The Sign of Five

Five connected gunshots in TLD (x)

1) Beginning

2) London Aquarium

3) With Faith

4) Eurus threatening John

5) Ending

The Final Problem: The Love Triangle and Staying Alive

1) Shoot the Governor: Kill the husband or the husband kills himself and the wife dies

2) Three Garridebs: Condemn one and loose all three

3) The Forced Love Confession

4) The Suicide

5) Save John Watson

Because after the fourth confession

he couldn’t stop confessing.

Keep reading

there sure are a lot of fives in this show.

Yep and I bet you they all mean the same. Think about TGG e.g., I can fit the five pips into the five confession attempts:

1) Carl Powers + trainers = John feels humiliated in THoB

2) Janus cars = Irene‘s game in ASiB

3) Connie Prince = stag night + wedding

4) Golem = Culverton = confession at the hospital bed

5) Pool = Save John Watson

Even the overarching themes of the seasons fit, where S5 will be the season where they can‘t stop confessing ;)

@possiblyimbiassed @raggedyblue @ebaeschnbliah @helplessly-johnlocked

mmhmm, pretty much every set of five anything, corresponds to the series, so it makes sense they connect to each other as well.

The Sign of Five

Five connected gunshots in TLD (x)

1) Beginning

2) London Aquarium

3) With Faith

4) Eurus threatening John

5) Ending

The Final Problem: The Love Triangle and Staying Alive

1) Shoot the Governor: Kill the husband or the husband kills himself and the wife dies

2) Three Garridebs: Condemn one and loose all three

3) The Forced Love Confession

4) The Suicide

5) Save John Watson

Because after the fourth confession

he couldn’t stop confessing.

Keep reading

there sure are a lot of fives in this show.

The Lying Detective

As the discussion about TLD here (x) got a bit confusing, I decided to start a new post about it to get a clearer overview again. This is just a brainstorming-post where anybody is free to join the discussion to make some sense of the episode.

So it’s been established in the discussion mentioned above that the hospital wing featured in TLD was opened by Culverton Smith on 20/07/2014 (x). This is the day before John writes up the Mayfly Man-case on his blog (x), the case that is clearly about him dating a row of women only to stab Sherlock in the back with it, as @possiblyimbiassed​ established here (x). As we are under the impression that Sherlock is constructing the narrative of the show inside of his head, this means that Sherlock built the hospital wing dedicated to Culverton Smith the day before John wrote up the Mayfly Man-case.

Furthermore @possiblyimbiassed​ pointed out that Sherlock planned to get a confession out of Culverton three weeks ago (x), the amount of time between the Mayfly Man-case and Sherlock’s blog post about John’s wedding (x).

Let’s take a look at TLD again with this information in hand (I’m not gonna dive into every tiny little bit of this episode, because that would be too much for my early morning-rant here; and this is not spell-checked or anything, I’m just writing my thoughts down):

Edit: It’s neither morning anymore nor is this post in any way short. Oh well…

Keep reading

this makes sense, on the whole. that the subtext of TLD is generally consistent with the subtext of TSOT definitely reinforces it.

i love the insight that "faith" as played by "eurus" is a projection of sherlock's own mind/emotions, that's why she's such a strong john mirror. and throwing her gun in the river is a kind of "if only" moment for him. a little bit like how sherlock rewrote their meet-cute in TAB.

i also couldn't help noticing that the screencap of john with nurse cornish over one shoulder and "mary" over the other, reminds mexof the framing in TFP when sherlock has john over one shoulder and mycroft over the other. Also how in tis image, all three of them are dressed very similarly, wearing a dark blue jacket with a v neck over a white shirt. nurse cornish's white lanyard stands in for that v neck shape in her case. so that makes me wonder if they are representing something about john's inner conflict?

Culverton’s Confessions

Just rewatched The Lying Detective, and it’s struck me this time – when it first aired, we all spent so much time thinking about Sherlock and John and Mary and Eurus, etc., that we didn’t give a lot of thought to Culverton Smith.  But he’s actually a pretty interesting baddie.

What’s interesting about Smith is, despite being a serial murderer, he’s not actually motivated by a desire to kill.  He *thinks* he is – I think he genuinely believes he enjoys killing people just for the fun of it.  And at first, Sherlock buys this premise, too.  But the episode is really careful to seed in Smith’s actual compulsion – a compulsion to confession. 

In fact, I think it’s arguable (though we don’t really know him well enough to say for sure) that the main reason Smith kills people is so he’ll have something to confess. 

Throughout the episode, Smith entertains a bizarre kind of flirtation with the idea of confession.  In the TD-12 scene, he desperately wants to get something off his chest, but he’s terrified of facing any repercussions for it.  This is why he develops this whole weird ritual of drugging his friends and business associates – so he can confess his crimes (or would-be crimes) to them without consequence.

It’s worth noting that Smith has specifically chosen police officials and judges to be part of his TD-12 audience, as well as his daughter.  He wanted the confessions to be *meaningful*, even as he wanted them instantly forgotten.

And why is the morgue is favorite room?  Not just because he likes corpses.  As Sherlock eventually figures out, before he developed TD-12, he needed the corpses to serve as an audience for his confessions.

I think it’s fair to assume that eventually, confessing to corpses stopped giving Smith the desired thrill, and that’s why he moved on to the TD-12 sessions.  But soon enough, that palls too – which is why Smith seeks out and encourages Sherlock’s attention (albeit only in a very controlled environment).

It always bugged me before – why would Smith do this?  Of course, we can easily justify the choice as being a result of Eurus’s irresistible powers of mind control…  But it’s even more deliciously satisfying to realize that Smith *wanted* to draw Sherlock to him, because what could be more thrilling than confessing to the world’s greatest detective? 

Sherlock gets this, and so he engineers a situation he knows Smith will find irresistible: an opportunity to confess his sins to a detective who is conscious and in full possession of his mental faculties.  But Smith will only do it if he feels certain that Sherlock will die immediately afterward. 

Smith is willing to believe that Sherlock is just as twisted as he is – that even though Sherlock doesn’t want to die, he’d be willing to sacrifice his own life just to hear Smith’s confession.

Of course, the little twist at the end is that Sherlock winds up giving Smith the greatest gift he never knew he wanted: the opportunity to confess in a situation that involves true consequences.  Smith had spent his whole career as a murderer avoiding this situation, but when it’s finally forced upon him, it turns out to be exactly the thrill he was seeking all along.

