The New Year’s Day season opener of the new series of Sherlock trounced the opposition, becoming the most watched television programme of the day, capturing 8.1 million viewers.



Featuring a bloodhound, a harrowing death scene, a motherless baby, an animal howl of anguish from Martin Freeman as Watson, and the great detective blinking away what would have been a tear in the eye of anyone less cold blooded than Benedict Cumberbatch’s Holmes, the programme took just under a third – 32.8% – of the viewing audience.

It became the second most popular programme of the festive period, beaten only by the New Year’s Eve countdown and midnight fireworks, which got 11.6 million viewers. It was also slightly down on last year’s Sherlock special, The Abominable Bride, which had 8.4 million viewers and went on to win two Emmy awards for the best television drama, and sold to 216 international broadcasters, the corporation’s biggest export success.

This time Sherlock beat the Queen, though her Christmas message was the most popular programme of Christmas Day, watched by 7.7 million, recorded before she caught the bad cold which has kept her out of the public gaze for the entire festive season.

The Six Thatchers, Sunday’s opener in what may be the last Sherlock series due to the increasing commitments elsewhere of both its stars, left the Brown family trailing in its wake: the Mrs Brown’s Boys New Year special, the BBC’s second most popular offering, which attracted just 6.7 million viewers – though almost precisely the same audience share, presumably as many viewers took their hangovers to bed.



At a preview screening, co-creator Mark Gatiss warned that the new three-part series of Sherlock could be the last.

“We would love to do more, but we are not lying, we absolutely don’t know. It’s up to all kinds of factors, scheduling. Willingness to do it is all here, but we are just not sure.”

Both lead actors have become international stars since Sherlock, based on updated versions of the classic Sir Arthur Conan Doyle stories, began in 2010. Cumberbatch played the hero in Marvel’s Doctor Strange this year, and is due to appear in at least two more films in the series. Freeman starred in The Hobbit films, and in the Fargo television series.