Slithytove

Make that another "Yes!"

As UK law stands at the moment, I don't think "consulting detective" has any legal status. Also, we have extremely strict gun laws and unarmed police (though we also have officers who are trained in the use of firearms and will respond to situations where armed police are required). Anyone, including a private detective, would have an uphill job to convince anyone that the shooting was legal. It seems that Mycroft is the Fairy Godmother in this type of situation, due to his undefined role in the government. Sherlock says his brother is "the British Government", and he does seem to have a very wide remit. Most of the time he seems to be part of the diplomatic service, but then he is conveniently part of M16. I wonder what his job title miight be?

It is impossible not to love Watson. However much he ages and however many terrible things he witnesses, he has a sort of youthful enthusiasm, an innocence and optimism in the face of everything. I think that that is why Holmes loves him too.

That is pretty much what I see her as already, or rather what my impression so far is. Which is why I feel for her the most during the scene at Baker St and also later at Sherlock's parents' house. Nobody ever asks her why she acted like she did, do they. Sherlock has at least tried to figure it out on his own, but John isn't even interested and he treats her quite harshly, in my humble opinion, considering that he knows nothing about her motives or background. Doesn't he even want to make sure she's not in immediate danger from somebody? Wouldn't it be a relief to him if he found she had some kind of justification for what she did? Sorry, some people had better take a deep breath before they read this, but I personally find John's behavior towards Mary at least as egocentric as her actions have been called. All he seems worried about is what the discovery that his wife was an assassin says about him and all he seems interested in keeping is the woman Mary should have been to please him and his idea of himself. It's all about him and his wrongs. Ahem. Sorry again. I am sure this was not the impression the writers wanted to create at all. And I do still love John very much (I've never wanted any character to be perfect, anyway. I hate saintly people, at least in fiction). I agree that there is something off about John's character in this episode. I think many of us have sensed it, though we attribute it to different reasons. I don't actually blame him for being unable to focus on Mary's needs and preoccupied by his own pain. If I discovered that everything my spouse had told me was a lie and that he had actually been a professional killer - which, when I think of my husband, is pretty hilarious - I would be more than upset. Hysterical, terrified and appalled wouldn't even begin to cover it. And, yes, I would want to know why he was a killer and whether his deeds could be justified - which is what I've said, all long, about Mary. John needs to stop hiding from the truth. Maybe she killed only in defence of others, or maybe she went round massacring orphans. John doesn't want to know, which seems weak and selfish to me. Those are not characteristics I would normally associate with John Watson. However, even if Mary was proved to have been a saint, I will never be able to see her as a victim because she shot her friend. Not only was he innocent, unarmed, trusting and offering to help, he was more than a friend - he was practically family. In fact, to John, he was family. Clearly John does have relatives and friends (no problem filling his side of the church) but the two people he loves most in the world are Mary and Sherlock. In some ways, though he has better social skills, he seems almost as lonely as Sherlock. We rarely see him with friends, except the occasional girlfriend, nor do any Watsons ever turn up. At least Mycroft visits. Then Mary nearly destroys the other person he truly loves, the person whose previous loss broke his heart, and he's fine with that? It seems to me that something went wrong with John's characterisation in HLV. Whether you think he is unfair to Mary or forgives her too easily, he just doesn't seem to be the character developed in the previous episodes. Of course, characters can surprise us, they can baffle us and do something which seems uncharacteristic, but they should never make us have a gut reaction of, "He would never do that.". Usually it happens when a character is forced to jump through a hoop for the sake of the plot. I think this happens with John, which is why many of us feel he has disappointed us. It seems that the writers have moved John quite a long way from ACD's Watson. The original Watson was a sort of boy's adventure hero, brave, loyal and always ready to accompany Holmes into danger, but I doubt he had a subconscious wish to marry a killer. In general, I think the updating is good - I quite like Sherlock being a bit ruder, a bit crueller, a bit more manipulative than Holmes, and John being a bit more outspoken and a bit more angry than Watson - but John is now supposed to be so addicted to danger than he seeks out violent situations and can only form meaningful relationships with psychopaths and wannabe psychopaths. Hmm. Not sure how far they can push that idea without eroding the central core of the character. He is already beginning to look a bit thin around the edges.

