Following the closure of his old school in the countryside, a young John Watson enrolls at London’s Brompton Academy, where Sherlock Holmes befriends him immediately.

Holmes, Watson and Elizabeth secretly investigate the murders, uncovering the existence of Rame-Tep, an ancient Egyptian cult of Osiris worshippers.

The trio track the cult to a London paraffin warehouse and a secret underground wooden pyramid, where they interrupt the sacrifice of a young girl.

Back in Waxflatter's loft, Holmes and Watson find a drawing of six men, including the three victims and a fourth man, Chester Cragwitch, who is still alive.

That night, Holmes and Watson go to see Cragwitch, who explains that in his youth, he and the other five men were in Egypt, where they looted an underground pyramid containing the tombs of five Egyptian princesses.

A local boy named Eh-Tar and his sister vowed to seek revenge for their parents' deaths in the protests, and replace the bodies of the five princesses.

Nigel Stock, who played Professor Waxflatter, portrayed Dr. Watson alongside both Douglas Wilmer and Peter Cushing in the BBC series of the 1960s.

The film is notable for including the first fully computer-generated photorealistic animated character, a knight composed of elements from a stained glass window.

[9] The effect was created by Lucasfilm's Industrial Light & Magic and John Lasseter[10] The fencing scenes were shot at Penshurst Place in Kent.

[18] Roger Ebert gave the film 3 out of 4 stars, and wrote: "The elaborate special effects also seem a little out of place in a Sherlock Holmes movie, although I'm willing to forgive them because they were fun.

"[19] Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune wrote: "The production is first-rate in all technical ways imaginable, but the villain that Holmes and Watson chase is not worth their intellect or time or ours.

[21] Reviewing the film for The New York Times, Leslie Bennetts called it "a lighthearted murder mystery that weds Sir Arthur Conan Doyle to the kind of rollicking action-adventure that has made Steven Spielberg the most successful movie maker in the world".

[4] Colin Greenland reviewed Young Sherlock Holmes for White Dwarf #77, and stated that "Conan Doyle's creation is reduced to an irritating sequence of in-jokes about deerstalkers, violins and pipes.

"[24] DVD Verdict stated that the film was both "a reimagining of the detective's origin story, but it is also respectful of Arthur Conan Doyle's work" and "a joy from beginning to end.