XistentialAngst's Blog, page 156

Sherlock (TV series) - A Pen Holder with Spades

bug-catcher-in-viridian-forest:

THE PENHOLDER
Sherlock keeps a pen holder on the desk in 221B’s living room.
This pen holder has printed on it the following French playing cards, in this order:

Jack of Spades;

Queen

of Spades;



King

of Spades;



Ace

of Spades;

The front face of the pen holder seems to change according to themes.

A STUDY IN PINK
The Ace of Spades is on the front face.

THE BLIND BANKER


The Ace of Spades is on the front

face.

THE GREAT GAME


The Ace of Spades is on the front

face.

A SCANDAL IN BELGRAVIA
The front face alternates between the Jack and the Queen of Spades.


Jack:

Queen:

Jack:

Queen:

THE HOUNDS OF BASKERVILLE


The Jack of Spades is on the front

face.

THE REICHENBACH FALL
Initially, the Jack of Spades is on the front

face.

Then the front face changes to the Queen of Spades, while Sherlock confronts John about the possibility that he’s starting to believing he’s a fraud.


Even if the Queen is on the actual front face, the camera is positioned in such a way that the King of Spades is almost entirely facing the camera.


This happens just mere minutes after the last shot in-universe, which might indicate an intentional change of the pen holder’s front face specifically for the shot in which Sherlock confronts John about believing the lies.
The Queen remains in the actual front the moment after, when the camera changes position.

THE EMPTY HEARSE


The Queen of Spades is on the front face.

THE SIGN OF THREE


The Queen of Spades is on the front face, even in the flashbacks from years before (one of which reuses footage from A Scandal In Belgravia).

HIS LAST VOW
The Queen if Spade is on the front face.

OVERVIEW AND SIGNIFICANCE

SERIES 1
Front face: Ace of Spades.
Possible significance:

It might represent Sherlock not being keen on forming relationships.
It might represent Sherlock’s suicidal tendencies, as the card is nicknamed the Death Card.

SERIES 2
A SCANDAL IN BELGRAVIA
Front face: Alternates between the Jack and the Queen of Spades.
Possible significance:

The Jack of Spades might stand for his developing relationship with John, as they get closer following their encounter with Moriarty.
Jack is in fact a short form of John and the card is even nicknamed as such.The Queen of Spades might stand for Irene Adler, the main antagonist of the episode, who has black hair and often dresses in black.
The alternation between the Jack and the Queen of Spades might represent the confusion that the episode deliberately creates as to who is the object of Sherlock’s affection, whether John or Irene Adler.

SERIES 2
THE HOUNDS OF BASKERVILLE AND PART OF THE REICHENBACH FALL
Front face: Jack of Spades
Possible significance:

The Jack of Spades might stand for his developing relationship with John. See the explanation for A Scandal In Belgravia.
At this point it seems that their relationship has become pretty strong and that John has stopped dating to be with Sherlock.

SERIES 2
LAST PART OF THE REICHENBACH FALL 


Front face: King of Spades faces the camera, probably intentionally, even if the Queen of Spades is in the usual front face.
Possible significance:

Sherlock is confronting John about believing the lies Moriarty has spread.
This is the moment when Moriarty starts to come between Sherlock and John, which will eventually lead to them being separated for two years.
Moriarty is presented as a king during the episode.

SERIES 3
Front face: Queen of Spades
Possible significance:

During this series Sherlock and John are separated as John is engaged and later married to Mary Morstan.
Mary eventually turns out to be a villain in this series, during a scene in which she’s dressed in full black.
Furthermore, Black Maria (being Maria a variant of Mary) in one of the surnames of the card.Plus the King of Spades, who thoeretically would be married to the Queen, is called David (after the biblical king), like Mary’s ex, whose main scene features the Queen of Spades right next to him in the background.

God, this show and meta! Great catch.

thesetison:So this happened… (x)Awesome. :-)

thesetison:

So this happened… (x)

Awesome. :-)

hudders-and-hiddles:hudders-and-hiddles:I managed to make it as far as “He still made it back...

hudders-and-hiddles:

hudders-and-hiddles:

I managed to make it as far as “He still made it back fine, as Mary intended,” before I totally lost it and collapsed into a ten minute fit of laughter.

I actually read every single variation of that post, and my fave bit might be the part where someone bent over backwards to claim that Sherlock’s death was, essentially, his own fault because he clearly got high again after coming back from the drug den and therefore the anesthesiologist didn’t know there were drugs in his system and THAT’s what killed him. And not, you know, the fact that his best friend’s wife shot him in the fucking chest. Clearly he’s the one who should be held at fault here.

