• In David McDaniel's 1965 novel,
The Dagger Affair (The Man From U.N.C.L.E. No. 4), THRUSH satrap Ward Baldwin explains to the U.N.C.L.E. team working with him to save the world that THRUSH is the successor to Moriarty's 19th Century criminal organization. • In
Nicholas Meyer's 1974 revisionist novel,
The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, Moriarty is portrayed as Holmes' childhood
mathematics tutor, a whining little man with a guilty secret. He is incensed to hear that Holmes, apparently under the influence of
cocaine, has depicted him as a criminal mastermind. Due to Holmes' worsening condition, Moriarty threatens to tell the authorities about Holmes' addiction. Dr. Watson seeks the help of
Sigmund Freud, who uncovers the truth behind Holmes' perception of "the Napoleon of Crime". This is one of many works to seize on the fact that Moriarty never actually shows his face in the Holmes canon. The novel was made into a 1976 film and starred
Laurence Olivier as a very different sort of Professor Moriarty. •
John Gardner has written three novels featuring the arch-villain:
The Return of Moriarty (1974), in which the Professor, like Holmes, is shown to have survived the meeting at the Reichenbach,
The Revenge of Moriarty (1975) and
Moriarty (released posthumously in 2008 after the author's death in 2007). In these novels, Moriarty is depicted as a Victorian-era
Al Capone or
Don Corleone, who single-handedly controls London's
organised crime structure. "The Professor" is not really Moriarty, but Moriarty's younger brother, also named James, and as brilliant as his older brother, whom he impersonates, disgraces and murders, later stealing the deceased's identity. •
Kim Newman used Moriarty as a minor character in the first volume of his
Anno Dracula (1992) series; he claims to have given up his criminal interests, in the face of Count
Dracula's increasing domination of London, and become a
vampire in order to have infinite time to pursue his mathematical researches. Newman later wrote a series of short stories about Moriarty, narrated Watson-style by Colonel Moran, in which Moriarty interacts with many of his fictional contemporaries. They have been collected in ''
Moriarty: The Hound of the D'Urbervilles (2011). One of the stories, "The Red Planet League", first appeared in Gaslight Grimoire''. Another story, "The Adventure of the Greek Invertebrate" (a play on "
The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter", which introduced Sherlock Holmes' brother Mycroft), features Professor Moriarty's two brothers, also named James, the colonel and the station master, and offers an explanation for the lack of variety in their forenames. The last story, "The Problem of the Final Adventure", is a revisionist retelling of "
The Adventure of the Final Problem" from the other side. • Moriarty appears in a short story by
Donald Serrell Thomas, in his collection
The Secret Cases of Sherlock Holmes (1997), as the mastermind of a blackmail plot involving the alleged
bigamy of
Prince George. His younger brother, Col. James Moriarty, appears as the antagonist of another short story in Thomas'
The Execution of Sherlock Holmes (2007). •
The Titanic Tragedy by William Seil features Homes and Watson sailing on the RMS
Titanic on its maiden voyage to supervise secret plans being taken to America, and realise that one of the other passengers is Colonel James Moriarty, the professor's brother. Holmes explicitly notes that both Moriarty brothers were named "James" by their parents, reflecting that this lack of originality in the matter of names demonstrates the limited intellectual abilities of both parents and he was never sure how the professor turned out so brilliant. Colonel Moriarty turns out to be after the plans himself, with Holmes reflecting that he has the potential to be just as dangerous as his brother, but he dies in a confrontation with Holmes on the night of the sinking and Holmes manages to escape. •
Michael Kurland has written a series of five novels (
The Infernal Device,
Death by Gaslight,
The Great Game,
The Empress of India, and
Who Thinks Evil) and four short stories featuring Moriarty. • Moriarty appears in
Alan Moore's comic book series
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (1999–present). Recruited from university by British Intelligence, he supposedly set up his criminal empire as part of an undercover operation to monitor crime in London which got out of hand, to the point where the 'cover' became more real to Moriarty than his role in British Intelligence. Having survived the encounter with Holmes, he went on to become head of British Intelligence under the code-name "
M" but still maintained his criminal interests. He instigated the creation of the League as a
covert ops unit with
plausible deniability and used them to recover an anti-gravity mineral called
Cavorite which had been stolen by his crime lord rival
the Doctor. He used the Cavorite to bomb the
