XistentialAngst's Blog, page 99
July 31, 2016
EMP - Just Might Be
Since TAB aired there have been discussions about what was real and what was not real. And then I saw mentions of another meta theory that possibly more than TAB might be a dream state. (EMP = Extended Mind Palace or extended dream state)
My initial reaction to this was ‘nah’. Mainly because I felt like you can get away with the ‘just kidding, it was only a dream’ thing only so long before it just becomes a joke. I thought the some of the plane scenes and the final plane-leaving scene in TAB were real. Clearly, there is one scene in there (the scene where suddenly Sherlock wakes up in a bed and then later is attacked by a skeleton in a grave) which can’t be real, but I though probably the other ‘current day’ scenes were.
However, I’ve just been sort of blow away by the John’s Choice meta by tjlcisthenewsexy. Definitely go read the whole thing, but basically the idea is that everything in HLV from the scene in 221B where John and Sherlock confront Mary, and Sherlock collapses and the ambulance comes, is a dream or a series of dreams.
Omg, thank you so much for this incredible summary of my meta and EMP in general….it was really interesting to read your perspective and I’m so glad it rang true for you. I literally only just started watching DW and my mind was blown when I found this stuff. I agree with basically everything you said here, especially BC’s very interesting comment at sdcc about shooting Magnussen being a “failure”, and I really hadn’t considered that aspect of it; that not only does John choose Mary in the modern dream, but Sherlock makes an enormous mistake (expecting everything to be clever) and that he has to resort to murder. He truly fails in every respect. I totally agree that Moftiss have always played with reality in this show and this is not that different, and I’m absolutely confident that if this is what they’ve set up, then it’s going to be awesome, *especially* if it fixes all those issues with HLV that you mention that SO many of us are feeling confused and unsatisfied about.
Thank you so much for writing this!
I’m glad you liked it. Thank you for your John’s Choice meta.
I just watched HLV again. They certainly don’t broadcast this possibility in HLV. There’s not a lot of dream-weirdness in it, even when I was really looking for it, not until TAB. At this point I could see EITHER it being EMP or John having a secret plan to take out Mary, but the later doesn’t explain the lack-of-real-overdose or some of the visual glitches (like Mycroft’s tie). Nor does it justify them skipping all the months between the shooting and Christmas–unless they flash back to those during S4. But yes, I think EMP is a real possibility. I wouldn’t have seen it myself.
They’re so tricksy it’s hard to be 100% sure of anything, but I can definitely see EMP, especially with the John-baby-Mary-dog sequence from E1. Since the baby vanishes after that it sure seems to be a mind projection only.
byebyefrost:
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This post cleared my skin and sent me to sleep with a kiss…
EMP - Just Might Be
Since TAB aired there have been discussions about what was real and what was not real. And then I saw mentions of another meta theory that possibly more than TAB might be a dream state. (EMP = Extended Mind Palace or extended dream state)
My initial reaction to this was ‘nah’. Mainly because I felt like you can get away with the ‘just kidding, it was only a dream’ thing only so long before it just becomes a joke. I thought the some of the plane scenes and the final plane-leaving scene in TAB were real. Clearly, there is one scene in there (the scene where suddenly Sherlock wakes up in a bed and then later is attacked by a skeleton in a grave) which can’t be real, but I though probably the other ‘current day’ scenes were.
However, I’ve just been sort of blow away by the John’s Choice meta by tjlcisthenewsexy. Definitely go read the whole thing, but basically the idea is that everything in HLV from the scene in 221B where John and Sherlock confront Mary, and Sherlock collapses and the ambulance comes, is a dream or a series of dreams.
I’ve never been a Dr. Who watcher, but the John’s Choice meta references two Dr. Who episodes where the characters keep waking up from a dream only to later realize they’re still dreaming. Further, the one called “Amy’s Choice” is one in which a character dreams two separate paths, two separate lives, depending on a choice she makes.
This could mirror what’s going on in Sherlock. Let’s suppose the ending of HLV, from Christmas on, is Sherlock working through John choosing Mary in a dream. How would that play out? He ends up having to shoot Magnussen in order to protect John because John has chosen to go back to his assassin wife. Sherlock is then sent into exile and tries to kill himself on the plane. This is what life looks like if John chooses Mary.
