Watson Season 1 Episode 12 Review: Your Life’s Work, Part 1

On Watson Season 1 Episode 12, “Your Life’s Work, Part 1,” the first half of the season finale turns Moriarty’s past with both Watson and Ingrid against the entire Holmes clinic.

A patient presents symptoms attributable to black mold, and the brothers are exposed while tracking it down.  Soon after, Adam begins acting strangely. He’s in recovery and the team theorizes a relapse until Stephens demonstrates the same symptoms.

Within hours, they’re both extremely ill. Moriarty shows up in the clinic, but only Ingrid recognizes him. He privately blackmails her into putting sugar into a “random” set of samples as the others begin trying to explain how both the Crofts are so sick.

Shinwell, at first mysteriously absent, returns with disturbing news. Moriarty has used their own research to create this disease. Adam falls into a coma while Stephens shares a brief moment with Sasha, but later becomes unresponsive as well.

A potential miracle treatment is found, but nearly all the samples that could be used in treatment are dead; killed by the sugar Ingrid adds. Only one remains and only one of the brothers can be saved. Watson and the others must decide who.

With a second season secured, Watson seems to be pulling out all the stops for plot twists and cliffhangers as it wraps up its first season. We’re also finally focusing entirely on main characters, but perhaps we should be careful what we wish for.

The writing and acting are both worthy of a dramatic climax, from the emotional scenes as Adam and Stephens’s health deteriorates to the tense ones as Moriarty slowly tightens his grip on everyone, even before some know who he really is.

The overwhelming question is, of course, will this really happen? Is a character going to be killed off in such agonizing fashion, leaving his brother without a twin and everyone around him wracked by guilt for having to make such a call?

Normally, I wouldn’t expect it of a freshman show dedicated to medical miracles. But given both what it would mean for next season and that Peter Mark Kendall may simply be tired of playing 2 characters, there’s a good chance tragedy will play out just as foreshadowed.

Either way, the last hour of this season promises to be a grueling experience for everyone. We’re likely to close out in one of two ways: either with everyone celebrating a miracle together, or with final goodbyes and a funeral.

The other huge question will extend well after those final moments but still needs to be addressed. How can we ever come to terms with the hand some of our central characters have in this, especially if either brother succumbs?

Even after unwillingly playing both sides, Shinwell gets something of a pass. He confesses his previous role without strictly needing to and brings essential new information. It won’t spare him resentment, but he’s less responsible for what may happen.

Lauren is almost certainly the most directly responsible, given the implications of the penultimate episode’s last scenes, but she only appears in name here and will likely face her consequences offscreen. That leaves a great deal on Ingrid’s shoulders.

There are extenuating circumstances. This is Moriarty’s doing above all, she’s reacting in desperation, and the act of killing her father that she’s fleeing from was largely justifiable. It’s still hard to imagine anyone ever moving on.

She may not make the brothers sick, but her obedience of blackmail directly takes away the one thing that might be able to save them both. If the team doesn’t know already, they will find out. That cloud will fall on both an already dark finale and everything that comes after it.

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Watson airs Sundays at 9/8 on CBS.

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