What kind of victim blaming nonsense

It honestly strikes me as someone trolling and trying to purposefully yank people’s chain. Nobody can be that stupid.

"[Benedict’s] Richard III makes Khan look like a utter pussycat in comparison."

“[Benedict’s] Richard III makes Khan look like a utter pussycat in comparison.”

-

[x]

(via mental-leaps)

Cool! Can’t wait. :-)

the apple meta 2.0

welovethebeekeeper:

consultingwives:

So the first apple meta that I wrote I actually started very shortly after series three aired and didn’t publish until a couple of weeks ago. A lot of people had some really awesome ideas about what other ways the apples could be symbolic in terms of tjlc. And then I kind of got thinking about Appledore and how that fits in. 

So I present to you: the apple meta 2.0, a slightly more coherent synthesis of ideas. I’m going to go through the chronological appearances of apples, and credit the people who tacked onto my meta and noticed things that I didn’t. 

First though, let’s agree that the apples are capable of representing two things: sex, and temptation. They’re really intricately tied together and I don’t think they’re at all two separate symbols, I think both meanings can get lumped together.

One (@madfoxx)

John places an apple next to his army mug, which has a snake on it. As madfoxx pointed out, this is pretty blatant symbolism that John’s about to experience temptation via his sexual attraction to Sherlock. I also would add that the position of the two objects next to each other shows us how he’s already experienced gay temptation in the army, through his relationship with Sholto. Jolto is #confirmed. 

Two 

The basket of apples starts showing up in series 2, when John and Sherlock have found level of comfort with each other that makes their relationship imminent. The amount of love and sexual attraction between the two is at its peak, as John reveals the amount of jealously that he really harbors towards Irene, as the gay innkeepers apologize for not giving them a double room, and as John learns about his tabloid nickname and accusations start flying (”You and John Watson, just platonic?!”). I don’t doubt that if Sherlock hadn’t faked his death, that they eventually would have resolved the tension. It’s a common thread through each episode of this series, and shows up in some of the promo pictures. 

Three (@ebaeschnbliah and @madfoxx)

Moriarty bites the apple (he “croque”s the “pomme”, which is slang for having sex in French) and carves the letters “I” and “U” around the “O” created by the bite. So he’s sexually propositioning him, trying to tempt him. “U” and “I” is also very telling. This apple also comes from Sherlock and John’s basket, showing that Moriarty is ready to mess with their apples; he’s meddling in their relationship, and it ends with the apples going away altogether at the beginning of series 3.

Four (@may-shepard, @isitandwonder, @ebaeschnbliah and @just-sort-of-happened)

Here’s the culmination: both Appledore and an actual physical apple show up in the same scene. I already looked it up, “dore” is essentially meaningless unless we interpret it as “door”. It’s the last checkpoint, or door, that Sherlock and John have to pass through in order to realize their relationship. Or the last season finale, perhaps. It’s a key to getting to the apples, their sexual relationship, and the apex of the temptation that both have experienced towards each other. (Thanks @may-shepard for asking about Appledore!) 

There’s also a decorative apple present in the scene, as @ebaeschnbliah pointed out. I see this as being representative of the perceived sexual/romantic relationship between Sherlock and John, as most people in the series (i.e. Angelo, Mrs. Hudson, Mycroft at the beginning of series one, etc) perceive them as being a couple. They’re not, however; the apple is fake, no one is biting into it. It is, however, flanked by cupids as ebaeschnbilah pointed out. So there’s potential there. It could become real. 

Five (@isitandwonder)

Finally, as many people, including @may-shepard have pointed out, the maid in tab is a mirror for Sherlock, and as she sasses John, there’s an apple between them. She points out that his relationship with Mary seems strained, as the fruit basket shows us that the potential for his and Sherlock’s sexual relationship has truly blossomed for the first time since series 2, due to the tense relationship between John and Mary and the ways in which their marriage seems to be falling apart. Namely, they spend no time together, and John’s obsessed with Sherlock (the maid is reading his latest story, whereas the same maid in the canon is distracted by reading a love story). So they’ve crossed the last border, the “apple door”, and they’re finally on their way to croquer la pomme, bite the apple, to yield to temptation. The stage is set, the curtain rises. We are ready to begin. 

Great meta!

sherlockundercover:Lester being paranoid but still super hot...

sherlockundercover:

Lester being paranoid but still super hot in his new blue coat.