TAB is the dream-within-a-dream in which Sherlock imagines John choosing HIM. In TAB, John is still married to Mary, but he basically ignores her and spends all his time with Sherlock. Mary isn’t pregnant (lessening John’s ties to her and her threat to Sherlock). And by the end of TAB, it’s just John and Sherlock, the two of them, always.
The reference to the Dr. Who episodes helped me see how this could actually work story structure wise without seeming too dorky or eye-rollingly ridiculous. After all, they play with all sorts of crazy stuff in Sherlock, from the time skipping of TSoT to Sherlock’s mind palace sequences. So yes, it could work.
Plus, TAB set up the ‘dream state’ idea, didn’t it? If we can accept that was a dream or mind palace sequence, why not more? If Sherlock collapsed at 221B and ended up in a coma, or on heavy drugs at the hospital, this could all be going on in that fantastic brain of his as he tries to work out what’s going to happen next. It’s almost a living hell really, like a dream you can’t wake up from.
Having accepted that, yes, it’s possible, it does answer a lot of problems and questions that have bothered me about HLV:
1. The giant time leap and storyline from the Waston domestic in 221B to
Christmas. This has always bugged the SHIT out of me. The writer in me is screaming. Like, what happened all those months when
John was supposedly caring for Sherlock in 221b? How can you just SKIP all that? This story is about John and Sherlock, so how can you just ignore such a large hurt/comfort, quiet, long time period with the two of them alone together? Months of it? Surely things had to be said during this time. John had to
have seen Sherlock’s scars, helped him bathe. Shown how much he cared. They had to talk about what happened with Mary. They must have talked about what to do next. There’s just so much that had to have happened during that time period that to simply gloss over it really was annoying AF and almost a crime of writing. But… what if we weren’t shown any of that because it never happened? The last time we REALLY saw John was during the argument at 221B and then, presumably, he’s been at Sherlock’s bedside since Sherlock went into his coma/dream state. Frankly, this makes a hella lot more sense. Also, we did get that brief image of John at a bedside in the trailer.
2. We never saw John making the choice to take Mary
back or even think about it. That would have been a huge character decision and one a storyteller wouldn’t skip without damn good reason. That should have been a John-wandering-London-haunted-standing-at-a
bridge looking thoughtful etc. Or hell, even talking to Ella or Mrs. Hudson, even a single line explaining why he feels he had to go back. I always figured we weren’t shown that b/c John had a secret plan, he’s in cohoots with Mycroft or something and the audience isn’t supposed to know that yet. But another explanation is, it never actually happened.
3. John’s unJohn like behavior. Another thing that’s bugged the shit out of me since S3 is John’s bordering-on-blank behavior. He doesn’t seem like himself at the tarmac or, at all, in the current day TAB scenes. This is the John who grieved Sherlock for 3 years and asked him to be best man. Who saw Sherlock shot again by his wife. Sherlock shot a man to protect them. And John just stands there looking neutral as Sherlock flies off again? Even if John didn’t know Sherlock was going to his death, he’s still going off into a case/danger, alone. John is just so… blank there. Again, I thought ‘maybe John knows about the ‘miss me’ video so he knows Sherlock will be right back’. That’s possible. But another explanation is, this is all Sherlock’s dream. And when it comes to John, Sherlock doesn’t know how John feels about him. So he can’t give John realistic responses. He honestly has no idea how John would react to him.
John is also weirdly passive in the plane during TAB. Here we have Sherlock supposedly overdosing and John remains relatively nonchalant about it. Compare his reaction on the plane to the screaming John in the Victorian section when he finds Sherlock doing drugs. Even when Mary says ‘you’ve been reading John’s blog’, John just makes a face like ‘huh’ instead of really reacting to that. It’s so fucking OOC. I thought maybe John’s acting all blank because he’s a terrible liar, and he’s secretly working against Mary, so he just tries to not show anything. Again, that’s still possible. But the EMP theory actually makes more sense. Again, Sherlock is so deeply confused about how John feels about him that he can’t give John realistic responses in his dream.
4. Sherlock shooting Magnussen. So… I bought this totally in the moment. But looking back at it, it is more of a nightmare response, isn’t it? As BC said in one of his SDCC interviews, shooting Magnussen was failure. Sherlock couldn’t figure out how to win, so he just takes a gun and kills him? Yes, Sherlock was already fucked up and compromised. But still… it’s almost like one of those space simulators in the movies where the crew fails and the ship blows up and then the lights come on and it’s ‘yeah, that didn’t work, let’s try that again’. Shooting Magnussen feels like a failure of the simulation.
