Earlier this year, actor Martin Freeman revealed that a special one-off episode of Sherlock might air between seasons.  This was exciting news, as the time-consuming schedule of putting together a full season of Sherlock is pretty difficult now that Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch are very in-demand actors, meaning season four is likely a few years away.  Now Freeman has offered a bit of clarity regarding the one-off, revealing that a Sherlock Christmas special is in the works, likely to be released in December 2015.  Hit the jump for more.

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Image via PBS

Speaking with The Telegraph, Freeman revealed that the BBC is putting together a Sherlock Christmas special, with a December 2015 release looking likely:

“If that’s going to be a special - I’m speaking off-message here; if this was New Labour I’d get fired - I think that might be for next Christmas. A Christmas special. That’s what I understand.”

Freeman noted that filming probably won’t get underway until early 2015 given his and Cumberbatch’s busy schedules, but did add that his real-life wife Amanda Abbington is poised to return as Watson’s wife Mary, saying she’s on the show “for the foreseeable future.”

I absolutely adore Sherlock so it’s great to hear that we’ll probably get a new episode later next year.  Though I’m certainly eager to see season four in full, I understand aligning the schedules of Freeman and Cumberbatch—not to mention showrunner Steven Moffat, who’s also busy running Doctor Who—is very tough.

Freeman was most recently seen on the well-received FX miniseries Fargo and returns for the third and final installment of The Hobbit trilogy, The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies, this December.  As for Cumberbatch, he plays WWII mathematician Alan Turing in The Imitation Game, has a voice role in The Penguins of Madagascar, and also returns as Smaug in The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies.

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Image via PBS