(all quotes from ariane devere’s transcripts)

it’s probably been pointed out before, but i just twigged on some parallels between smith wanting to confess to sherlock, even though he planned to kill him right after, and the cabbie in ASIP luring sherlock into the “game of chess” by the promise of essentially confessing how he’d killed the earlier victims. and sherlock being willing to risk his life for it.

Oh, this is very good. But if Culverton Smith mirrors John - it’s interesting to think about the confessions evolution too. John’s initial gay trysts - looking, fantasizing - knowing that there are extreme consequences for discovery. Becoming a doctor/healer (“Three Continents Watson” womanizer) to cover for being a killer/soldier (gay sex/death trope) - very much confessing to the corpses. And then - John’s discovery of TD-12: a British DADT (Don’t Ask Don’t Tell) - where John falls in love with Sholte but they must ‘forget it ever happened’. Then - wanting a confession to have consequences - upping the stakes again and again - falling in love with the greatest detective of all time. Surely, confessing to Sherlock would be the highest stakes ever - because how could a man like Sherlock fail to find John out? Well, turns out - John loved and wanted Sherlock (killing Sherlock) - but perhaps, as in the show, they maintain the facade? That could be the “desperately unspoken” bit - they come so close to a true consummated relationship: a few kisses - maybe a Hug that lasts too long for friendship. But Sherlock never dies (belongs to John, emotionally and sexually as a partner) - and John never “kills” him (sex/death) again.

mmhmm!

Culverton’s Confessions

Just rewatched The Lying Detective, and it’s struck me this time – when it first aired, we all spent so much time thinking about Sherlock and John and Mary and Eurus, etc., that we didn’t give a lot of thought to Culverton Smith.  But he’s actually a pretty interesting baddie.

What’s interesting about Smith is, despite being a serial murderer, he’s not actually motivated by a desire to kill.  He *thinks* he is – I think he genuinely believes he enjoys killing people just for the fun of it.  And at first, Sherlock buys this premise, too.  But the episode is really careful to seed in Smith’s actual compulsion – a compulsion to confession. 

In fact, I think it’s arguable (though we don’t really know him well enough to say for sure) that the main reason Smith kills people is so he’ll have something to confess. 

Throughout the episode, Smith entertains a bizarre kind of flirtation with the idea of confession.  In the TD-12 scene, he desperately wants to get something off his chest, but he’s terrified of facing any repercussions for it.  This is why he develops this whole weird ritual of drugging his friends and business associates – so he can confess his crimes (or would-be crimes) to them without consequence.

It’s worth noting that Smith has specifically chosen police officials and judges to be part of his TD-12 audience, as well as his daughter.  He wanted the confessions to be *meaningful*, even as he wanted them instantly forgotten.

And why is the morgue is favorite room?  Not just because he likes corpses.  As Sherlock eventually figures out, before he developed TD-12, he needed the corpses to serve as an audience for his confessions.

I think it’s fair to assume that eventually, confessing to corpses stopped giving Smith the desired thrill, and that’s why he moved on to the TD-12 sessions.  But soon enough, that palls too – which is why Smith seeks out and encourages Sherlock’s attention (albeit only in a very controlled environment).

It always bugged me before – why would Smith do this?  Of course, we can easily justify the choice as being a result of Eurus’s irresistible powers of mind control…  But it’s even more deliciously satisfying to realize that Smith *wanted* to draw Sherlock to him, because what could be more thrilling than confessing to the world’s greatest detective? 

Sherlock gets this, and so he engineers a situation he knows Smith will find irresistible: an opportunity to confess his sins to a detective who is conscious and in full possession of his mental faculties.  But Smith will only do it if he feels certain that Sherlock will die immediately afterward. 

Smith is willing to believe that Sherlock is just as twisted as he is – that even though Sherlock doesn’t want to die, he’d be willing to sacrifice his own life just to hear Smith’s confession.

Of course, the little twist at the end is that Sherlock winds up giving Smith the greatest gift he never knew he wanted: the opportunity to confess in a situation that involves true consequences.  Smith had spent his whole career as a murderer avoiding this situation, but when it’s finally forced upon him, it turns out to be exactly the thrill he was seeking all along.

(all quotes from ariane devere’s transcripts)

it's probably been pointed out before, but i just twigged on some parallels between smith wanting to confess to sherlock, even though he planned to kill him right after, and the cabbie in ASIP luring sherlock into the "game of chess" by the promise of essentially confessing how he'd killed the earlier victims. and sherlock being willing to risk his life for it.

“Inadmissible” (‘Sherlock’)

Moffat more or less told us, through the Culverton storyline in TLD, what’s going to happen, didn’t he?

The “inadmissible” part is particularly interesting!

(x)

Since Culverton in TLD made his ‘confession’ by Sherlock’s bedside, doesn’t that mean that John might make his (love) confession sitting by Sherlock’s bedside, too? Possibly while Sherlock is unconscious?

And afterwards everyone (the audience of this show) will treat this confession like it didn’t count (=was inadmissible). 

The audience, and ESPECIALLY those fans who weren’t too keen on a gay reading of the show to begin with, will claim that, “John didn’t mean it like that. It’s just bro-love. He just said, ‘I love you,’ because Sherlock was comatose and John felt desperate and overwhelmed by what was going on. There’s nothing gay about it. It doesn’t count as an actual love confession. This ‘love’ is just a bromance. This confession is ‘inadmissible’.” 

It’s possible that even Sherlock himself, who somehow will have heard that ‘confession’ despite being in a coma, that even Sherlock will keep telling himself that John’s confession ‘doesn’t count’ (=is inadmissible). Not for long, though…:)

But Moffat clearly told us that all of that noise and chatter by the usual suspects won’t matter. What will count is that, in the end, John won’t be able to stop himself from confessing over and over again.

That’s a nice explanation for Moffat’s choice of the word (‘inadmissible’) here, right?

This way we would, maybe, FIRST get a (subtle, half-hidden) love confession in one episode. And then get the real deal in a later episode. And in between those two, millions of viewers (including every stupid journalist ever) would explode and fall all over themselves trying to prove that that first confession was totally ‘inadmissible’, ie, didn’t point to John being in love. And then…baaam…the second one would happen.

Well, a guy can wish, can’t he?

