Employing Holmes on a case can’t always give happy endings. Sometimes, what he uncovers is tragedy that cannot be repaired.
- “The Cardboard Box”’s case may be the most tragic one in the bunch: a husband and wife’s marriage is wrecked by a jealous sister who tried to force herself on the husband and was rejected. The husband kills his wife and her lover, but is so broken with guilt over what happened that he confesses all and welcomes execution. Even the wife's sister doesn't get away unscathed, since she's so horrified by the guilt on learning that all her scheming has resulted in the wife's horrible murder that she has a mental breakdown. Holmes at the end of the case somberly ponders the existence of life, and whether there can be any salvation for the pitiful.
- This was the very last story Jeremy Brett filmed, as he was suffering failing health and eventually passed away. This context just adds to the loss and sadness surrounding the tale.
- “The Five Orange Pips” has Holmes’ client John Openshaw get murdered by the Ku Klux Klan. The police didn’t take the threats to his life seriously, and when he visits Holmes (which Holmes says he should have done before) he is advised to be careful, a warning that comes too late to save him. Holmes is briefly devastated at the death he couldn’t prevent in time.
- “The Dancing Men” has Holmes Late to the Tragedy. He deciphers the titular code, but is too late to prevent the death of poor Hilton Cubit and his wife's Attempted Suicide (though she later recovered).
- It gets even worse when you learn Elise's backstory. She was the daughter of a notorious crime boss from Chicago and engaged to one of the men who worked for her father. Desperate to escape, she fled to England where she met Hilton. Elsie was so desperate to leave her previous life behind her that she made Hilton promise on their wedding day to not ask any questions about her past. But, despite her best efforts to lie low and start a new life, her ex found her and not only wrote to her but stalked her at her own home. When she tries to bribe him to leave her and her husband alone, her ex tries to kidnap her. Hilton (who had been alerted by the sounds of an argument) comes into the room...
- “The Veiled Lodger” is less a mystery than a tragedy; of a young artiste married to an abusive husband, whose murder plot to free herself succeeded, but at the cost of her face. She was so maimed that she spent the rest of her life alone, and even had thoughts of suicide before her meeting with Holmes.
- “The Speckled Band” tells the tale of Helen Stoner, trapped by an abusive stepfather looking to gain her inheritance through murderous intent and who has already killed her beloved sister. Furthermore, the story opens with Watson narrating that the details of the case can be disclosed because Stoner has recently and untimely died. She was free from peril, but only lived for a few more years. Who knows if she never really got over the incident?
- The fact that Watson is setting it down because there are some questions about the death of Helen's Stepfather, hinting that the poor woman, an abuse victim, was blamed for his death.
- “The Missing Three-Quarter” kicked off because a rich rugby player’s secret wife (they were married secretly because he’d have otherwise lost his inheritance) became fatally ill. Holmes tracks down the player to find him in tears at his wife’s deathbed, incapable of comprehending anything else.
- “The Three Garridebs” ends with Nathan Garrideb, who was deceived into thinking his unusual name would entitle him to a fortune, going mad on the reveal of the scam, and spending the rest of his life in a nursing home.
- In "The Devil's Foot" it turns out that Dr. Sterndale was in love with Brenda Tregennis (the initial murder victim) for years, and vice versa, but they couldn't marry because Sterndale was unable to divorce his current wife. When he learns that Brenda not only died in agony along with her brothers being driven insane, but the murderer used a poison stolen from him, he tracks him down and kills him using the same poison...but is left devastated at Brenda's death, and with nothing left now except his work in Africa. Holmes and Watson are moved and let him depart.
- Holmes: I have never loved. But if I did, and if the woman I had loved had met with such an end, I might act even as our lawless lion-hunter has done. Wouldn't you?
