Jade Eshete, Hannah Marks and Samuel Barnett (L-R) talk about their new BBC America series "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency" at New York Comic Con on Oct. 7, 2016. Photo by Karen Butler/UPI

NEW YORK, Oct. 18 (UPI) -- British actor Samuel Barnett doesn't mince words when describing his character in the new television series Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency.

"Dirk is a really terrible detective who thinks he is absolutely brilliant," Barnett told UPI in a recent interview at New York Comic Con. "He's the anti-Sherlock. I do like to say that if Sherlock has his mind palace, Dirk has his emotional-neurosis cottage. He is just a mass of sort of instinct and intuition. He does have some kind of psychic power. He is connected to the flow of the universe, so he does receive all these messages, but he just doesn't know how to interpret them. He doesn't know what to do with them. So, he's always getting into trouble. He just acts on them without thinking of any consequences. When he meets Todd, played by Elijah Wood, he's really looking for human connection. He's connected to everything in the universe, yet cannot connect to other people, so he wants Todd to be his assistant and his best friend. What's great about their relationship is Dirk's a terrible detective, Todd has absolutely no interest in detecting at all, and yet, somehow because there is a kind of plan in the universe, they end up solving these mysteries -- or do they?"


Barnett joked that viewers should pay no attention to Todd's vehement denial that he is Dirk's sidekick.

"He's totally my sidekick bitch," Barnett emphasized. "He really is."

Written and executive-produced by Max Landis, the show is an adaptation of Douglas Adams' popular novels.

"When washed-up rocker Todd Brotzman stumbles upon the murder scene of a millionaire, all hell breaks loose. Eccentric detective, Dirk Gently, wholly believes they're destined to untangle the peculiar events surrounding the mystery together, whether Todd likes it or not! A collection of wild and dangerous characters' further infiltrate and complicate their world, each episode landing them a few random steps closer to uncovering the truth," explains a BBC America synopsis of the show.

Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency is to premiere on Saturday.