East End of London in an attempt to destroy the Doctor but was thwarted by the League which had uncovered the double-cross. Following his supposed death (indicated, but not clearly portrayed, as he "falls" into the sky while clutching the Cavorite), he was ironically succeeded as "M" by
Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's older brother. In
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier, it is suggested that
Jack Kerouac's Dean Moriarty (from
On the Road) is his great-grandson, and the rivalry between the two criminals is continued by the fact that the Doctor's great-grandson is Kerouac's other creation,
Doctor Sax. In the third volume, set more than six decades later,
Mina Murray comes across his carcass, still holding on to the Cavorite, inside a block of ice floating through space. • In
The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes (1999), set during Holmes' three-year fake "death", Holmes encounters Moriarty during his trip in
Tibet, where he learns that Moriarty is actually "the Dark One", a former Tibetan mystic possessing great psychic powers who lost his memories in an attack on the
Dalai Lama, only for his near-death experience on the Reichenbach Falls to restore his memory, albeit leaving him horribly crippled and disfigured by his injuries. He attempts to acquire a legendary crystal that would allow him to wield even greater power, but, although Moriarty acquires the crystal, boosting his powers and healing his injuries, he is defeated when it is revealed that Holmes is partly possessed by the spirit of the Dark One's old rival. Sharing the spirit of a former llama allows Holmes to wield similar powers to Moriarty's, utilizing these mental powers to delay his old enemy long enough for Holmes' ally, Huree Chunder Mockerjee, to knock the crystal away from Moriarty and into Holmes' hands, giving Holmes the power to turn Moriarty's own abilities against him, vaporising Moriarty's body and destroying him once and for all. • In
Neil Gaiman's short story "
A Study in Emerald" (2003), the Moriarty and Holmes of an
alternate history reverse roles. Moriarty (who, although never named as such in the story, is identified as the author of
Dynamics of an Asteroid) is hired to investigate a murder. The murder has apparently been carried out by Sherlock Holmes (who signs his name Rache, an allusion to Doyle's first novel starring Holmes and Watson,
A Study in Scarlet, in which "Rache"—German for "revenge"—is found written above the body of a murder victim) and Dr. Watson. The story is narrated by
Colonel Sebastian Moran, given the rank of Major (Ret.) by Gaiman. • In a 2006 comic book story featuring
Lee Falk's
The Phantom, the 19th Phantom has to fight Moriarty; the climax of the story features the Phantom and Moriarty falling down a waterfall in the Bangalla jungle. At the end of the story, Moriarty is shown to be alive, as he returns to London to find "a detective named Sherlock Holmes". • In the comic series
Victorian Undead (2010), Holmes and Watson must face a 'reborn' Moriarty as he unleashes a zombie plague on London, having survived his own death via a modified zombie formula that allows Moriarty to retain his intellect despite his deathly state. • In
Paco Ignacio Taibo II's "The Return of the Tigers of Malaysia" (2010), Dr James Moriarty appears as the mastermind behind the attacks on
Sandokan and his friend Yanez. • In
Anthony Horowitz' 2011 novel
The House of Silk, a chapter is dedicated to Watson's meeting with a secretive criminal mastermind. This character is not definitively identified, however it is heavily implied that he is Moriarty. Watson later states that he believes this to be the case, and in an appendix Horowitz states the identity of the character outright. Moriarty also appears as a corpse in
Moriarty, the 2014 sequel to this novel, in which Pinkerton detective Frederick Chase is investigating the events that took place at the Reichenbach Falls. • In
The Thinking Engine (2015) by
James Lovegrove, set in 1895—specifically at the same time as the events of "
The Adventure of the Three Students"—Holmes is called to challenge the Thinking Engine, an early computer that is seemingly capable of solving crimes using the same deductive abilities as Holmes himself. As the novel unfolds, Holmes realizes that every case the Engine has been called on to solve was committed by a perpetrator who had to be assisted by someone else to come up with such an intellectual scheme. In the final confrontation, Holmes and his allies realize that the Thinking Engine is actually a hollow construct with Moriarty inside it; he survived the confrontation at the Reichenbach Falls as he was wearing a specially designed body armour that protected his vital organs, although his limbs were so injured that his legs and one arm have been amputated and he can still barely speak on his own due to damage to his larynx. With his deception exposed, Moriarty apparently dies due to complications of the drugs being used to medicate his injuries, although it is strongly implied that Holmes gave him a deliberate overdose to prevent the risk of a trial allowing Moriarty to escape again. • In
