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Shatner's Sherlock Holmes Flop Forgotten
3 Sep
Summary
- ABC's 1972 TV movie adaptation was largely forgotten.
- William Shatner played Sherlock Holmes' antagonist.
- Low ratings canceled plans for a detective series.

ABC's 1972 television adaptation of "The Hound of the Baskervilles" has largely faded into obscurity, despite featuring William Shatner in a prominent villainous role. The made-for-TV film, which cast Shatner as George Stapleton opposite Stewart Granger's Sherlock Holmes, was envisioned as the first in a series. However, the broadcast garnered low ratings and critical disappointment.
This failure meant that ABC's plans for further Sherlock Holmes adaptations were abandoned. The original Arthur Conan Doyle novel, which detailed Holmes and Watson's investigation into a mysterious hound on the English moors, had previously sparked a significant revival of the detective's popularity. Sadly, this legacy did not extend to the ill-fated 1972 production, leaving Shatner's portrayal of a key antagonist largely unrecognized.