How are Heroes and Villains Presented in The adventures of Sherlock Holmes(TM)?

       In ‘The Copper Beeches we meet a very different villain to Roylott. Mr Rucastle follows a very different type of villainy relying entirely on his cunning and intelligence in order to outwit those who would try to stop him. Unlike Roylott when we first meet Rucastle it is unclear that he is the villain. He seems very friendly and pleasant and doesn’t seem to follow many stereotypes for villains as he is ‘A prodigiously stout man with a very smiling face and a great heavy chin.’ He is not intimidating and acts very pleasantly in order to hide his villainous qualities. We can tell from the way he is described that he is very good at appearing like a perfectly good person. However he perhaps overacts it and gives a lot away from this. As upon hearing about his proposition to Miss Hunter, Holmes says how ‘no sister of his should have ever accepted such an offer’. However none the less he covers his motive well enough to still appear quite friendly. However he changes quite drastically later on in the story. When he becomes annoyed he is a completely different person going from ‘smiling in the most pleasant fashion until his eyes were just to shining slits’ to being so angry that ‘his cheek were red, his brow was all crinkled with anger and the veins stood out on his temples with passion.’ This shows a totally different side of Rucastle which shows his true villainy. However he is very cunning and attempts to hide it and even ‘spoke in a jesting tone’ although no matter how he tries he is unable to suppress his rage as ‘there was no jest in his eyes’. This is a demonstration of how he is keen to hide his villainy and how although he has been able to do this up until this point we know he is clearly very annoyed as he was unable to hide it this time. However he does then show himself as a villain fully with no attempts to hide it as ‘In an instant his smile hardened into a grin of rage’. This shows that he is keen to get his point across and wants Miss Hunter to know that although he appears to have been kind and friendly up until know he is very serious and extremely angry and does not want her in the turret. Even going as far as too threaten to ‘through her to the mastiff’. During the most part he tries to hide what makes him a villain with very friendly actions. He told her ‘some of the funniest stories she had ever heard’ and spent most of the time ‘smiling in the most amiable manner’. This shows just how good he was at covering up his darker side.

       The final villain we are introduced to is Irene Adler. She is introduced during ‘The Scandal in Bohemia’ and is a very unusual villain compared to the others. Conan Doyle presents her differently mainly because she is a woman. However Doyle was writing a head of his time as during his era women were looked upon as inferior to men yet she is the only villain to successfully outwit Holmes. She is also the only villain of the three who never uses aggression. She relies entirely on cunning and intelligence and manages to outwit Holmes very skilfully. She also completely changes Holmes opinion. Holmes originally believes her to be no different to any other villain. However by the end of the story she has gained his respect and ‘In his eyes she eclipses and predominates the whole of her sex’. This shows Holmes’ lack of respect for women and how he sees himself as superior. This is clear because he considers outwitting him an extremely impressive thing meaning he thinks himself better than other people. But Adler changes this. With her cunning she is able to defeat Holmes at his own game. And at the same time as being so good at what she does she hides it from everyday people with her appearance which makes her seem innocent. ‘She was a lovely woman, with a face a man might die for’. From that last bit ‘a face a man might die for’ we can interpret it to mean she is very good at manipulating people. And we know that although she is beautiful she is ruthless. ‘She has the face of the most beautiful of women, and the mind of the most resolute of men…’ As well as showing her two different images of how she can be very clever and ruthless but also alluring this shows the contrast of men and women at the time. Showing how men were considered to be more ‘resolute’ and cunning. We also know that her skills are enough to impress anyone even royalty. This is clear when the king says ‘What a queen she would have made’. On the other hand the king feels this from the beginning but Holmes is always unwilling to deem anyone to be equal to or greater than him does not change how he feels until the end.

       Holmes himself is quite different throughout the stories. In the speckled band he is a true hero. Not caring about personal gain ‘working for the love of his art rather than the acquirement of wealth’ showing dedication to his work. And how he feels the feeling he gets from solving the mysteries is a better reward than any amount of money. However even here we see some of his darker side as he was able to ‘see deeply into the manifest wickedness of the human heart’. This suggests he has perhaps been there himself and is able to understand wickedness so well that there could be a side to him which is quite different to the hero presented to us. However no matter how dark he may seem sometimes, there is no denying his brilliance as a detective. His ‘faculties of deduction and of logical synthesis’ mean he is always one step ahead. We also know that he is very observant and notices the smallest things. ‘I observe the second half of a return ticket in the palm of your glove. You must have started early and yet you had a good drive in a dog cart along heavy roads’. This shows he notices and observes everything and works things out that no one else could. However in the ‘Copper Beaches’ he has become less of the helpful hero who would help anyone and anything. He considers himself better than others. His friend Watson was ‘repelled by the egotism’. Showing a completely different side of Holmes. He is egotistical and believes the rest of the world to be beneath him. ‘The public, the great unobservant public, who could hardly tell a weaver by his tooth or a compositor by his thumb. This shows that he believes himself to be better than anyone else and that the public are ignorant.

       Overall I think all the villains posses similar qualities but with key noticeable differences. They are all cunning and intelligence with Roylott being the only physically villainous one. And Adler being the only one successful in outwitting Holmes. Conan Doyle was writing ahead of his time by show Adler as equal to Holmes as women were looked upon as weaker at the time. As for Holmes himself we see he is not perhaps the true hero who can do no wrong he would appear in the Speckled Band. And even venturing in the worlds of drugs, which gives him darker apparel and make him more of an anti-hero.