39 Times Benedict Cumberbatch Made The World A Better Place

Happy 39th birthday Benedict Cumberbatch!

To celebrate his big day, we made a list of 39 times everyone’s favourite Sherlock made the world a better, brighter, more Benedict-y place.

1. When he got this excited at Wimbledon

2. When he wore a flat cap backwards and didn’t give a damn what anyone thought

3. When he spoke at his distant relation Richard III’s internment and made us question whether or not it was morally okay to fancy someone at a funeral and we decided we just didn’t care

4. When he turned up to the GQ Man of the Year awards looking like THIS

5. That time he wore glasses

6. When he got this close to Tom Hiddleston and we had to sit down for a moment and count to ten so we didn’t pass out

7. When he photobombed U2 at the Oscars, basically reaching peak photobomb and thus negating the need for anyone else to try and top it. Ever.

8. That time the world found out that he basically can’t pronounce the word ‘penguin’ despite voicing a character in ‘Penguins of Madagascar’ and narrating an entire documentary about them

9. When he had THIS to say about his fans calling themselves ‘Cumberbitches’:

“I definitely didn’t [come up with it]. That’s part of my problem with it. I just went: ‘Ladies, this is wonderful. I’m very flattered, but has this not set feminism back a little bit? Empower yourselves if you’re going to get silly about a guy with maybe a little bit more of a sort of, you know, a high-regard, self-regarding name!’"

10. When he wore a white tuxedo to the Oscars

11. And gave us all unattainable relationship goals as we all saw how utterly besotted he is with his wife, Sophie Hunter

12. His ability to do this to women with a single look

13. When him and Sophie practically reinvented couples airport chic

14. When Benedict went old school and announced his wedding in The Times

15. When him and Eddie Redmayne basically defied the ageing process and looked like this when they were 33 and 27, respectively

16. When he had this to say about his engagement

17. When he danced like THIS

18. When even Jon Stewart got it

19. When he shut down a blatantly sexist question from an interviewer aimed at Keira Knightley

20. When he tried (and failed) to do the perfect Knightley pout

21. When he reacted exactly the same as we would if we had to sit through the Oscars knowing we wouldn’t win

22. When he got in a river in a tuxedo and we somehow lost the ability to speak

23. When he played Smaug. In a grey onesie.

24. When we all realised that there never was and never will be a better Sherlock Holmes

25. Like, seriously

26. How are we supposed to remain calm in the face of such brilliance?

27. When he became one half of our favourite ever TV duo

28. That moment when it looked like Sherlock and Watson were about to kiss and we nearly lost our damn minds

28. When he danced, like this, with Michael Fassbender after the Golden Globes and for a moment the world stopped turning on its axis

29. When he realised the Americans would never really get his name so kindly tried out a few others. Of course, none stuck.

30. When someone rightly pointed out that he looked remarkably like an otter

31. Right?

32. When he totally beat Jimmy Fallon in an Alan Rickman-off

33. He’s kinda the king of period dramas

34. He did the Ice Bucket Challenge that was both good for charity and us, his fans, cause then he looked like this

35. In fact, he did it like 10 times. Each more wonderful than the last

36. I die

37. When he let slip that he’s just as much of a diva about his birthday as the rest of us

38. When he even managed to make us root for the bad guy in Star Trek

39. When he looked like this 39 years ago

Happy birthday Benedict!

Image credit: Rex, Tumblr