5. The ‘overdose’ in TAB is a joke. It bugged the fuck out of me in TAB how they talk about all the drugs Sherlock took, and how he is ‘overdosing’ and Sherlock mentioned ‘having overdosed’ at the very end, but what we actually saw on screen was not realistic for an overdose at all. If he was really overdosing, why was John not calling an ambulance? Trying to get him to vomit? Panicking? Where were the convulsions, etc? It was totally lame. If the entire plane sequence was a dream, that would explain it. (Though Sherlock treats Mycroft pretty sympathetically there with the whole ‘take care of him’ to John)
6. EMP would also explain some weirdnesses that others have pointed out before like Mycroft’s tie reversing from the end of HLV to the plane in TAB, Mary so hacking casually into MI5, etc. Others have written extensively about this. Check out isitandwonder’s tumblr.
So… yeah. I’m late to this party. Apologies. I’m sure I’ve said nothing new on the theory. But I just wanted to post this for anyone who hasn’t read the EMP theory yet and add a few thoughts that occurred to me. I’m not saying I”m sure this is what’s gong on, but I’m now considering it a very strong possibility.
S4:
If the ‘dream from the domestic in HLV onward” theory is correct, then I suspect the ‘baby and dog’ sequence from E1 was a continuation of that dream. Presumably at some point Sherlock will wake up and John will be at his bedside. That likely will happen in E1 because the whole Toby Jones/Dying Detective thing seems like a separate story. Possibly? I hope so.
Personally, I’d love for John to look at Sherlock and say “Do you really think I could ever forgive her? You died, Sherlock. Twice…” God that would be great.
XA
Shit, I’m actually buying into this EMP thng.
Shit, I’m actually buying into this EMP thng.
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In which I rethink what could be audacious and historical
As I look at what fans have been writing since the Great Debunking, I am struggling to rewrite my understanding of the show to incorporate this new information we’ve been given by the clearly fed-up-with-fans’-shit writers.
I don’t share their sense that “no homo” jokes are hilarious, but then, I’ve never cared for Moffat’s boyish view of heterosexuality and managed to watch around that in his shows for what other bits of brilliance he can bring to a script (and I’ll be clear: I still feel that despite his many flaws as a writer, he does have moments of brilliance). But since Mark Gatiss himself has assured us that this is all completely and knee-slappingly hilarious, it’s also not up to me to judge them: all I can do is decide the extent to which I feel it unfunny and whether it irretrievably taints the show for me.
Similarly, I remain baffled as to how two such capable writers, not to mention all of those directors, managed to cram quite so many romantic tropes and such romantic acting into a couple of characters, over so many episodes, who have no relationship other than being best mates. I was never of tjlc certainty, but I have always thought that the real treasure in even ACD’s stories was the relationship between these two men and I was thrilled that it seemed, in this version, so much more well-established and fundamental. Editing this out, re-interpreting all of those scenes to just mates and rejecting the romantic tropes is a difficult exercise and I’m finding it so difficult I’m not sure I can perform the necessary rewatch for doing so. What was enthusiasm for what I thought to be a pretty damned good bit of television is so battered now that I can’t even support that basic premise any longer. Their insistence that there is no romance just destroys the quality of the whole thing. Brilliantly written to utterly failed is quite a leap, and a failure of that magnitude no longer seems worth the effort.
And so I find myself again mulling over the audacious television history enthusing AA did at SDCC. There are lots of plot things that they can do in s4 that might warrant this in her imagination, and I’ve pondered some of them already in my blog.
But it was in looking at this photo today that another notion began to solidify. AA is nothing if not self-absorbed, and I wonder if this take on history mightn’t indeed be that the error the fanboys have chosen to “correct” is the non-entity nature of Watson’s bride(s). Taking this character and not just expanding her into a full character instead of just an offscreen name might not be all we get. Instead, the whole “Uncle Sherlock” thing may be exactly it. If Mary Watson has been shown to be capable in s3 and, perhaps, redeemable in TAB, is that the setup for a threesome of case-solvers in s4-5? Is that the audacious move they’re writing: bringing Mary Watson fully into the show? Watson in domestic life is certainly hinted at in ACD; to go into it further with this bold new Mary rather does compliment this bold new Watson we’ve been given. As I mentally wall Holmes off from emotional engagement, then, this does grow more plausible. And Sue Vertue has indeed deeply hinted that Uncle Sherlock will be fine taking care of Bunny Watson.
