A total disappointment (and I liked the first movie)

Rating: 3/10 (16 January 2012)

While the first movie was a bit unorthodox regarding its portrayal of Sherlock Holmes, it functioned because of the good performance of the main actors, a very convincing villain and a good plot which had more than a necessary amount of mystery for an SH plot, made even stronger by toying with the elements of the occult. Occasional action scenes, though sometimes overdone, were rather original and few and far between to annoy.
The sequel though seems to be written by a different set of writers. There is no plot whatsoever above the basic premise which can be told in a sentence or two. The only mystery present was what actually connects all too many random and overly long action sequences and dispensable characters together. And though the main actors might still be pushing hard, their lines rarely work, being written poorly as they are. To accommodate for the weak script, Robert Downey character's eccentricity seems to be simply pushed much too far this time that it becomes annoying rather than fun. Jude Law repeats the first role as much as possible with the lines he's been given and is a rare memento to what worked well in the first movie. Rachel McAdams was a rare miss in the first movie, so the fact she doesn't play a larger role in this one can only be a plus. I'm still puzzled by the gypsy woman character's purpose in the movie, but it only underlines the weak script as this character is actually one of the main ones. And the villain himself leaves an impression of a low-level local gangster given to play with higher stakes (selling weapons to opposing countries, rather than illegal liquor) which, unfortunately for the script writers, doesn't automatically create a character of a top criminal mastermind. As there was no secrecy about him or his plan or his ulterior motives even, the "game of shadows" being played between him and the SH is reduced to running around the Europe at seemingly random locations, fighting (in the most direct sense of the word) the forgettable villains alone while trying to save the world. And if that might sound more like a James Bond script to you (as mentioned in some other review), you would not be mistaken.
Just avoid it. It made for a very tedious experience and the only thing I cared about while watching was that it finishes as soon as possible so I can forget about it.