Before I get into my review of Sherlock Bones, I want you all to do a thought experiment with me. Imagine, if you will, what you think would happen in a movie titled Sherlock Bones. Think of how many different ways you could take that material! Maybe you’re imagining a dog dressed like Sherlock Holmes solving mysteries with his human Watson? Or maybe Watson is a dog too and they have to solve dog mysteries that humans don’t know about! Maybe they need to stop a cat burglar that’s an actual cat! My point is, whatever movie you are imagining would be a better movie than Sherlock Bones.

After the lukewarm, oh it was bad but it had heart and was made on a budget of 34$ so I can’t be upset at it, reaction I had to A Dog’s Adventure, it feels so good to find a dog movie I can get good and angry at and oh boy is Sherlock Bones that movie. Sherlock Bones made me furious, but before I just start ranting I will try and explain why it is so bad. Sherlock Bones is the story of an ugly kid named Billy who travels to Catalina Island to see his father, whom we learn is an aspiring toymaker. The boy wants to stay with his dad (because the parents are divorced), which he just flat out tells his mother. Jesus, kid, I’m sure that wasn’t a pleasant thing for your mom to hear. Don’t worry about her feelings though, because once the opening scenes are done she is never seen or heard from again.

It turns out the boy’s father is an unemployed Harry Potter impersonator with a penchant for terrible slapstick comedy. I can’t imagine why any mother wouldn’t just ship her kid off to live with this upstanding gentleman. You might be wondering, how the hell does Sherlock Bones fit into this plot? Also, why isn’t the main plot about Sherlock Bones? Those are both great questions!

Sherlock Bones, who can talk because of course he can, is working with his human partner, who for some reason is named Mike and not Watson, on a case for Scotland Yard, that, for some reason, involves them trying to bust a drug smuggling ring on the island of Catalina. You probably have even more questions now, like: Why are they stopping drug smuggling ring and not solving mysteries? Why are detectives from Scotland Yard in California? Why does Sherlock Bones talk? Why does he wear an eyepatch and bandana instead of his signature hat and coat?

I can answer one of those questions. Sherlock Bones was made in the early 90s when every single piece of media had to have an evil drug dealer so we all knew just how bad drugs were and just how villainous people who sold them were also. Oh, you wanted to know about any of the other questions? Well, so do I, because the movie never explains any of them! Especially because the main plot isn’t about Sherlock Bones solving a mystery, the main plot is that Sherlock Bones’ van gets carjacked and Mike gets kidnapped by the drug dealers so Bones has to save him. Bones is wounded and is joined by the child in question to free his captured partner.

Of course, while that is happening, Billy tries to convince adults that Sherlock Bones can talk and that they need to help him. This doesn’t work because Bones refuses to talk to any adults who aren’t Mike because Bones was chatting with him during the opening FOR NO REASON. Bones just says he ‘doesn’t talk to adults’. And leaves the kid to try and convince this group of dickhead adults that there’s a cop who needs saving on the island somewhere.

Look Bones, I hate talking to people too, but YOUR PARTNER’S LIFE IS ON THE LINE. Just once, talk to a goddamn adult and solve this plot in 5 minutes. Instead of doing that sensible thing, Bones relies on this kid to come up with ludicrous schemes to free Mike that cause all sorts of hijinks to occur, like the time when they pretend the kid is blind and Bones is his seeing-eye dog, which ends up going nowhere except that we get treated to a child making some hilarious and not at all racist gestures to prove he is not blind.

That’s the entire story, this dumb kid and this dumber dog trying to save Mike, and every sequence is just a repeated “they find Mike but can’t get to him, they try to get the adults to help but no one believes them” and it wears thin very fast. It’s especially annoying because there is so much mediocre physical comedy and bizarre unfunny one-liners from ugly child’s ugly friend that the writers thought were just gold. Unfortunately, it is no longer 1994, so children saying “Is it gonna be retarded?” Isn’t as funny as it once was.

That’s not even bringing up the weird shit. Like when Bones is injured and brought to a vet, the veterinarian begins the medical procedures and for some reason, the camera starts doing closeups ON the medical stuff! We get a closeup of the dog wound and a closeup of the sedative being injected and I have no idea why! Kids don’t wanna see that! I don’t want to see that! And then we see him get a red cast on his arm that he has for the rest of the movie! Wait a second…red left arm…eyepatch over his right eye…spends part of his opening sequence struggling to get help while sedated…could Bones have been the inspiration for…

I’m not accusing Hideo Kojima of purposely referencing Sherlock Bones when he designed Venom Snake. But I am implying it. Kojima’s known for adding strange references to his works, so was this his final masterwork reference that no one understood until years later? Did Konami fire him because they figured it out and wanted to keep it under wraps? You decide!

Seriously though, I would not recommend anyone watch Sherlock Bones. It is pure misery, without an ounce of cleverness or genuine human emotion. Anyone with a brainstem could have written a better script, and that is what makes me so sad about movies like this, they didn’t even try. They wrote the title, said ‘that’s clever!’ And then decided that children did not deserve any more effort than that. But children do deserve better. We all do. Watch anything else.