@ebaeschnbliah @sarahthecoat @gosherlocked @possiblyimbiassed @raggedyblue @tjlcisthenewsexy @fellshish @88thparallel

Absolutely concur with this reading @sagestreet, and it’s always a treat to see you’ve tagged me and to read your thoughts. Another thing I initially thought after hearing these words at the end of TLD was that perhaps Moftiss mean that their queer interpretation might be inadmissible to the greater Sherlockian fandom, and that despite their hope for it to change things, it wouldn’t necessarily mean we’d be spared endless heteronormative re-do’s in the future. They can’t prove their interpretation is correct, or change the way it’s portrayed from now on - it will remain just one interpretation of the canon. (I also like “technically it’s entrapment” because they will have heterobaited their viewers into watching a gay conclusion to the story) :)

When I started reading it I thought “Oh no, another limits, and to get around it will take at least another three episodes, I can not do it”. But in Sherlock things if they want can run fast and you might be right, even if I also like the reading of @tjlcisthenewsexy . I’m not even sure who will confess and will not be able to stop. Now I’m pretty sure that Culverton is, like all the villain, a side of Sherlock with whom he has not yet come to terms, in this case his ability to love, to be able to falling in love. And considering that his object of love is John, this side looks like,moor or less,  to him. And as we see in TFP Sherlock has the feeling that it must be him who confesses his love first. It could therefore be an unconscious confession, under the effect of drugs, murmured on the edge of the coma’s awakening. Equally inadmissible. But then repeated. Again and again. That said, I am so immensely happy to read you again @sagestreet! I missed you … even if I recognize that writing something like this in this fandom is a bit disturbing ;-p

@possiblyimbiassed @ebaeschnbliah @gosherlocked @loveismyrevolution @sarahthecoat @sagestreet @tjlcisthenewsexy @fellshish @88thparallel

@sagestreet I’m so very delighted to see you post again! I’ve been missing your metas and various wise words a lot. :) 

Your prediction about the audience and the ’inadmissible’ confession makes a lot of sense to me, and I quite agree that’s probably what’s going to happen: whatever love confession John might make to his comatose friend, it’s going to stir up debate as to whether it can be interpreted as ‘gay’ or ’bro’. Just for the record, here’s the quote from the end of TLD (transcript by Ariane deVere, although without descriptions), talking about Culverton’s ’confession’:

SHERLOCK: Oh, by the way, the recordings will probably be inadmissible. JOHN: Sorry, what? SHERLOCK: Well, technically, it’s entrapment so it might get thrown out as evidence. Not that that matters; apparently he can’t stop confessing. JOHN: That’s good. SHERLOCK: Yeah.

@tjlcisthenewsexy I love your interpretation of the entrapment point! :)) And yes @sagestreet; I agree that at some point in S5 there will most probably come a lot of undeniable confessions from John, and we will all be rejoicing :). 

But until the moment we’ll be able to witness this, the problem is also, as I see it, that Culverton doesn’t actually confess to any particular murder or other crime in TLD, he just says that “killing human beings” makes him “incredibly happy” and that he likes to “make people into things” so he can own them. Then he talks about murder as “a difficult addiction to manage”. But this is not precise enough, is it? The only particular crime we have evidence of is his physical murder attempt on Sherlock. 

Keep reading

Sorry for this belated reply, @possiblyimbiassed. Keeping up with what’s going on here is still an exhausting affair for me, so I haven’t caught up with all the comments to this post yet. Yours (both this one and your other comment) somehow just got lost in the comment tsunami.:)

“[…]  Culverton doesn’t actually confess to any particular murder or other crime in TLD, he just says that “killing human beings” makes him “incredibly happy””

That’s a very, very important point you’re making there, I think.

We probably all agree by now that the metaphor Mofftiss have been employing over and over again is: MURDER = FALLING IN LOVE, right?

So, what Culverton (=John!mirror) gives us here is a deeply interesting insight into John’s personality. 

Granted there are people who experience no trouble whatsoever in being single for a prolonged period of time. Some people really don’t mind living without romantic love for years or even decades. But John most definitely isn’t one of them. John needs love. John needs to be in love. He needs it like the air that he breathes.

What’s particularly interesting is the fact that this trait of John’s, in and of itself, has nothing to do with Sherlock specifically.

As you’ve observed quite correctly in your comment, Culverton doesn’t even tell us that it’s Sherlock he wants to ‘kill’ (=love) specifically. 

My guess is that this is because, Sherlock or no Sherlock, John has always been this way. That’s who John is. John needs to be in love. And originally this had nothing to do with Sherlock. It’s a character trait of John’s. John needs to be in love to be happy. It’s a deeply ingrained part of John’s nature. It’s his personality. He’s always been like this.

(Well…Obviously, once John meets Sherlock, this need to love is directed full force at Sherlock. He finds in Sherlock, the perfect receptacle for this love of which he has always had a lot to share.)

But it’s not Sherlock who has caused John to be like this. John has always felt the need to have love in his life. If he hadn’t met Sherlock, he would have kept endlessly falling in and out of love with men and women alike. It’s just that with Sherlock he has finally found THE one person.

I really think that’s what Culverton’s (John’s) confession means. That’s why Culverton doesn’t tell us that he needs to ‘kill’ Sherlock specifically. John’s nature is to love people. Not all people, obviously. But to be in a relationship with someone is what John needs to be happy. This is who he is. Sherlock or no Sherlock. That’s what he’s always been like.

Or to be more precise, it’s what Sherlock has worked out John is like (!). Because a lot of us (myself included – and you have written some of the most brilliant meta on the subject –) don’t believe anything in s4 is ‘real’. It’s all Sherlock’s dream/coma/imaginings/hallucinations or whatever. In short, it’s all Sherlock’s EMP.

So, in other words: This isn’t John speaking. It’s Sherlock working out what John’s confession might be all about: John is confessing that he always needed love and still needs it. He has always been a ‘serial killer’ (ie, a serial monogamist). That’s what John’s nature is like…is what Sherlock is telling himself (!) in his own mind here.

But why doesn’t Culverton tell us he wants to kill Sherlock specifically?

As you rightly observed, “[…] But not even then does he tell Sherlock that he wants to kill him[…]”

Because it’s all in Sherlock’s mind!

It shows us how deeply repressed Sherlock actually is. He can’t bring himself to even just think, “John actually really wants me.” Not even through the thick veil of a murder=love metaphor. Not even while employing a Culverton=John mirror. 

In Sherlock’s mind, Culverton never says, “I want to kill you,” because Sherlock can’t bring himself to think, “John wants me.”

What Sherlock does instead is all the more heart-breaking: He tells Culverton (aka John) what HE (Sherlock!) wants! 

He tells Culverton (=John) that he wants Culverton (=John) to kill (=love) him. That’s the only thing Sherlock dares to think at this point. “John, I want you to love me.” But he doesn’t dare to think it the other way around. (“John wants me.”) Or at least he doesn’t spell it out yet.

Oh, boy, the amount of things those two don’t dare to say to each other or even just think about each other…Just wow!

