Everyone loves a crossover. We’ve all heard tell of the tale where there had been a wish that the 4th Doctor and Blake met in a corridor. Various TV shows make whole episodes featuring characters crossing over from one TV series to another.

Big Finish often like to cross-over characters from their various ranges (no doubt to help boost sales, but it’s fun, so I’ll let them off); whether that’s the 6th Doctor popping up in Jago and Litefoot; or Ace in Gallifrey; or whole box sets such as The Worlds of Doctor Who or Worlds of Big Finish where various ranges come together to tell one huge story.

The Ghosts of Christmas Past, a Dorian Gray story, is a quieter affair but sees Sherlock Holmes enter the world of Dorian. It is very much that way round. This isn’t Dorian involved in a Holmes case, this is Holmes involved in the macabre and supernatural world of Dorian.

I’ve listened to the whole first series of The Confessions of Dorian Gray, which skips through time right up to the 21st Century, so it took me a moment to place Dorian back into the correct time period and point in his life that this story takes place. It is 1912, so only about 20 years since the end of The Picture of Dorian Gray and about 10 years since the first release of the Confessions series, This World Our Hell. Dorian has only been immortal for around 30 years at this point and this story is closely tied in with the events of The Picture of Dorian Gray.

Dorian’s painting is stolen and he receives a note informing him that it will only be returned if he kills Sherlock Holmes by midnight on Christmas Eve.

Sherlock, reluctant and incredulous, is drawn into Dorian’s life. It transpires that he was involved in investigating the disappearance of painter who created Dorian’s painting (murdered by Dorian). His investigations condemned an apparently innocent man, a chemist who then committed suicide. Dorian enlists his help to discover who has taken his painting and wants Holmes dead. I don’t want to give too much away in terms of the case itself, as it’s typical Holmesian fare and an enjoyable mystery in its own right.

However, I will discuss the more supernatural elements. Dorian is visited by a ghost from his past, Sybil: the girl he cast aside in Picture who died, has apparently entered into a similar pact as Dorian and is now immortal. Sherlock, meanwhile, is visited by a younger James Moriarty, reincarnated after events at the Reichenbach Falls.

Sherlock finds himself, inevitably, solving the mysterious case whilst determined to keep its supernatural elements at arms length. Even by the end he is unwilling to accept Dorian’s claims of immortality. It is an effective juxtaposition of two world views although it doesn’t quite ring true. Holmes, after all, has already encountered the supernatural and unexplained in his encounters with various vampires (e.g. Sherlock Holmes vs Dracula and The Tangled Skein). The truth behind Moriarty is left enigmatic at the close of the play tieing in more closely to the tone of the Confessions series than Sherlock Holmes, which is fitting as this is a Confessions story.

The performances are, unsurprisingly, excellent and absorbing. Alexander Vlahos is mesmerising as Dorian and Nick Briggs gives an excellent Holmes. As with other Holmes stories set in this time, he is currently retired and slightly more cynical about the world and his place in it. Rupert Young’s unsettlingly young and smooth Moriarty adds a fine performance into the mix.

The sound design is evocative and listening to this whilst walking home through darkened side streets was quite an atmospheric experience.

Historically, the 1912 setting is most important in establishing where in their lives Dorian and Holmes are. In Holmes’ case his retirement is integral as is the fact that Watson is away spending Christmas with his wife’s family (a nicely vague line to allow for the inconsistencies in Watson’s wives in the canon, that was added to by The Adventure of the Perfidious Mariner). The only other real historical feature of note is the sense of doom on the horizon with the approach of the Great War.

I haven’t been as overwhelmingly impressed by the Confessions series as other people but this release is excellent. I would strongly recommend giving this one a go (although I also strongly recommend listening to The Picture of Dorian Gray first).

I don’t care that it’s maybe not even that good, doesn’t even really feel like a ‘Confessions’ story, and is very silly and vague for a Sherlock story. This is the most delightful crossover of our lifetimes. Who even needs deep character study on a tortured immortal mind when you have “And Sherlock? Merry Christmas”, said Dorian Gray? Ghosts of Christmas Peak.