Review of Enola Holmes 2, directed by Harry Bradbeer

I remember when I watched the first Enola Holmes movie, and I thought it was charming. I didn’t love it enough to want to rewatch it any time soon in the near future, but I thought it was a cute movie. That said, I also know nothing about Sherlock nor did I have an interest in that series, but here we are.

Now, I had no idea that they had renewed this for a sequel, but one day I was really bored after finishing my master’s degree. I was waiting for my flight and study abroad program to South Korea, so I had an excessive amount of free time. I made use of said free time by catching up on my endless backlog of movies and books.

I didn’t get anywhere near denting that list, but I certainly did knock a few books and movies out of the running tally of what I need to do. Enola Holmes 2 wasn’t originally on that list, but it was suggested on my Netflix, and I just ran with it. That’s becoming a reoccurring theme lately.

Let’s get into the review and summary!

After starting her own detective agency, Enola Holmes is search for clients when she stumbles upon a new mystery.

This movie begins with Enola’s latest struggle: she’s opened her detective agency, but no one is walking through the door and asking her to solve their problems. And when they do, they tend to not realize it’s Sherlock Holmes’ younger and female sister.

That said, she catches a potential trail when a factory girl, Bessie, says her older sister Sarah is missing. Enola accompanies Bessie to the factory they worked at, and Enola realizes there’s an epidemic going on in there. They also meet with another girl named Mae, who was their coworker, and talk to her.

Mae shows Enola a theater where she worked as a dancer with Sarah. There, Enola digs around and finds some letters to Sarah from a secret admirer, which becomes the first sign of a potential suspect. On the way home, Enola runs into Sherlock and discovers that there are government officials being blackmailed.

Enola cracks the code through a poem, and then goes to a home in Whitechapel. However, she only finds a dying Mae there, as she has been stabbed. It’s there she discovers sheet music in the folds of her dress, but then she’s caught by the Superintendent, who naturally thinks she has done this.

At the same time, Sherlock is having a break in his own case, and it might actually be connected to the one Enola is working on right now.

Her new theory is that Sarah’s lover will be at a ball, so she heads there next. She’s trying to get close specifically to the son of the factory owner, as she thinks this is Sarah’s lover. But it’s at the ball Enola is arrested for murder, leading to Sherlock rallying their mother and several others into an elaborate scheme where they bust her out of prison.

It’s on the way out and back into the world that Enola pieces together a noblewoman she met at the ball, Cicely, is actually Sarah. It turns out that Sarah, Mae, and William (Sarah’s lover) were figuring out that the epidemic at the factory was actually manmade with white phosphorus.

As Enola puts the pieces together with Tewkesbury, the two of them have a romantic moment where they confess their love. He goes with her to the factory out of concern, but they find William dead in there. Sherlock appears, and the trio finds another piece of sheet music.

Turns out the sheet music is a map of the theater, and they go to Sarah. She tells them that she needs help exposing McIntyre, who’s behind all of this, but then the police show up with a hostage: Bessie. Enola takes them down, but McIntyre burns all of the evidence implicating him and tries to get Sarah arrested.

With their combined detective skills, Sherlock and Enola find out that Mira is the one Sherlock has been looking for. They then convince the factory girls to strike, and McIntyre is arrested. Enola decides to expand her office, while Tewkesbury officially begins courting her.

Overall Thoughts

I think the first movie was better than the second (as with many things—the sequel is often never better than the original, but there are some cases out there in the world where it it truly better), but this was still a pretty entertaining movie in itself.

I like how the Enola Holmes movie series is creating a narrative where women can be detectives too—it’s like how we rediscover women in history that were often overshadowed by their male contemporaries. As someone who specialized in women’s history and literature, I find this to be right up my alley.

But like with the first movie, I don’t know if I would return to this again. I guess we’ll see in the future.

Go watch this if you have not already and want to!

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