Exploration of the Private Life through Television

The Adventures of Harland Bennet is a T.V. show series starring the new detective on the gloomy streets of London, Harland Bennet. Bennet is a detective modeled after the infamous Sherlock Holmes. He longs for adventure and the thrill of the chase to conquer the villain. The viewer will follow Bennet into the depths of the murder, and believe me your hands will get dirty. However similar to Sherlock Holmes, Bennet’s life is anything but average. The viewers are allowed to immerse themselves into the story and get a full view of his private life. The Adventures of Harland Bennet gives the Victorians a chance to lift up the tablecloth and view the intricate and beautiful design of the table foot.

I decided to create a television show to relate the craving for peering into the private life in Victorian Era to the craving of the private life today. The television show allows the viewer to see inside the life of the London detective, Harland Bennet. This connection allows the viewer to understand Victorian England through the aspect of mass media. Sherlock Holmes was such a hit that many people had a difficult believing that he was not a real person, merely a fictional character. Today, many people believe characters from books and even television shows are real people.

This television show, The Adventures of Harland Bennet, not only presents the start of the spread of mass media and its influence on a culture but, it also attempts to define a detective character. As we have discussed previously in class, there are three things that determine detective fiction: a detective who detects, the detective being the protagonist, and the detective has to triumph over the criminal. However since mass media has greatly influenced the culture it has consumed, the Adventures of Harland Bennet challenges the ramifications of detective fiction. It presents a challenge for whether the detective actually triumphs over the criminal or becomes one himself. I chose to challenge these ramifications of what defines detective fiction because modern mass media challenges all of society’s’ norms and gets away with it.
The question is: Is Harland Bennet a villain?

The Adventures of Harland Bennet: a Detective TV Show Series in Victorian England
Tune in every Tuesday from 7-7:30 p.m.

Episode 1: Missing by the Pond

The candle flickered in the back corner flashing violent shadows across the wall. Horse drawn carriages hurriedly splashed through puddles, as the wind howled through the barren streets. Harland Bennet sat up from the bed and traced her full outline, from collarbone to the lower part of her belly button. Gliding across the room, he picked up the chicory colored pipe, opened the red box, and stuffed his pipe as the tobacco aroma filled the bedroom. He lingered over to the window, pipe resting between his chapped lips, lit a match, pressed it up against the tobacco and deeply inhaled. With each puff, his eyes stayed glued to the window.

Eva stirred and sat up in his bed, her tussled red curls fell slightly below her breasts, barely covering her nipples. Like a mysterious mermaid, she ventured over to the red velvet chair and dressed herself in a blue silk robe, which was beaded down the sleeves. She popped open her silver cigarette case that lay on the bedside table, lit it off of the candle and placed her hand on Harland’s shoulder. He remained still, eyes fixed upon the dingy, paned window.
She rested her lips on the outside of his earlobe and whispered, “Gloomy London?” And her green eyes lifted in reference to the streets out beyond the window.

Without a response, Harland ventured over to the coffee table. It was littered with shards of tobacco, a bag of heroine, news paper clippings, and various newspaper headlines: “Detective Bennet Does it Again, McNabbe Jailed,” “The Murder of Madame Nerlame: Case Closed.” He pulled a tiny gold pocket watch from the top of the table, popped the top down. It read 4:15 a.m.
“You better get going Eva, I have work to do,” Harland said while lifting his pipe from his lips as white smoke curved around his exhaled breathe.

Eva walked slowly towards him, “Why so early tonight?”

“I have a lot on my mind,” he gestured toward his head with his pipe. Without further explanation, she stepped into the dark corner by the bed and clothed herself. Harland usually enjoyed watching her, the way she tightened her corset, rolled her stockings up her thighs, and pulled her red locks up in a chignon bun. But not this morning, his mind was other places.

Before pulling the latch to leave his bedroom, Eva lingered over to Harland, stroked his upper thigh and kissed him on the lips. “Toddles,” she murmured, placed her silver cigarette case in her pocket, and closed the bedroom door behind her.

