[GJim]

> a fantastic and hilarious job of portraying holmes as an erratic drug addict.

Except in Conan Doyle's books, Holmes was a user of cocaine, not an addict.

This desire to portray Holmes as a drug addict says far more about our own times.

[leejoramo]

Regardless of if we consider Holmes a drug addict, abuser or merely a controlled user, it is clear from the stories that Watson was very concerned as both a Friend and Medical expert, that Holmes is damaging his mental faculties

[lazide]

Where do you draw the line between user and addict?

He was definitely not holding together his life by any traditional measure.

[GJim]

Tell me you haven't read the books without telling me you haven't read them!

[lazide]

Read them all. Multiple times.

Mind actually using words to form useful sentences?

He of course insisted he wasn’t an addict - like all addicts do - but he always went back that I remember - like all addicts do. And he used it to cope with not having any interesting problems and the misery of life.

He was enabled by Watson and his brother, and mostly supported in the elements of normal social functioning by them.

Where we draw the line between addict and not is quite subjective in these situations eh?