- "The Beryl Coronet", involving the theft of a priceless heirloom from its guardian Alexander Holder, heavily dwells on how the theft has affected his family. He mistakenly assumes his son James is the culprit and damages his relationship with his son through accusing him and having him arrested. Later on, he finds his niece Mary has quit the house, apparently in disgrace over the affair. Holder does get the coronet back, but learns that Mary carried out the crime, in collusion with her gambler lover George Burnwell. Holmes advises him to apologize to his son and mend fences with him, but gives no comfort as to whether Mary will return or redeem herself.
- "The Blue Carbuncle" has the perpetrator, James Ryder, driven to the verge of a nervous breakdown over his theft of a valuable jewel. He is in such a pitiful state that Holmes decides to let him go free.
- While it is portrayed has a fun and humorous tale it is easy to forget that the man who originally bought the goose, according to Holmes, has allowed himself to fall on hard times and driven his wife to no longer love him. As he says to Watson, if Mary left Watson walk out the door looking so shabby Holmes would be VERY worried.
- "The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton" features a blackmailer's victims, a royal lady whose husband received letters about her sordid past and died of a broken heart. Fortunately, she was able to take her revenge.
- "The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire" involves a woman carrying out vampiric deeds of bloodsucking her own child. The truth is a little less supernatural, but sadder: the child was poisoned by his jealous older brother, and the woman was sucking out the poison.
- "The Adventure of the Blanched Soldier" involves a soldier who had the bad luck to take refuge in a hospital of lepers, and later he finds out his skin has started to suffer a strange condition, which leads him to believe he has contracted the dreaded disease. Fortunately it's just a skin condition that will pass eventually.
- "The Noble Bachelor" tells the tale of a young bride, who lost her lover and was engaged to the titular bachelor, who then found her lover at her own wedding.
- The bachelor, who never loved his wife and was only interested in her money, himself feels he has been ill-used and humiliated by his fiancée's behavior, and while she pleads for a pardon for deeds she couldn't help, coldly brushes her off.
- The "Boscombe Valley Mystery" is a tale of blackmail and dark pasts, which culminates in the murder of the blackmailer by his victim to save his daughter. Holmes, on hearing his story and learning he is close to death, lets him go free.
- "A Case of Identity", which has a lady come to Holmes to find her missing husband, ends on a downer note. Holmes discovers that her stepfather posed as her lover to keep her close so that he would keep her money. Holmes decides not to say anything to his client in the belief that no good will come of it, a point that is still debated by fans and critics today.
- "The Gloria Scott":
- A young Holmes uses his deductive skills on the father of a friend, which freaks him out as he has a criminal history. Holmes ends up setting him on edge as long as the two are close.
- The father later on gets subject to blackmail over his past by an old comrade, and ends up dying of a stroke brought on by stress. This leads to the son discovering the full truth about his father's past, and he is utterly broken by it.
- "The Adventure of the Crooked Man" begins as Holmes and Watson investigate the suspicious death of Colonel James Barclay. Their investigation reveals that (then Sergeant) Barclay wanted to marry Nancy, the daughter of the regimental sergeant-major. But she was in love with another soldier named Henry Wood. When the Indian Mutiny broke out, Wood volunteered to sneak past enemy lines to relieve the siege. Barclay not only gave Wood the information that led to him being captured but alerted the enemy as to Wood's whereabouts. Wood was enslaved but was considered dead by his loved ones, including his beloved Nancy. She ended up marrying Barclay and moved on with her life. Wood escaped and decided to return to England. By chance, he ended up in the same town as the Barclays and his path crossed with Nancy's. Her subsequent confrontation of her husband about what he did to Wood and her and Wood's arrival at the scene caused Barclay to have an apoplectic fit and hit his head on the fender (hearth), dying. So that means Nancy and Wood can live happily ever after, right? Well...not exactly. Watson describes Wood as having jaundice and it's also hinted by his need for a fire that he has malaria. In other words, he's dying. So they can be together...but Conan Doyle hints that this is most likely not to be.