Amazing how good he looks here, especially compared to the first episode Lester. 

consultingwives:i mean, honestly, for all the awesome stuff we’ve caught and all the great and...

consultingwives:

i mean, honestly, for all the awesome stuff we’ve caught and all the great and amazing subtext that lsit and rebekah everyone else has found, i have only ever needed five basic facts to convince anyone of tjlc. 

the bbc did a study and resolved to commission more lgb works the year that sherlock was commissioned.

mark gatiss is an openly gay man.
steven moffat, whom many perceive as being the holdout, has written two iterations of married lesbian detectives.
both identify tplosh, whose writer has said he wished he had gone farther with the relationship between john and sherlock, as their favorite adaptation. 
they have said they’ve never disagreed on anything.

i mean that’s it, i’ve converted people, especially other queer people, in sixty seconds with just those five facts, because together they debunk any reasons that people could possibly come up with for not having it happen. 

it’s just so implausible that it won’t happen at this point, there’s no need to doubt. (also credits to rebekah @softsons because this list comes from her first tjlce video) 

Love this! TLJC in a kid-friendly bite-sized package.

Thoughts on this week’s setlock; week 4.

welovethebeekeeper:

Weekly random musings, on this weeks ‘Tale of Two Cities’ Cardiff and London.

We started the week with a wonderfully typical setlock deduction after Arwel tweeted a photo of Sue V at an outdoor location ready to watch filming. There was partial street sign behind her. It took @constancecream and myself exactly 11 minutes to nail the location; Sue was opposite the Watson house. We dispatched our setlock sleuths, @StreetwiseLee and @sherlockmanor, who were in the field, to the location. The operation went like clockwork. The intel started to come in to the fandom and we were off and running for a great week of setlocking.

Benedict and Loo were on scene at an apparently John and Mary less flat, but baby Watson [age 2-3 months] made her first appearance to her public in Molly’s arms. The overall impression of this scene was of a ‘worried’ Sherlock. 
Our agents in the field did a fantastic job with the first photos of Benedict filming, although @sherlockmanor was down for a few seconds when she fainted at seeing the beautiful man in person, however she managed to tweet the first photo of him. Then @StreetwiseLee ran in to computer problems and we all waited with baited breath for her photo of Loo and the baby. It was worth it. Great job both agents. 
Filming moved on to Cyncoed Road and a red brick mansion, or was it the white stucco mansion next door? Much speculation about the red brick being Mycroft’s house, but our elite setlock team of @cupidford and @miadifferent ruled that out as a strong probable when they matched the location of Mycroft’s house to Miskin Manor, Pontyclun. Although they concede that the red brick could be a location for some very Miskin Manor like shots of Mycroft’s abode. 
Apparently most of the action was taking place behind the white stucco and red brick houses. SA’s dressed as police and SOCO agents, Mycroft, Lestrade and Sherlock were in the scene. My thoughts went to chemical weapons being involved at an official residence in London.
Then we had the setlock incident of a leaked call sheet. A couple of fans saw an old call sheet on the dash of a parked van. They teased it’s info, backtracked when Amanda found out and told them not to reveal anything, then finally released partial information. The baby is played by boy/girl twins Freddie and Annabelle, the call sheet appeared to be from the day of the Margam Abbey shoot and there was an actor on the list that ‘could’ have been cast as the vicar. Nothing really earth shattering.