Is their boldness, then, to be one of making the modern Sherlock just as superficially ordinary as the Victorian one? An openly loving gay Sherlock isn’t what ACD wrote, even though we fans readily embraced his modernization going in that direction. A marriage for Watson where his wife is incorporated into his life and Work with Sherlock: maybe that’s what they feel is the way to modernize him while still keeping him that degree of remote from the real world that ACD captured. This, I can see with little imagination required, would indeed thrill AA, and its threatened thematic revelation could well be one that would send Sue Vertue into her epic eye-bug.
Do I want this? Not especially. But, as the writers so forcefully reminded us, it’s their show to do with what amuses them. And the more I think about it, this, instead of a romantic underpinning, does sort of fit with what we’ve so far seen (with the proviso that we expunge all of what looked like emotional engagement between the two men), what’s been in setlock, and what’s been hinted about s4. If Mary has joined Team Sherlock as the whole lot of them are challenged by something in his past, that doesn’t contradict any dark and dangerous teases, but does seem like something that would thrill AA. In our new understanding of the show, it does make sense.
I won’t be supporting the show they’re making now with my dvd purchases the way I happily did when I still thought it quality television, but I’ll likely at least begin watching the new series. Whether I’ll find it enough to my taste to continue, well, that remains to be seen.
Is that the threesome AA hinted at at the Nerdist panel? Sorry, I fear exactly the same - and it makes me sad and a little bit nauseous. But most of all I feel
BORED. This would be so ordinary…
I get where this kind of speculation is coming from, but I don’t think this would be especially revolutionary. Not even in Amanda Abbington’s eyes.
I think she’s excited about getting to play a villain.
Interviewer: I want to talk to you about your character. I did not trust her from the beginning.
AA: No. Did you not?
Interviewer: Of course not.
AA: I love that you didn’t trust her from the beginning. That’s very insightful. Because I totally did. [Sue nods.] I mean I knew she had a secret, but I didn’t know it was going to be that enormous, and that chilling, actually. So uh–
Sue: […something about playing it normally?] I remember looking at the early series of 24, like the second series, when everyone thought, maybe I’m the bad guy, and I think everyone was playing it with a slight edge of–just in case I turn out to be the bad–[laughs]
Interviewer: But that didn’t happen with you.
AA: No, well because I didn’t know what her storyline was. I knew she’d done something in a past life, but I didn’t know what it was, so, the fact that she does the ultimate betrayal, and sort of [sic] shoots Sherlock, was um, yeah it was great to play, it was great to play, it was great.
This is the part of the interview that we haven’t focused on as much, because it isn’t the grand statement about groundbreaking television history that follows. But I would just suggest that 1) we are getting an unambiguous statement from Amanda that shooting Sherlock was a betrayal. 2) the flip from relatively benevolent Mary to villain!Mary was meant to be a shock, was meant to be huge and chilling, not the “shrug oopsie” that some readings have made it out to be.
Most importantly 3) the statements about television history are preceded by her making it clear that Mary’s actions are terrible.
This is Amanda, who said her favourite scene from the series was the pool scene (yes I think that was a nudge nudge wink wink but let’s keep things simple here). I’m no Amanda stan, but I do think she knows how to play the game in a way that makes it not all about her.
As much as I would love to see any show offer more respect to its female characters, I trust Mofftiss to do a m/m pairing much more than I trust their feminism. (”Feminism.”)
Don’t know if that helps, op.
I may be 95% sure of johnlock as endgame, but completely separate from that, I’m 100% sure that it’s never going to be a happy trio and uncle Sherlock.
Amanda was gloating over how bad Mary was in several interviews at SDCC. Plus there’s the infamous ‘fucking psychopath’ tweet. Honestly, I think AA loves being evil (what actor doesn’t?), and I also think she gets what the show is really about and is able to applaud that separate from her own character/career. I have a feeling AA ships johnlock pretty hard.
Making them a happy trio also wouldn’t be ‘groundbreaking television’ in any way. Plenty of shows have had various buddy configurations, and even giving the original Mary from ACD more of a role isn’t exactly ‘groundbreaking’.