Harland ventured towards his armoire, clothed himself, and sat back down on the red velvet chair facing the window. He pulled the gold wedding band from the depths of his front pant pocket and placed it on his cold ring finger. He gently picked up the blue cloth that resided on the bedside table next to his red tobacco box. Picked up the small syringe hidden inside the smooth cloth, he filled it with a hit of heroine, pierced his upper forearm. His ring finger pushed the trigger in, sighing delightfully, “Sometimes Eva just doesn’t entertain the mind enough.”
He enjoyed the silence as he stared down at the gloomy London streets.

Shortly after Harland concealed the syringe back in its blue cloth, there was a knock on his bedroom door. He stuffed the wedding band back into his front pocket, strolled toward the door and opened it, not surprised to find Rufus Waynefield, the Lieutenant of the London police department, standing there short of breathe and dark circles cupping his bottom eyelids.
“Good Morning Bennet, pardon for bothering you at this ungodly hour, but it is urgent,” Waynefield muttered as he walked towards the fireplace after throwing his coat on the coat hanger along with his fedora. A drop of sweat rolled down his forehead and he rubbed it off with his pudgy round fist. He picked up the glass container of whiskey on the mantel, poured a small amount into a cup, put it to his lips and kicked it back. As he backed away from the mantel, the flame of the candle caught the edge of his silver badge, pinned strategically below his collarbone, and it cast a glinted streak of light across the room.

“Not a problem Rufus. It is keen time for another case.” Harland pulled his watch from his pocket, 5:30 a.m. He strolled over to the window and stared out blankly.

“Luke Levanti, the manager of London Federal Bank, went missing last night at eight o’clock. The last anyone saw him was standing in the National Park near the bridge and it was as if he disappeared in the deep fog. I sent out a crew to cover the premises, the dogs are tracking the area. We need you out there, looking for clues, doing what you do best Bennet.”

“Let us waste no time,” Harland murmured. He went over to his closet picked a black cloak, swung it over his shoulder, stuffed the pipe in his mouth and stormed out the bedroom door, with the thrill of the chase on his mind. Waynefield followed hurriedly behind.

The thinning fog clung to their cloaks as they hurried down the cobbled stone path toward the horse carriage. Once inside the carriage, Harland and Waynefield sat quietly listening to the trotting hoofs pounding down the rickety path. The carriage slowed to a halt as they approached the edge of the park. As they descended the carriage, the first rays of morning bent around the tall elm trees; the stubborn fog only let three rays shine through.

Waynefield turned to Harland, “The police force has been searching for a couple of hours, searching for remnants of where he could have been taken too, and the possible perpetrator.”
Without a further word from Waynefield, Harland scanned the perimeter of the park. He pulled out his pipe and a small box of matches wedged in his cloak pocket. He lit the tobacco remnants that clung to the inside of the pipe. He strolled over to the bridge following the large, wet footprints in the mud. The bridge was covered in the early morning dew, moist and slippery. Harland noticed a thick green streak of algae wedged between two bricks. He peered over the side of the bridge into the glass like pond below, untainted and naive. While peering deeply into the water, he was brought back to that night, the night he wished he could forget. He flashed back to the night it happened. It haunted his dreams.

He saw her face in the pond, bubbles flying out of her mouth feverishly. Her arms flailing above her head, gasping for breathe. Panting and craving for attention, longing for him to rescue her from the bottomless pit of water. Her eyes resembled dusty marbles left abandoned under the bed as oxygen left her body. Her eyes spoke her impending fate. All he could do was stare and long to save her. He was too high to save her, to call for help, to do anything. He stood tears streaming his face as the water swallowed her whole.

He emerged from the flashback with his pupils elongated, and hands extended screaming. He took three forceful steps away from the bridge; his right arm shook uncontrollably. A drop of sweat trickled down the side of his temple. He felt into the depths of his pocket, felt his wedding band, and longed for the feeling of the syringe gently pushed into his arm. He longed for his mind to find a release stronger than Eva; he longed for the heroine.

Harland spoke aloud to himself:
“Could I be the villain for not trying to save her? It goes against everything I stand for as a detective, searching for a villain of the crime. I let her drowned. I let my wife drown in the lake. What kind of detective am I?”