Next we moved to London filming. Not our usual North Gower Street port of call but the busy Borough Market. Enter Denver the bloodhound, maybe cast as a modern version of Toby, the dog Holmes ofter used in canon on cases, however Denver was more of a model/close up type of guy, less action more projection. He was not overly impressed by the content of his scene and became a tad difficult. Eventually he had a human stand in and it worked much better. 
Baby Watson appeared again, a slightly older incarnation, maybe 5-6 months, in a pink bunny suit. Now my mind went to bunnies and rabbits in the show. Baby Watson = pink bunny = blue bunny =  bluebelle = Isabelle Watson = Izzy Watson = IS she a Watson?  OK, I know, I will go to any lengths to get her as far away from John as possible. So sue me. 
The smoke and mirrors of the baby and the dog filming led us to overlook a main clue here; the large freezer and a tracker dog. We see but we do not observe. Hormones kicking in to feel maternal/paternal and our deduction skills plummet, Sherlock would be appalled.
Onto a boring shoot in Trinity Church Square, just a sequence shot.
Next day we are hit right between the eyes by lonely fucking Sherlock on Vauxhall Bridge. He was so forlorn. Talk about hormones kicking in, I wanted to rescue him from his sad sorry state by finding and dragging damn John Watson onto that bridge and handcuffing him to his one true love. STAY WITH HIM! Mycroft told you this once, but did you listen? John, look at Sherlock! Look at his face! Now stay put, at his side. Forget your smirking, manipulative, arrogant wife, just stay next to Sherlock, how hard can that be???? Anyhoo, we had a bit of running, a nice white shirt view of muscles [thank you London meterological office for arranging a moment of warmth] some PR shots looking at the Thames, and a possible Moriarty look-a-like sighting.
Our own @cupidford had it all under control, reporting from the site like a pro. She even interviewed crew to get some intel. Most notably, from a very reliable source, that earlier in the day a secret scene had been filmed inside the MI6 Building, in rooms not usually used by film crew. it was a Sherlock and John scene, with only Rachel, the assistant director and the camera crew present. YES!!! 
The day continued with filming in the evening at the London Aquarium, reportedly in the area of the tunnel under the huge tank, which does contain some sharks. This brings us to the dialogue in HLV, see my post on this; http://welovethebeekeeper.tumblr.com/post/143573682088/the-shark [how the hell do you do the x versus the huge link?] Now a man is compared to a shark in canon, no not Milverton, in the Mazarin Stone it is Count Sylvius. Now MAZA, in Holmesian History is considered to be the worse story in canon. It’s odd, it sits outside the usual and when reading it, the story feels very different to the others. Holmes fans know MAZA is an anomaly, it’s the cuckoo in the nest. Hello Mark and Steven!! Hi!!! It is oft considered to be written by a GHOST writer, or Doyle was having a very ‘off’ day. A nice little fanboy clue there? Bless ‘em.
God this week we had a lot of setlock; look at the length of this post? I digress: we should move on to the Curious Incident in Bonnington Square.
Rundown house of Vine Lodge, Mary inside with baby when John and Sherlock arrive by cab. Hello….liking this scenario. Sherlock rings door bell or knocks, Mary delivers Denver/Toby to Sherlock then tells John to take the baby. He looks surprised, then disapproving. [Trust me I do this for a living, I’m one of best in the UK, I know…but it’s true] The small scene was verified by video and also @cupidford, who added that Mary seemed a bit ‘ingenious’. Liking this scene so much more now. We are seeing Manipulative Mary again. When we link the “Toby’ scenes we have the narrative of Sherlock and John arriving at a location, probably to pick up the dog [canon compliant] finding Mary already there, Mary telling them that she and baby Izzy are going along on the investigation, they walk and Mary is taking over as lead on the case as she thinks the two men are idiots.
Finally….phew, it’s the Miles Street Tunnel Delivery Boys. An Audi, [similar to HLV Audi but different colour] is in the tunnel and apparently a HLV prego Mary is pushing a baby out in the back seat. Sherlock is in the front seat, I am sure in both disgust at the event he has found himself involved in, whilst also being in total awe at how well his boyfriend takes command and delivers a child. John is literally delivering his own fate, his own problem, if this is the scenario. Again we have the threesome, polyamory implied, which is a remnant from canon and a Victorian mentality shown in TAB. However in the modern Au the writers are showing us that this will not work, why? Because 1/ Mary is evil, a liar, corrupt, and a psychopath who will only tolerate people as possessions, and 2/ John and Sherlock are in love and really only want it to be ‘the two of us against the rest of the world’. The tunnel, the birth, the small delivery space in a small Audio [!!!??] All scream of pressure, secrets, repression, suppression, cramped relationship, and the birth of something new, something good from all this. Whatever the writers have planned for us, they have the backs of John Watson and Sherlock Holmes. Rest easy on that.

I expect episode 1 of series 4 to be almost done by this coming week. Hints are they plan to move straight into episode 2, so they are filming in order. Just look for news of new director, lets keep vigilant for Mary/baby involvement in next 2 episodes, don’t forget ring watch, and I do think that the three words maybe ADVENTURE, ROMANCE AND TERROR. So episode 2 may be our 3GAR episode. Episode 2 in a series always reveals a great deal about TJLC; TBB [yes it did on reflection] HoB and TSOT all had, at their heart, romance. Exciting isn’t it? Just don’t panic. It’s seldom as it seems.

constancecream:[x]

constancecream:

[x]

johnwatlock:Martin talks about being on Love Actually tonight...

johnwatlock:

Martin talks about being on Love Actually tonight on The GN Show