In your other comment, you stated that ‘Did you miss me?’ is less compromising than ‘I love you.’ While that is true on some level. I sometimes wonder if maybe ‘Did you miss me?’ isn’t even ‘worse’ in a lot of ways.

I mean, I can totally see myself say, “I love you, man,” to a buddy of mine without it being romantic in any way. Well, it depends on the tone, I suppose. But you can totally say that in a “Bro, I love ya,” kinda way. (Not meaning to imply that Sherlock and John’s confession would be that kind of thing, obviously.)

But seriously, honestly, genuinely asking another man, “Did you miss me?”…erm, nope! I wouldn’t pull that with anyone but my better half. If I were to do that with just any (male) friend I can think of I would probably be asked, “Are you feeling okay, sage? What’s with the emo mood today?”:D

Thanks for your very explanatory answer @sagestreet! I can totally understand that my monsterposts easily plummeted in the sea of interesting additions to your meta, and you’re right that trying to keep up with what’s going on here is almost a full-time job. :)))

@sagestreet : “Oh, boy, the amount of things those two don’t dare to say to each other or even just think about each other…Just wow!”

Indeed! These guys are the highest degree of repression; it’s both a bit pathetic and tragic, really - it almost hurts to watch them! :) 

And what you say about John’s need for love makes a lot of sense to me. But then it also struck me, that what Sherlock has learned at the end of TLD, once he has worked that one out, is to show compassion, that he can hug John and comfort him when he thinks John needs it, even if John doesn’t love him - Sherlock in particular - back. As you say, @sagestreet, Sherlock has figured out that John has a loving nature and needs love, even if Sherlock doesn’t get to have John returning his own feelings (or so he believes). 

And that’s a pretty big step in maturation, if you ask me; it’s permitting yourself to love selflessly, without expecting anything in return. I think Sherlock already had that in him; otherwise he wouldn’t feel the need to sacrifice himself for John, and neither would he have done what he did for John with the wedding planning. But in TLD Sherlock begins to understand what that actually means, he begins to embrace it, which makes a lot of difference. That’s probably why he then fiercely claims that John is family in TFP; he’s now letting himself love John as a person, and maybe even as a part of himself (his heart). He is starting to acknowledge John’s needs, even if they don’t benefit himself. And, come to think of it, I can’t recall a single moment in TFP where Sherlock disrespects John’s intellectual abilities as he used to do with John and everyone else. Instead, he consults John’s expertise of weapons, etc. Isn’t that a nice respite? :)

@possiblyimbiassed:

“[…] what Sherlock has learned at the end of TLD, once he has worked that one out, is to show compassion, that he can hug John and comfort him when he thinks John needs it, even if John doesn’t love him - Sherlock in particular - back.”

Ouch. My poor heart. That’s so poignant.

“[…] Sherlock has figured out that John has a loving nature and needs love, even if Sherlock doesn’t get to have John returning his own feelings (or so he believes).”

Ouch again. But it makes so, SO much sense now that you’re saying it. I never really understood how the ending of TLD fits in with the rest of the episode. But what you’re saying here suddenly makes sense of it all. THIS has got to be how the hug at the end is connected to the whole subtext of the episode. Thank you for clarifying that. Reading your comment just made a light bulb go on in my head about this strange ending. Now it makes sense.

“Instead, he consults John’s expertise of weapons, etc. Isn’t that a nice respite?”

You mean…

…John has more experience when it comes to *cough* ‘guns’? And he will show Sherlock how to, ahem, ‘handle’ them? And all of that happens in Sherlock’s dream?;) Wow, Sherlock sure has some dirty dreams in TFP if this all indeed turns out to be his EMP.:D

Allow me to quickly insert (no pun intended) my new favourite gif here again:

:))) And here I was, innocently thinking we were watching Tjechov’s gun in TFP, @sagestreet! But your suggestion seems far more more plausible, more apt to John’s particular expertise, so to speak ;)

And speaking of EMP, I do believe the hug in TLD makes sense from Sherlock’s perspective. But soon it’s Halloween, so why not take the ’pain-heartbreak-doom’ feeling a bit further still, yes? >:)

So, at the end of the TLD scenario, Sherlock has finally Learned To Love Selflessly. He has made peace with himself; he can now permit himself to love John fully, offer him comfort and truly be there for him, without expecting anything in return. He can hug John and let him cry on his shoulder, even if John doesn’t hug him back. John even advices him to - ahem - text Irene when he feels the need, so he can have ’romantic entanglement’. A giant step for mankind Sherlock’s personal development, right?

Sherlock is at peace now, their friendship is saved, he has surrendered and put on the Hat once and for all, so now they can go and have cake together, just the two of them… (Oops, that turned out a bit wrong, didn’t it? Maybe safer to include Mirror!Molly as well…) Anyway, everything is fine now, right? Sherlock is back to solving crimes, and John, he seems so much better.

But there still seems to be something wrong with this picture, unfortunately: Sherlock’s client is chanelling satan, and there’s still this ’miss me’ issue lurking - the ’inadmissible’, desperately unspoken confession! And then of course, Sherlock’s Evil Sister has to step in and shoot what’s left of this bliss right in the face. Sherlock - for being incurably curious - ends up at her mercy, and she isn’t satisfied until she has forced Sherlock to say the words ’I love you’ clear and loud. To Mirror!Molly, fortunately, but still: what a frustrating mess! >:))

rb for discussion.

“Inadmissible” (‘Sherlock’)

Moffat more or less told us, through the Culverton storyline in TLD, what’s going to happen, didn’t he?

The “inadmissible” part is particularly interesting!

(x)

Since Culverton in TLD made his ‘confession’ by Sherlock’s bedside, doesn’t that mean that John might make his (love) confession sitting by Sherlock’s bedside, too? Possibly while Sherlock is unconscious?

And afterwards everyone (the audience of this show) will treat this confession like it didn’t count (=was inadmissible). 

The audience, and ESPECIALLY those fans who weren’t too keen on a gay reading of the show to begin with, will claim that, “John didn’t mean it like that. It’s just bro-love. He just said, ‘I love you,’ because Sherlock was comatose and John felt desperate and overwhelmed by what was going on. There’s nothing gay about it. It doesn’t count as an actual love confession. This ‘love’ is just a bromance. This confession is ‘inadmissible’.” 

It’s possible that even Sherlock himself, who somehow will have heard that ‘confession’ despite being in a coma, that even Sherlock will keep telling himself that John’s confession ‘doesn’t count’ (=is inadmissible). Not for long, though…:)

But Moffat clearly told us that all of that noise and chatter by the usual suspects won’t matter. What will count is that, in the end, John won’t be able to stop himself from confessing over and over again.