Sherlock Holmes and the Servants of Hell (2016) by
Paul Kane, it is revealed that Moriarty was able to escape his demise by using an incantation to transfer himself into the realm of the
Cenobites, where he is transformed into the 'Engineer' of the Cenobites, intending to mount a new assault on Earth. Holmes is able to make a deal with the master Cenobites to transform himself into a Cenobite to oppose Moriarty's forces, the final confrontation seeing Moriarty destroyed once again, while Watson is able to make his own deal to restore Holmes to normal. •
The Martian Menace by
Eric Brown (2020) is essentially a sequel to
The War of the Worlds, looking at Holmes having come out of retirement after the Martian invasion was thwarted and diplomatic relations were established with the red planet. After Holmes is invited to Mars to investigate the death of a Martian philosopher, he and Watson learn that the Martians are not only attempting a second invasion using remote-controlled humanoid robots, but they were aided in their initial invasion by Moriarty, having rescued Moriarty from death and using his criminal expertise. However, the Martians betrayed Moriarty by trapping him in a complex device that kept him on the brink of death while forced to continue advising them, prompting Moriarty to subtly work to undermine their second invasion attempt by discreetly setting up a resistance movement against the Martians and even drawing Holmes into the scheme. A final confrontation between the two ends with Holmes turning off Moriarty's life support systems on the request of his old adversary, Holmes later informing the Martian leaders that they were defeated precisely because they abused Moriarty when if they had agreed with the initial terms he would have continued to serve as their ally. •
Sherlock Holmes and the Beast of the Stapeltons by
James Lovegrove (2020) is essentially a sequel to
The Hound of the Baskervilles, where Holmes and Watson learn that their old ally, Doctor James Mortimer, is actually Moriarty's step-brother; his mother married Moriarty's father, and Doctor Mortimer was the one who wrote the letters defending his brother's memory under the alias of station-master Colonel Moriarty. • In
The Cthulhu Casebooks by
James Lovegrove, presenting an alternate version of Holmes' cases where he and Watson regularly faced the Great Old Ones of
H. P. Lovecraft's work, Moriarty is the antagonist of the first novel,
Sherlock Holmes and the Shadwell Shadows (2016), set in 1881, where he attempts various sacrifices to win the aid of the old god Nyarlathotep, but is drawn in by his would-be god when he attempts to sacrifice Holmes, Watson, Mycroft and Gregson, although Holmes speculates that he has some plan to return. • In the sequel,
Sherlock Holmes and the Miskatonic Monstrosities (2017), Holmes and Watson learn in 1896 that Moriarty's willing sacrifice of himself to Nyarlathotep gave him the strength of will to consume his would-be god's power for himself, leading some of the other Outer Gods against the Old Ones in preparation for an assault on Earth due to his greater ambition and drive. Holmes and Watson are able to defeat Moriarty's current assault by destroying his human agent, but they are each aware that Moriarty will return. • In the conclusion of the trilogy,
Sherlock Holmes and the Sussex Sea-Devils, set in 1910, after killing Mycroft Holmes and various other old allies of Sherlock with his mortal agents, Moriarty captures Holmes and Watson with the intention of taking them to witness his destruction of Cthulhu's physical form as his Outer God forces destroy Cthulhu's mind on the higher planes, which he believes will allow him to kill Cthulhu and ensure his own dominance. However, Holmes had secretly made a deal with Cthulhu years ago to maintain his own vitality while hunting Cthulhu's enemies on this plane, and when Holmes grants permission for Cthulhu to take back what was given, it gives Cthulhu such a power boost that he recovers from the injuries inflicted by Moriarty's efforts, with the two last shown engaging in a physical struggle as they ascend into the higher planes. • In the manga series
Moriarty the Patriot written by Ryōsuke Takeuchi and illustrated by Hikaru Miyoshi, the story follows a young Moriarty and his two brothers, expanding on their motives for following a path of crime. • In New Paradigm Studios comic series
Holmes and Watson (set in modern day Harlem with the characters being African-Americans), Moriarty is a "software giant/record label/movie studio/clothing brand" alluded to throughout the comic. In "Music. A Treat For the Gods, Doctor...", a modernization of "A Scandal in Bohemia," William King of Bohemia Record Labels attempts to sell Irene Adlero's song to the Moriarty label. ==Video games==