Moffat in a nutshell

A high proportion of the writings on this blog over the last six months or so have been devoted to praising Steven Moffat, first as writer of the latest series of Dr Who and now as writer of the new Sherlock series -- and next year we will probably praise him as writer of the first Tintin movie for Steven Spielberg.

There is a Moffat style, of course, not universally beloved. Last week in the Spectator, in a few offhand graphs at the end of a piece about something else entirely, critic Simon Hoggart brilliantly summed up the case for the prosecution. I will not be able to watch Moffat's work without remarking these touchstones:

high-speed action, large chunks of the plot left out or unexplained, lack of detail juxtaposed with too much detail, the detective (or in the case of the Doctor, the Doctor) as a high-functioning autistic......