That’s a nice explanation for Moffat’s choice of the word (‘inadmissible’) here, right?

This way we would, maybe, FIRST get a (subtle, half-hidden) love confession in one episode. And then get the real deal in a later episode. And in between those two, millions of viewers (including every stupid journalist ever) would explode and fall all over themselves trying to prove that that first confession was totally ‘inadmissible’, ie, didn’t point to John being in love. And then…baaam…the second one would happen.

Well, a guy can wish, can’t he?

@ebaeschnbliah @sarahthecoat @gosherlocked @possiblyimbiassed @raggedyblue @tjlcisthenewsexy @fellshish @88thparallel

Wonderful to hear from you again, @sagestreet  And I rally love your interpretation of ‘inadmissible’. The whole story feels extremely open, feels like something big is missing, alle the relevant mirrors point in the direction of a confession too. And after so many words ‘unspoken’ I would love to hear a lot of repetitions. The more, the better! :)))

@sherlockshadow

Thank you.:)

Aaand I’ve just remembered my own meta (x) from ages ago (*slaps self*) about Moriarty’s, “Did you miss me?” shtick.

And now I’m thinking that maybe John’s confession by Sherlock’s bedside won’t be an, “I love you.” 

Maybe it is that same, “Did you miss me?” line. (Possibly followed by a later admission of “Miss you,” etc.) 

I have argued before (in the aforementioned meta) that Moriarty’s, “Did you miss me?” is actually John’s voice speaking to a comatose Sherlock and tried to explain why it would make sense for Sherlock to imagine it’s Moriarty’s face saying this.

Maybe that, “Did you miss me?” line IS the bedside confession…I don’t know.

Oh, yes! @sagestreet  I highly agree and those ‘did you miss me’ / ‘miss you’ lines make all the sense in the world to me. They run throughout the whole story. Just like ‘I’m you’ and ‘you are me’. If Jim appears like the monstous hound from hell in THOB, there should be a simple dog hiding behind that hound … most likely RedBeard. RedBeard though is also closely connected to the well, to Eurus, to Victor and to John. RedBeard seems to be the centre point of the story. RedBeard connects all the main characters. John or James, James or John …. what if it shouldn’t be ‘or’ but ‘and’? If John represents friendship and love …  and Jim repressents sex ….. wouldn’t it be only logical that finally both characters have to melt into one as basis for a full-blown romantic and sexuell relationship? 

I don’t know either …. but I wonder …. :)

Oh yes neither saint nor sinner, because there is no sin.

And yes also for MISS ME, and “the bed side’s confession”, like a foreword for a properly love confession.

@sagestreet ​ @ebaeschnbliah

Interesting! Yes, I agree that ‘Did you miss me?’ does make sense as something John might say to a comatose Sherlock - at least if it’s said in a context that has to do with the two years when Sherlock was away pretending to be dead. As I tried to explain in my earlier answer to this post, I think John would only ‘confess’ things to Sherlock (perhaps even when the latter was comatose) that he would be able to kind of take back if needed; he would make his own confession ‘inadmissible’, in order to not risk having to come out without being absolutely sure about Sherlock’s true feelings for him. So even if it’s implying things, the question ‘Did you miss me?’ is still less compromising than openly admitting ‘I love you’. This is the little game John and Sherlock have been playing with each other for years, which is so devastating for their relationship, and I think Sherlock’s repression of emotions is at the root of it. Therefore, I believe, Sherlock is the one who will have to make a clear ‘i love you’ confession first. 

But it does seem as if Sherlock has picked up on the ‘miss me’ issue already in these scenes in HLV and TAB: 

Maybe he hears John say it with his subconscious, and turns the words around in his head into something else (like @sagestreet says in that meta)? 

@ebaeschnbliah @sarahthecoat @gosherlocked @raggedyblue @tjlcisthenewsexy @fellshish @88thparallel @sagestreet 

wow, yeah. And @ebaeschnbliah that "melting into one" idea has been on my mind for years too. Back when tptb were saying "expect the unexpected" about s4, i thought, what hasn't been done in fic or meta? What if john & sherlock have to team up with "mary" and jim, to defeat some uber-villain? (not mycroft, too expected, try frank hudson)(oh, and then frank hudson got teased in that hangman pic) so anyway, since we have been reading the show metaphorically, it seems to be more and more about personal integration. To the point where sometimes it feels like, not only do "mary" and jim need to be incorporated into sherlock and john, but john and sherlock are starting to feel like different aspects of one being. OR maybe i have just been down this rabbit hole for too long!

and while we're on "miss me", isn't that on one of "mary"s dvds as well? So now we have all four of them connected by that phrase.

“Inadmissible” (‘Sherlock’)

Moffat more or less told us, through the Culverton storyline in TLD, what’s going to happen, didn’t he?

The “inadmissible” part is particularly interesting!

(x)

Since Culverton in TLD made his ‘confession’ by Sherlock’s bedside, doesn’t that mean that John might make his (love) confession sitting by Sherlock’s bedside, too? Possibly while Sherlock is unconscious?

And afterwards everyone (the audience of this show) will treat this confession like it didn’t count (=was inadmissible). 

The audience, and ESPECIALLY those fans who weren’t too keen on a gay reading of the show to begin with, will claim that, “John didn’t mean it like that. It’s just bro-love. He just said, ‘I love you,’ because Sherlock was comatose and John felt desperate and overwhelmed by what was going on. There’s nothing gay about it. It doesn’t count as an actual love confession. This ‘love’ is just a bromance. This confession is ‘inadmissible’.” 

It’s possible that even Sherlock himself, who somehow will have heard that ‘confession’ despite being in a coma, that even Sherlock will keep telling himself that John’s confession ‘doesn’t count’ (=is inadmissible). Not for long, though…:)

But Moffat clearly told us that all of that noise and chatter by the usual suspects won’t matter. What will count is that, in the end, John won’t be able to stop himself from confessing over and over again.

That’s a nice explanation for Moffat’s choice of the word (‘inadmissible’) here, right?

This way we would, maybe, FIRST get a (subtle, half-hidden) love confession in one episode. And then get the real deal in a later episode. And in between those two, millions of viewers (including every stupid journalist ever) would explode and fall all over themselves trying to prove that that first confession was totally ‘inadmissible’, ie, didn’t point to John being in love. And then…baaam…the second one would happen.

Well, a guy can wish, can’t he?

