Sherlock Series Three Confirmed

Sherlock will return for a third season of exciting episodes, its execs have confirmed. Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss broke the news shortly after the broadcast of the Series 2 finale The Reichenbach Fall on Sunday night via Twitter: "Gotcha!" Gatiss said after we saw Holmes leap to his death, only to watch John walk away from his grave when in reality he was alive and well, "Of course there'll be a third series! It was comissioned at the same time as Series Two!" Kudos to the BBC for keeping this one quiet, as the most recent episode's climax would really have lost a lot of its impact if we'd known both Holmes and Watson would be back for more. Still, we've got a long wait ahead- Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman are both currently filming The Hobbit, and the former will also be working on Star Trek 2 for the remainder of 2012, so don't expect a new series to air on BBC1 until mid or late 2013. Could Moffat possibly want to structure his next two years' drama line-up like this...?
SPRING 2012- SHERLOCK SERIES TWO
AUTUMN 2012- DOCTOR WHO: SERIES SEVEN PART 1 (EPISODES 1-7)
WINTER 2012- DOCTOR WHO: CHRISTMAS SPECIAL
SPRING 2013- DOCTOR WHO: SERIES SEVEN PART 2 (EPISODES 8-13)
SUMMER 2013- SHERLOCK: SERIES THREE
AUTUMN 2013- DOCTOR WHO: SERIES SEVEN PART 3 (ANNIVERSARY SPECIALS)
WINTER 2013- DOCTOR WHO: CHRISTMAS SPECIAL
Whether the Moff is able to get this much screen-time in the next two years remains to be seen, but at worst I'd wager we may have a two-year wait until Sherlock's third season, which shouldn't be too bad with Doctor Who so prominent from this Autumn onwards. One thing's for sure, though- we won't be finding out how that cliffhanger will be resolved for quite some time...