Martin Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch may have played best pals in Sherlock - but the reality could not have been more different.
On camera they played inseparable friends Sherlock Holmes and Doctor John Watson for four series, although many believe there would have been another if the two leads had actually got on.
The pair reportedly did not spend time together in between shooting scenes and hadn't developed a friendship over the six years working together.
"Benedict and Martin aren't mates and they don't spend time together away from the show," a source told The Sun in January 2017.
"They're professional and very polite to each other but there's not the warmth you'd expect after filming together for six years. There isn't a huge desire to come back for another season."
Their "frosty relationship" has mostly been kept under wraps, but it was exposed when one was labelled "pathetic" by the other.
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The Office star Freeman had described his unhappiness with the intense fan attention generated by Sherlock.
"Being in that show, it is a mini-Beatles thing. People’s expectations, some of it’s not fun anymore," he huffed.
"It’s not a thing to be enjoyed, it’s a thing of: ‘You better f***ing do this, otherwise you’re a c***.’ That’s not fun anymore. It's not a thing to be enjoyed."
However, Cumberbatch disagreed during an interview with The Telegraph in April 2018 and slammed his co-star's comments.
Hitting back, he said: "I’m very grateful for the support, but that’s about it. It takes on its own thing. But that happens with every franchise or entity like this.
"It’s pretty pathetic if that’s all it takes to let you not want to take a grip of your reality. What, because of expectations? I don’t necessarily agree with that."
Cumberbatch's scathing remarks may have come as a shock to fans of the BBC series, but many in the industry were already aware of the simmering tension between the pair.
When Benedict married Sophie Hunter in February 2015, Sherlock viewers started speculating that Martin would be his best man.
However, he was not even pictured at the nuptials, although Andrew Scott who played villain Moriarty was seen at the Isle of Wight Service.
Perhaps giving an indication into their relationship at the time, Cumberbatch made a joke when asked about the internet campaigns to get Freeman to be his best man.
"I’m sure they do, I’m sure they do," he said, then added: "I think we’ll let the internet talk to Martin Freeman."
Freeman was also very adamant that their characters would not end up as lovers, despite it being the dream of many die hard fans.
"There was a chunk of people who just knew it was going to end with us getting together," the actor told The Telegraph.
"Me and Ben, we have literally never, never played a moment like lovers. We ain’t f***ing lovers."
Their rivalry was said to have started almost as soon as they were cast as they had similar profiles in the showbiz world.
Freeman, 50, rose to fame as Tim Canterbury in The Office in 2001, while 45-year-old Cumberbatch made it big as Julian Assange in 2013's Fifth Estate and Alan Turing in The Imitation Game in 2014.
Some believe that there may have been jealousy involved and cite an interview given by Martin about his co-star's growing profile in 2014 after he received an Oscar nomination.
"The trajectory of [Benedict’s rise] is very extreme. It’s deserved in his case, because he’s really good," said Freeman, who then claimed it was not for him.
"But to that extent? No thanks. I like to be a moving target. I’ve got enough madness in my life without it being there all the time."
Awkwardly, the pair would then go on to appear in The Hobbit movies together.
But this time it was Martin in the limelight as leading man Bilbo Baggins, while Benedict did voice and motion capture for the villains, Smaug the dragon and the evil lord Sauron.
Both are also now part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe but in quite contrasting roles.
Cumberbatch's stock has risen massively since signing a multi-picture deal to play Doctor Stephen Strange, most recently wowing audiences in Spider-Man No Way Home and in his self-titled movie in 2016.
While Freeman has appeared in two Marvel movies, Captain America: Civil War and Black Panther, as lesser known character Everett K. Ross, a US State Department employee who will also appear in the upcoming film Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
They have not yet shared any scenes together in the MCU but there is the possibility it could happen in the future.
As for Sherlock, a fifth series has been written but creator Steven Moffat has stated that whether it is made depends on the two stars.
"Re: Sherlock's future - for those of you asking, it's definitely the end. Of Chapter One," Moffat wrote in 2017.
"Dr Watson is now Doyle's brave widower and Sherlock Holmes has become the wise and humane version of the main run of the stories (we've focused, so far, on the cold Holmes of the early days.)
"Whether we ever get to Chapter Two - our boys consciously living the myth and battling wrong-doers - rather depends on our two stars. I'd be slightly surprised if we never made it again. But I've been surprised before."
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