@ebaeschnbliah @sarahthecoat @gosherlocked @possiblyimbiassed @raggedyblue @tjlcisthenewsexy @fellshish @88thparallel

Absolutely concur with this reading @sagestreet, and it’s always a treat to see you’ve tagged me and to read your thoughts. Another thing I initially thought after hearing these words at the end of TLD was that perhaps Moftiss mean that their queer interpretation might be inadmissible to the greater Sherlockian fandom, and that despite their hope for it to change things, it wouldn’t necessarily mean we’d be spared endless heteronormative re-do’s in the future. They can’t prove their interpretation is correct, or change the way it’s portrayed from now on - it will remain just one interpretation of the canon. (I also like “technically it’s entrapment” because they will have heterobaited their viewers into watching a gay conclusion to the story) :)

When I started reading it I thought “Oh no, another limits, and to get around it will take at least another three episodes, I can not do it”. But in Sherlock things if they want can run fast and you might be right, even if I also like the reading of @tjlcisthenewsexy . I’m not even sure who will confess and will not be able to stop. Now I’m pretty sure that Culverton is, like all the villain, a side of Sherlock with whom he has not yet come to terms, in this case his ability to love, to be able to falling in love. And considering that his object of love is John, this side looks like,moor or less,  to him. And as we see in TFP Sherlock has the feeling that it must be him who confesses his love first. It could therefore be an unconscious confession, under the effect of drugs, murmured on the edge of the coma’s awakening. Equally inadmissible. But then repeated. Again and again. That said, I am so immensely happy to read you again @sagestreet! I missed you … even if I recognize that writing something like this in this fandom is a bit disturbing ;-p

@possiblyimbiassed @ebaeschnbliah @gosherlocked @loveismyrevolution @sarahthecoat @sagestreet @tjlcisthenewsexy @fellshish @88thparallel

Oh, yes, I like the interpretation of the word “inadmissible”, this is very clever. And I would really like to see people bending backwards to find a non-gay explanation for a love confession. I also like the “entrapment” interpretation by @tjlcisthenewsexy. Btw, there have been several predecessors of a confession, hints that many of us could read but others could not: “I don’t mind./Anytime”. Re-starting the heart. The tarmac scene. But so far it has been “desperately unspoken”. So it is about time for a clear, audible confession (even if it is deemed “inadmissible” at first).

And so good to have you back, @sagestreet. 

@tjlcisthenewsexy Oh, I absolutely agree with your meta reading of this. I think our interpretations of this scene are probably not that far apart.

“[…] their queer interpretation might be inadmissible to the greater Sherlockian fandom[…]”

Yes. This. That’s exactly what I meant.:) Totally agree.

“[…]and that despite their hope for it to change things, it wouldn’t necessarily mean we’d be spared endless heteronormative re-do’s in the future.”

But that’s the part where I might cautiously disagree…Well, at least, I’m a tiny bit optimistic on that front (and for me, being optimistic on anything feels really weird. I’m not an optimist by nature.:))

Will there be other adaptations in the future in which Sherlock Holmes will, once again, be portrayed as an asexual, emotionally cold creature with heterosexual undertones? Undoubtedly.

But will there be ENDLESS adaptations like this? I’m not so sure.

And I think Mofftiss aren’t so sure either.

I think once you open up the possibility of Sherlock Holmes being gay, it will be difficult to put all of that back in the bottle. It will stay on the audience’s mind. 

So, I’m not that pessimistic. I don’t think the ascetic straight version will forever and ever be the only one we are gonna get in the future. I think the current ‘Sherlock’ interpretation will stick for a lot of people.

What you write about ‘entrapment’ and ‘inadmissible’ is all true, and I don’t doubt that that is what Mofftiss meant. But let’s not forget that they also included the sentence about Culverton being unable to stop confessing over and over and over again.

Wouldn’t that mean that once the happily gay genie is out of the bottle, it will be difficult to put him back in? Once the iconic, 130-year old Sherlock Holmes character is out as gay, it will be at least more difficult to see him in a different light. We will be unable to stop ourselves from hearing that confession in our heads over and over again.

@raggedyblue Not disturbing at all.:) I faintly remember writing that one meta (x) a while ago, in which I proposed my interpretation of Moriarty’s, “Did you miss me?” phrase. Because you see, I don’t think this is Moriarty speaking at all. I think this is Sherlock in his coma, hearing John’s voice. John is sitting by Sherlock’s bedside and asking Sherlock if Sherlock ever missed him while he was gone after Reichenbach.

See, not disturbing at all.:D

And I missed all the Sherlock speculation and fandom fun, too. But I was in no shape for any of this. I’m a bit better now, but probably still looking at another surgery by the end of this year.

@gosherlocked Thank you.

“[…]And I would really like to see people bending backwards to find a non-gay explanation for a love confession.“

God, I would SO enjoy that. I’m already getting out the popcorn for this. Nothing more enjoyable than seeing people digging themselves into an indefensible position.xD Yes, I’m baaad.:)

lol, yes! I still hope i just live long enough to see, not only the culmination of this show, but the next one too. I can't be the only person who wants the pilot universe show, and i hope among those others is a (present or future) tv producer. Bring on the 6x60 min once a year case/romance/romp with the consulting boyfriends/husbands.

“Inadmissible” (‘Sherlock’)

Moffat more or less told us, through the Culverton storyline in TLD, what’s going to happen, didn’t he?

The “inadmissible” part is particularly interesting!

(x)

Since Culverton in TLD made his ‘confession’ by Sherlock’s bedside, doesn’t that mean that John might make his (love) confession sitting by Sherlock’s bedside, too? Possibly while Sherlock is unconscious?

And afterwards everyone (the audience of this show) will treat this confession like it didn’t count (=was inadmissible). 

The audience, and ESPECIALLY those fans who weren’t too keen on a gay reading of the show to begin with, will claim that, “John didn’t mean it like that. It’s just bro-love. He just said, ‘I love you,’ because Sherlock was comatose and John felt desperate and overwhelmed by what was going on. There’s nothing gay about it. It doesn’t count as an actual love confession. This ‘love’ is just a bromance. This confession is ‘inadmissible’.” 

It’s possible that even Sherlock himself, who somehow will have heard that ‘confession’ despite being in a coma, that even Sherlock will keep telling himself that John’s confession ‘doesn’t count’ (=is inadmissible). Not for long, though…:)

But Moffat clearly told us that all of that noise and chatter by the usual suspects won’t matter. What will count is that, in the end, John won’t be able to stop himself from confessing over and over again.

That’s a nice explanation for Moffat’s choice of the word (‘inadmissible’) here, right?

