To prepare you for number three, here’s how the first two delighted me.

I’ve made a big mistake of not reviewing the first two “Enola Holmes” movies on Netflix, but with the third movie premiering this Friday, I’ve been given another chance to see them. Millie Bobby Brown plays Enola Holmes, the youngest sister of Sherlock Holmes. Not only is this young lady based on the Nancy Springer books, but she also has a knack for breaking the fourth wall. She deduces that we’re all here watching her every move.

The first movie released in 2020 says that Enola is “alone” spelled backwards, and that’s why her bad ass mother (Helena Bonham Carter) named her that, and yet, they’ve spent a lot of quality time together. Until her old lady disappears, leaving only secret messages. Some of them through Scrabble tiles.

Sherlock (Henry Cavill) knows she’s smart, while their older brother Mycroft (Sam Clafin) thinks she’s troublesome and wants to send her to a boarding school to become a proper lady. But she leaves home to find their mother and to skip out on boarding school. How can she kill two birds with one stone here? Elementary, my dear Watson.

Things get more challenging for her, when a rich young man named Viscount Tewkesbury (Louis Patridge) crosses her path and is trying to dodge a killer (Burn Gorman). And when she finds herself in the boarding school, she fails to impress the headmistress (Fiona Shaw). But Enola is a clever young lady and will overcome the obstacles.

Certain plot points go on a little long, but there’s a lot of enjoy about the first “Enola Holmes.” Such as our introduction to Brown’s delightful and strong-willed performance and the power of women in such a time period. And while Cavill delivers the charms as Sherlock, Carter has the right kind of attitude as their mother.

Then, we move on to “Enola Holmes 2,” which has her starting a detective agency to no success. That is until a little girl named Bessie (Serrana Su-Ling Bliss) asks her to help her find her foster sister Sarah (Hannah Dodd). And then, she’s accused of murder by a corrupt police superintendent (David Thewlis), who may be part of bigger. Something that caused the Matchgirls’ strike.

This sequel is even better than the first, because of the stakes that the main heroine is placed in. One of them regards Enola, her mother, and the martial arts instructor Edith (Susan Wokoma) fighting some bad cops during a jailbreak. And it even allows her to find out she’s been in love with Tewkesbury all along.

Both “Enola Holmes” entries are part of another whodunit franchise that delivers on the twists and turns, as well as the sense of humor and adventure to help elevate it. And it does make sense that she would be Sherlock’s younger sister, because she possesses the same mind and logics as him.

I should kick myself for missing on these films in the past, but with “Enola Holmes 3” streaming on Netflix soon, I’m glad I was given another chance to see them. “Better late than never,” one may say. For now, the game is a foot with finding out how the third one compares with the first two.

“Enola Holmes”

“Enola Holmes 2”

Both Movies Now Streaming on Netflix