I suspect that if we're to agree on this, we'll have to agree to disagree. I suppose the universal definition of "murder" is "killing of which I do not approve," and you choose to approve of only certain government-sanctioned killing, while I choose to approve of other cases such as some self-defense, and to disapprove of others such as some capital punishment. Our definitions overlap considerably, but are not identical around the edges. In my understanding, Moftiss basically admitted that Magnussen was a straw man, created to be so utterly vile that it would be a relief when Sherlock pulled the trigger. That sort of thing happens so rarely in real life that we don't need special laws to deal with it, we just call it murder. But this is fiction, so I think we're allowed to cheer when Sherlock returns. As for what Mary did, I will need more data before I can have much idea what I think of it. Meanwhile, I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt, for John's sake if nothing else. Essentially, I accept the legal definition of murder as unlawful killing with malice aforethought. I do not approve of state-authorised killing, except for euthanasia for those who wish to end their lives due to terminal illness. I listed war, capital punishment and (in some places ) euthanasia as the only legalised intentional killing which came to mind. It doesn't mean I approve, but the fact that I think war and and capital punishment are both morally abhorrent doesn't change their legal status. I suppose that self-defence is another case of killing allowed by the law in certain circumstances, though that one is less clear-cut - you do have to prove that you really believed your life was endangered and that you had no other way to protect yourself. I am not sure how far this extends to killing in defence of others, so I don't know if it would be arguable that John's killing of the cabbie was necessary to save Sherlock. I doubt it, as Sherlock was partly responsible for accepting the challenge to choose the right pill. Clearly the killing of CAM would not be legally defensible because no-one was in immediate danger. I am prepared to cheer Shetlock's return, because he believed he was killing to save a life, but even Mycroft doesn't try to pretend it is anything but murder. If Mary murdered CAM, it would not have been self-defence because she was killing to protect her freedom and her marriage, not her life. If Sherlock had died, it would have been a clear-cut case of murder. If she was caught, I assume she would be charged with his attempted murder. To be honest, I don't think there is a fuzzy line where murder is concerned. To misquote Gertrude Stein, a murder is a murder is a murder. You may feel that some murders are a case of choosing the lesser of two evils - which is presumably how Sherlock saw the murder of CAM - but it doesn't alter the fact that it is murder. I don't see how Mary's killings can fall into any other category. At 221B, Sherlock said that Mary was on the run from something and I doubt the writers will waste such an obvious plot line. I suspect Mary will have a backstory designed to make us sympathise with her and feel her actions were justified. Given the telegram reference to her family, and the fact that she seems to be wholly alone (because they are dead? or because she is in deep cover?) I wouldn't be surprised if she has killed to protect or avenge her loved ones. Judging by her reaction at the airfield, I also wouldn't be surprised if the something she is running from is Moriarty. I think it will be designed for us to see her more as a victim than a perpetrator. Of course, it will be difficult to convince those of us who feel she went over to the dark side forever when she shot Sherlock.

Seems like a solid theory. If I am not mistaken, Moffat said in an interview that they intended for HLV to be like an explosion after the somewhat sappy reunion and wedding. If youŶ can't do another cliffhanger, then you have to create some controversy. If that's what they wanted to achieve, they definitely succeeded. Concerning writer intention: Maybe I am reading too much into it, but are you by chance a supporter of reader-response criticism? I agree that an author/writer sets the direction and the pace but often people arrive at different destinations due to their experiences. I don't know if it's really the writer's fault. I don't consider it possible to make every reader reach the same destination. In this episode's case, though, it feels like a bomb hit the path. People are scatter all over. It is so blatantly controversial it must be intentional... Reader-response theory has a lot of validity, I think, though I approach the question from a writer's viewpoint. Good writing allows space for the reader's contribution. After all, we all add our own experiences, values, ideals, etc. To give a very simple example, if I have been to Paris and you haven't, the world we create inside our heads when we read a piece about that city will be very different, even though we are reading the same words. However, even if we have both been there, our reading experience will still be different because we are different. Drama is more complex, in some ways, than prose because it has already been filtered through several consciousnesses, including the actors'. A change of intonation or facial expression can subtly alter meaning. Nonetheless, the viewer still brings their own input, and the argument about Mary's culpability is a good example because we are all processing the same scenes through our different value systems. However, although a writer does not determine what the audience brings to or takes from the work, they need to be in control of their own material. In this case, it was suggested that the writers intended to create a romantic, heroic mood in the reconciliation scene, but there are enough of us saying the scene felt manipulative, even distasteful, to suggest that that intention was not fulfilled. If the writers really intended to create such a mood, they failed to communicate that emotion. I believe, as I was taught, that as writers we are responsible for our material. We can never say, "But you misunderstood! I didn't mean that!". If the reader doesn't understand me, it is my fault because I did not communicate my intentions clearly. This applies to all aspects of the craft, including mood. If I try to write a funny piece and it makes you miserable, I have failed in my intent. It might be a great piece, you might take all sorts of meaning from it, but it was not what I was trying to say. Of course, it may be that the reconciliation scene was not meant to be about romance and heroics. Maybe it was about something less easily defined - a mood of uncertainty and insecurity, perhaps? I would not be surprised if the meanings we have found in S3 are all undermined by S4. Consider TRF, for instance. We thought we were watching a man on the verge of panic, struggling with fear and sorrow, but what were we really seeing? Relief that the plan had worked? Resignation about having to go through with the rest of it? We don't even know why Sherlock is crying. Moffatt is an arch-manipulator of mood, which is why I tend to mistrust his writing even though I enjoy it. Sometimes you can feel the puppet-master pulling the strings. "Laugh! Be angry! Now cry!". You can recognise this more clearly in Dr Who, which is aimed at a slightly younger audience. If we have a wide range of emotions in response to HLV, and the reconciliation scene in particular, I suspect that it was intentional.