Add in the fact that we didn’t see that much of AA in setlock after E1, and the half-assed replies to questions about the marriage and baby at SDCC and, yeah, not worried.
Also: All roads lead to Baker St. TAB showed us that it’s always John and Sherlock - “there’s always two of us”, at Reichenbach falls, and at the end at 221B in front of the fire. Mary is not a part of that picture and never will be.
londoncallingsigh:
Steven Moffat and Sue Vertue at SDCC 2016...
Steven Moffat and Sue Vertue at SDCC 2016 Sherlock panel, in response to expectations that The Abominable Bride was a standalone episode (video)
"All roads lead back to Baker Street"
I cannot fathom how Mofftiss could have planned a story arc that would break this. Like it is so fundamental. Everything they have ever said about the canon comes down to the inseparability of Holmes and Watson. It’s not the cases. The canon is loved not for the adventures but for this pair and their bond. They have said this every which way. Over and over.
Leaving aside the specifics of a Johnlock end game, the one point we know we have to reach is the two of them back together in Baker Street.
I know this past week has upset a lot of people but don’t disregard that the entire pitch for this show from the very beginning can be summarized as “this is the story of why there is no Sherlock Holmes without John Watson.”
Ep1 ends with John saving Sherlock’s life
S1 ends with John letting Sherlock know he is willing to risk dying with him.
S2 ends with Sherlock faking his death to save John.
S3 ep 3 has Sherlock saving John’s life, then being killed and coming back to life to save John who is now in danger because his wife is an assassin, and then Sherlock - having killed a man to save John - takes the punishment of exile and almost certain death. Meaning permanent separation from John.
And then TAB ends with Sherlock once again falling so he can come back and be exactly where he should be - with John at his side.
Why in the name of all that is good would Mofftiss be telling a story where the intent is to have this pair be a trio with Mary? To do so they are not just giving Mary a better role than in ACD, they are fundamentally breaking canon. And breaking their own narrative. They gave Mary an enhanced role in TAB only to make her completely irrelevant at the end. It took us right back to 221b. Just the two of them.
If anything, I think there is everything to suggest they are trying to one-up ACD. Because her presence screwed with them being in 221b he just made her disappear. Problem solved. However Mofftiss solve the problem of Mary one thing is surely sacrosanct: she will not be there at the end. Destroy her or redeem her - this goes way beyond strong female characters and villain!Mary or even Johnlock.
This entire show is built on the rock that Holmes and Watson are - even if strictly platonically & if they were the straightest most broiest bros to ever walk the earth - fundamentally one of the greatest OTPs in Western popular culture.
Nothing can convince me that we do not land back there. Just the two of them. Against the rest of the world. At the end of TAB we know for sure that that is what Sherlock believes. That he can trust Watson to never fail him. That it’s always the two of them. No one else. We should have the same faith.
All roads, people. All. Roads.
Yes! We should. Well said. Just because they said it in a slightly more nasty way than usual, suddenly everyone is believing the same old lies. I honestly don’t get it. The show hasn’t changed. And it’s the show that we always say matters.
After such a positive Johnlock/LGBT vibe coming out of Sherlock SDCC, all it took was a predictable slap down from Mark to rattle everyone’s faith. Yes, it was stern, it had to be to work. But really? Really tumblr? That is all it fucking took to cause such doubt? And don’t give me the OK to doubt message, at this late stage of the game, this far into the slow burn romance, after brilliant metas, are we that unsure of OURSELVES and our intelligence, our insight and intuition to have a freak out? Product doesn’t lie. The product is the show, you know the show with the TWO protagonists who cannot live without each other? The one that’s gay and the other bi? Canon!!! That is canon in case anyone missed it. Yes to the above post and comment. And yes, John and Sherlock will get their romance in BBC Sherlock.
Amen!
Count me onboard this train. Toot.
S4 Casting Masterpost
Now that we’re starting to move into promo season, I thought it might be helpful to have all the casting news in one place
to make it easier to identify anyone we might see in photos, trailers, etc. Below the jump is every new cast member that we know of so far, divided up by episode. Any others will be added in as they’re announced.
Thank you for this.
Great! Thank you.
July 30, 2016
penns-woods:
professionalblunder:
♦ 29/221 photos of BBC’s...
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