This way we would, maybe, FIRST get a (subtle, half-hidden) love confession in one episode. And then get the real deal in a later episode. And in between those two, millions of viewers (including every stupid journalist ever) would explode and fall all over themselves trying to prove that that first confession was totally ‘inadmissible’, ie, didn’t point to John being in love. And then…baaam…the second one would happen.

Well, a guy can wish, can’t he?

@ebaeschnbliah @sarahthecoat @gosherlocked @possiblyimbiassed @raggedyblue @tjlcisthenewsexy @fellshish @88thparallel

i like it!

Alibi vs Confession

PILOT vs TLD

RB. Nice mirroring.

Ahhhhh, @sherlockshadow  I noticed just now …. those two scenes (three including ASIP) have something else in common:

Twenty minutes left!  :)))))))

@gosherlocked @possiblyimbiassed @raggedyblue @sarahthecoat @loveismyrevolution

hmm, both with john mirrors.

TGG

TLD

hmmm.

I’m not caught up on all the meta yet so this may be old news but… does TFP being in John’s head, Garridebs in disguise, does this mean the lock screen on Molly’s phone was intentional? I mean intentional and symbolic? Because Molly is a John mirror and phone=heart and he is trying to tell Sherlock he loves him but they aren’t connected, the call isn’t going through

Like Sherlock thinks John will die and tells him he loves him but John believes it’s ONLY because he might die… Sherlock is only saying it to Molly because she might die…. but John wants to say it back, anyway, but he can’t, he’s not connected, he’s not conscious enough, he can hear Sherlock but the call isn’t going through so he doesn’t respond where Sherlock can hear him… just whispers it to his heart… is this the first time John has let himself think that?! The first time he’s told himself out loud that he loves Sherlock like that, he’s been trying to deny it so long….

The phone being on the lock screen is how we know the call doesn’t go through, Sherlock doesn’t know John heard him, doesn’t know he wanted to respond, this is where the rage and grief when he trashes the coffin comes from?

THATS why this scene was so upsetting, it felt off everywhere because we didn’t have the right emotional context ….

Ok so I kept thinking about this at work and… I was like, that can’t be right? The bit about John being so repressed he’s never dared admit even to himself that he’s in love with Sherlock, I mean. Because Eurus’ poem at the end is also subtextually John, I think, so what exactly am I saying here? That he went from repressed, whispering “I love you” in his own heart for the first time, to this poetry, “I am lost without your love, save my soul” In the space of an episode? Yeah ok right like that one first confession……

broke the dam…

And now he can’t. Stop. Confessing.

somehow  I hadn’t seen this before, and it’s brilliant: the phone is off/locked means the heart is still closed off. Also the interpretation of this scene kind of makes me think of the train car scene at the end of TEH, which also made me sick to my stomach till I started prying out some of the subtext. It’s another “we’re about to die so let’s confess our love to each other except we can’t actually do that so we’ll make a really awkward joke that isn’t actually funny instead”. and on the way down into the tunnels, John TRIED to use his phone but there was no signal by then, but sherlock had ALREADY called the police. aaauuuuggghhhhhh these two idiots, bang their heads together till they talk!!

THE BEST MAN - CULVERTON SMITH

A while back, the brilliant @fellshish made the discovery that in TLD, we see a flash of Culverton in the same wedding clothes John and Sherlock wore to John’s wedding. But why? What could it mean? Today, I figured it out. AND IT ALL SPELLS FUCKERY.

S4 is fake as fuck. I mean we know this, BUT COME ON.

Fellshish’s post is here: X

Take a look at that, then see this:

They have *literally told us* how fake this series was.

Also -

Culverton to me seems–in ways–like a Sherlock mirror, as much as he might sort of resemble an evil version of John. And what does Culverton do? He drugs his “best friends” in order to confess a secret to them. Something he wants them not to remember if they don’t react well. Could Sherlock have drugged John at some point and confessed his feelings to him? And John wasn’t ready to hear it? Just a thought….

Besides, we already have our John mirror: Faith, with her cane.

What’s the worst thing you could do to your best friend…

Yes! Yes! Yes! And in his wedding speech i think Sherlock commented that he sometimes drugs John and that he “missed a whole wednesday once”.

@ebaeschnbliah

Wow, this is amazing. Sherlock’s very own EMP version of Billy Kincaid, mixed up with elements of himself and John?

yikes, that is quite a few points of contact.

“Culverton gave me Faith’s original note. A mutual friend put us in touch.”

Now what kind of person would be a friend of both Culverton Smith and Eurus Holmes?

I can think of one (1) person

And didn’t this note get written after his death?

Explain that Moftiss.

@brainofthe1storder

Here’s another question, why the hell would Culverton Smith show anyone the letter to begin with??? He could have just torn it up and Faith would have forgotten about it. It doesn’t make sense.

Moriarty was the person I thought of, too, @hufflepuffpentaholicinthebau. Especially given how the entirety of S4 was billed to be some sort of ‘showdown’ concerning him. I believe it was @loveismyrevolution that thought it was meant to be Mycroft? I’m still on the fence with just how ‘bad’ he might have been, but that is another possibility that I think might hold water.

Because your question, @sherlock-meta-collection is one that has bugged me as well. What exaclty was the point of ‘whomever’ it was giving the note to ‘Faith’? Culverton took the letter from the ‘real’ Faith (though, how do we know that really since TD12 compromises memory, and how did Sherlock know about that whole meeting? To recreate it on the street perfectly? Are we to infer ‘Faith’ described it in such detail?) So, Smith took the letter to keep his daughter from  ‘remembering’ (almost a kindness, in his twisted way) But, then gave it to ‘fake Faith’ in order to have Sherlock come after him? WHY? And how did Smith and ‘fake Faith’ know each other in order to be of use to one another??

All this is to me is another case of Sherlock re-using events, playing them out over and over in his head because haven’t we had this sort of thing before?

It never made sense that distraught Lady Carmichael went to Mycroft for help with her husband, who then sent her to Sherlock in order to prevent his murder by ‘the bride’ only to actually go through with it herself. It didn’t make sense because Lady Carmichael didn’t kill Sir Eustace.

So, why would we believe Smith had, in a roundabout way, asked Sherlock for help in ‘preventing’ more murders?

Smith was no more a murderer than Lady Carmichael. Because it’s all in his head. :/ 

(Pre-warning, this got a bit longer than I had intended)

@monikakrasnorada​ I also think that most, if not all of S4 is taking place in Sherlock’s head/MP. Even before I heard about EMP, I always got the feeling that the note in TLD was somehow from Sherlock and the deductions he was supposedly making about Faith, he was actually making about himself:

Says the scruffy, unkempt Sherlock who is usually immaculately dressed and primped.

