"The Great Game" is the third and final episode of the first series of the television series Sherlock. It was first broadcast on BBC One and BBC HD on 8 August 2010. It was written by Mark Gatiss and directed by Paul McGuigan. The episode follows Sherlock Holmes (Benedict Cumberbatch) and John Watson (Martin Freeman) as they race to solve a series of seemingly unrelated cases presented by a mysterious bomber. If they fail to solve the case in the time specified by the bomber, he will kill the hostage he is holding. After four such cases, the episode ends in a standoff between Holmes and the bomber, who it turns out is Jim Moriarty, the "consulting criminal" and the main antagonist for the rest of the series. The standoff is left as a cliffhanger until Season 2. Like its predecessors, the episode features numerous references to the works of Arthur Conan Doyle. Critical reception of "The Great Game" was highly positive, being praised for its complex and gripping plot, and its unusual and original portrayal of Moriarty. Plot Sherlock Holmes is bored without stimulating cases. Mycroft Holmes urges Sherlock to investigate the death of Secret Intelligence Service clerk Andrew West and the disappearance of a flash drive containing missile plans. Sherlock refuses and is called to Scotland Yard where he receives a mobile phone matching the victim's from "A Study in Pink". The phone shows a derelict room, which Sherlock recognises as the long-unoccupied flat 221c; his neighbour. Inside the room is a pair of trainers, and a hostage calls: if Sherlock cannot solve the puzzle in twelve hours, a bomb will kill her. Sherlock traces the trainers to Carl Powers, a schoolboy who reportedly drowned in a swimming pool. Proving the boy was poisoned with botulinum toxin via his eczema medication, Sherlock announces the solution to the bomber, and the hostage is freed. A second MMS shows a blood-stained sports car; another hostage phones, saying Sherlock has eight hours to solve this mystery. Finding the vehicle without its driver, Sherlock interviews the missing man's wife and the car rental boss, whom he deduces was recently in Colombia. After learning that the blood in the car had been frozen, Sherlock announces that the missing man paid the agency owner to help him disappear, and the hostage is freed. A third message and hostage point Sherlock to the demise of