chestnut of Rosewood and The Resident fame stars as the good doctor, and his description of the new series has me sold.
Watson will be CBS’ first attempt at a medical drama since Sophia Bush’s Good Sam was cancelled back in 2022, and the show’s approach to the genre combines medicine with mystery. The main character leads a clinic that attempts to treat very rare disorders, which requires as certain kind of approach. Or, as Morris Chestnut put it to TV Insider, an approach that’s a kind of genre hybrid that can’t be found anywhere else on network television:
We’re not just doctors. We’re not just detectives. We are ‘doc-tectives.’ That’s where our show is different than a lot of primarily straight-line medical dramas or straight-line detective dramas. It’s a combination of both.
The mysteries may be primarily medical from week to week, but the action centering on John Watson doesn’t mean that the show is missing more familiar Sherlock Holmes elements like those adapted in CBS’ Elementary before that show ended in 2019. (Watson showrunner and creator Craig Sweeny also created Elementary.) While the famed detective himself has been dead for six months by the time the story picks up, there’s always more to the world of Sherlock Holmes.
Famed antagonist Moriarty has a part to play in the show, with Chestnut describing him as having the ability to
CBS Is Premiering Its New Watson Series This Weekend And Star Morris Chestnut’s ‘Doc-Tectives’ Description Has Me Sold