Remember what John just told his therapist in the beginning of the episode?

Then, Sherlock goes on to deduce:

Says the man that, although his family seems to be wealthy, needs to have a flatmate for some reason, and so far as the small kitchen/keen cook goes, I’ll just submit these stills from later in the scene:

Then, later when Sherlock and Faith are sitting at the bus stop eating chips

This is referring to when John was living with Sherlock in 221B. So if the note is real, Sherlock kept it hidden away.

P.S. Does anyone else think that those hands look like they belong to Benedict Cumberbatch???

Also, that shadow sure as shit looks like Dr. John H Watson by the way, and I think others have addressed this fact, but I’m not sure who at the moment. 

(More under the cut, this got reeeeeeeaaaaalllyy long)

Keep reading

(Part Two)

So, there are some of the Sherlock comparisons, but what about the note, what exactly is the note and what is it trying to tell us? That’s where I’m having a difficult time. I have noticed that there is a list/note theme in the show (others as well, I think there are even meta’s, but I’ll have to check later). We have the conversation between Mrs. Hudson and Sherlock in TSoT:

And of course the many instances of list conversations in TAB:

And in the “real world” on the plane:

…

I am not sure exactly what to make of it, but it does seem to me that Faith’s note actually looks like a list. If you try to imagine for a minute that you don’t know the story behind Faith’s note

It says:

That looks like a list of people that someone needs to kill, and notice that ME is crossed out in blood, like the person has chosen to kill themselves from the list.

I don’t have concrete conclusions, I just wanted to put down all of my thoughts on Faith’s note. I will have to clean this up later and make a proper meta out of it. 

Any thoughts? (and I apologize about the length :/ )

@monikakrasnorada

Ack,  so sorry. I posted a reply to your other post before I saw this, @hemlock-her-loss. 

The note business is a conundrum. If we go back to TRF, Sherlock’s note was via phone (written from the heart?) And then we get John giving Sherlock a note we never get to see. Then there is Mary’s OTT dramatic reading of her note in T6T. It’s crazy, right? There is definitely a key to all these notes, but like you, I’m at a loss as to how to go about making sense of them all. 

I think the mutual friend is Sherlock. It’s a joke just like “I’m against new people.” They are all him. He invented the note.

Funny, the fact that Culverton kept Faith’s note don’t shock me. At All.

That man’s urge isn’t to kill anyone, it is to confess. That what TD-12 is all about, that’s what the whole episode is about. I’m a killer, you know I’m a killer… but did you know… I’m a cereal killer?

Keeping the note is only stupid when you are trying to keep the secret safe. If you want to plan a great game… you give it to someone like Moriarty so that he’d do something extraordinary. Like, I don’t know, making you meet someone who’ll give it to Sherlock Holmes because you know Sherlock will scream to everyone what you can’t say. You will go viral, you’ll tease him what you are but, and that’s the beauty of it, he has nothing against you and you’ll drive him insane. With your luck, he’ll even be willing to listen and no one will ever suspect the truth except some hard fans who’ll be convinced all their life and you are a dangerous lunatic, but what can they do?

Hiding the truth is second nature but when you’re finally, you can’t stop confessing because that’s what’s been missing all this time.

Another thing to notice is that, let it be this note, John’s letter or even Mary’s, all of them are utterly useless.

Take Faith’s note, it’s not what Faith wrote that interests Sherlock, it’s the added deductions about the flat, all the little things Eurus added, that’s what drove Sherlock to take the case and it’s the ‘Miss me’ that is the most important thing. The original note was meaningless and nothing could have been archieved.

John’s note… nobody cares about what was inside. Mary’s farewell letter is funny because, while she was being dramatic, John was following her with the tracer probably bored to tears and he utterly rejecting her way of doing things. All she wanted to prevent happened anyway. As for the Miss me video, her brillant plan didn’t come to pass because John wasn’t planning to save Sherlock until he saw the video.

Here’s the thing, the only powers these notes have are the ones given by those who got them.

Behind Faith/Eurus, the case is indeed about Sherlock and John and it is the heart of the episode, it never was about Culverton. Mary’s letter and John’s mean nothing except one was supposed to be a love letter and the other… a break up? No one will ever know because Sherlock refuses to show it to us the content and so any power it might have had vanished. Culverton’s recorded confession is not recievable, the recording should be pointless and everything Sherlock has worked for should have been for nothing but Culverton keeps confessing anyway.

With every single note, we mustn’t ask what the note means, it is only an excuse if we think it’s EMP, but what meaning, what power, the characters gave them. Because what should be important is useless what what should have been meaningless was the most important in the whole thing. The more important it seemed, the more useless it was and what whould have been pointless was actually the most important because the characters decided to change what it was supposed to be about. Eurus, the Subtext, gave power to a note that had none by adding deductions, Culverton used evidence that wouldn’t have been posssibly accepted by any court to confess on his own.

And worse, wasn’t the biggest deduction of that letter written by Eurus in invisible ink? Hidden behind the text there was indeed something hidden from our eyes, there was a subtext. One chilling conclusion because there was absolutely no reason for this 'Miss Me’ except to tell us, 'Congratulations for passing level 1, now the real game begins’.

What power does Season 4 have anyway? It is silly, it is a mess, it is full of contradictions, what can we find inside that is possibly salvageable?

Well, what is meaningful in that freaky season is whatever we deemed important, not what actually was important in the beginning.

AH, what an interesting discussion! I also get the sense that all these "notes" are connected, reiterations, recycled memories, reworkings. If i had to pick, i would guess the "original" is the phone call "note" in TRF.

I like the connection back to lady carmichael and culverton smith, both john mirrors, and that paradoxical or contradictory murderer​/not-murderer thing... i cant tell if it means john did or didn't kill "mary", or whether it's more internal than that, having to do with sherlock having hurt john, and been hurt by him, but also not wanting to hold that against him.

I also can't help thinking there is a connection between the "aborted love confession" on the tarmac, and smith confessing like he cant stop. Its the exact opposite of bottling it up.

I need to read this again, and also follow the read-more in the middle. Still catching up from the weekend!

Two-Way-Mirrors

A Dream Tell For Series Four

In S4, all three episodes have an interrogation room. Rooms where confessions are often made. These rooms have two-way-mirrors: “To dream that you are looking through a two-way mirror indicates that you are coming face to face with some inner or worldly issue. Consider the dream as an investigation or questioning platform, what or whomever is being watched through the two-way-mirror is being scrutinized.”

AAHH, good catch.