Be very careful what you wish for -- Steven Moffat may be listening! But you're absolutely right, we know hardly anything about Mary's past so far, unless we choose to believe Magnussen's implications and Sherlock's inferences. Ooh, interesting idea! So you think maybe she wants to be absolutely certain that Sherlock will read it -- so, using reverse psychology, she gives it to John, knowing that Sherlock will then sneak a peek at the first opportunity. Meanwhile, dear loyal John heeds the fear in her voice and refrains from reading it. Sounds bizarre, but I do believe it would be pretty foolproof, knowing those two men. I'm neither disputing nor agreeing with the rest of what you said, but I would like to point out a couple of assumptions here. 1. "Mary murdered people for a living." We don't know who she may have killed, or why. All we have is Magnussen's innuendos and Sherlock's inferences. And while those apparently frightened Mary, for all we know, what actually frightened her was the part about her false identity. It seems likely that she did kill people as part of her job, but equating that with "murder" assumes more facts than we currently have. 2. "As far as we know, Sherlock killed one person." While it's true that we could not actually name anyone else he's killed, I personally suspect that he used some seriously extra-legal means to "dismantle" Moriarty's network over the past two years. Sorry, have to answer everyone separately. Haven't mastered multi-quote. It is, of course, entirely possibly that CAM was lying and Mary didn't work for the CIA, though Sherlock also thought she had been an intelligence agent. It seems clear that there is something very bad in her past. She says CAM's evidence would put her in prison for life, that John wouldn't love her if he knew what she had done, that it would break him, and she is prepared to kill CAM and Sherlock to keep it secret. So I think we can assume she has killed people. If CAM was lying, maybe she didn't do it for money - maybe she is an amateur, which calls into question her motives for taking people's lives. I am inclined to think she was a professional, simply because of her skills. I am trying to think of killing which is not classified as murder, and all I can come up with is casualties of war, capital punishment, and euthanasia in countries where it is legal. In the unlikely event that Mary's activities took place in one of these fields, she would not face life imprisonment. The only type of killing that would not be considered murder but would put her at risk of jail is manslaughter, and it seems highly unlikely that she killed a lot of people by accident! Personally, I don't see Sherlock as an assassin. The original Holmes fought his enemies by using his brilliant mind, not by violence, and I see his modern incarnation in the same light. I agree that both versions are brave, physically strong and willing to take risks but their true weapon is their formidable intelligence. (This is why I hated the Robert Downy Jnr version - Sherlock Holmes, action hero?). As for the messy work of arresting or killing Moriarty's agents, I imagine that, as Sherlock himself would say, he "farmed it out."

Interesting. I am a writer and I am curious about any discrepancies between a creator's intention and the "finished product." Writing, like all art forms, is a collaboration between artist and audience. The reader or, in this case, viewer brings their own experience, interpretation, morality, expectations, etc to the work and good writing allows for this. I am also aware that we have gone far beyond authorial intent in our discussions here. However, it is always the writer's task to convey their intended effect. If I had written a scene which I intended to be read as romantic and heroic, and a sizeable proportion of my audience went, "That's not loving and brave, it's selfish and distasteful", I would know something had gone wrong somewhere. As a writer it is always my fault, not the reader's, if I fail to get my message across. I would know I made an error of judgement in my plotting, characterisation, dialogue, or whatever. If, on the other hand, the writers of Sherlock's intended effect was ambiguity (and controversy?), they have succeeded, haven't they? Maybe they decided to lob a moral hand grenade at us and sit back to watch whilst it exploded.

You really think that Mary and Sherlock are morally the same? That is interesting. Even though we know Mary murdered people for a living but, as far as we know, Sherlock killed one person in an act of desperation, to protect someone else? As John did, in ASiP. So do you think Mary and John are on the same moral footing? To me, Mary and Sherlock are nothing alike. Sherlock kids himself that he is a sociopath but he evidently feels empathy and does things which are against his own interests, for the sake of others. Certainly he can be selfish, arrogant and sometimes cruel, but he does have emotions - we have glimpsed them throughout S3 - and acts on them even when they are self-destructive. Shooting CAM is a prime example. Other people - John and Mary - benefit from this act. Sherlock doesn't. As far as he knows, he is going to prison for life, which would effectively be a death sentence - if he did not provoke his fellow inmates into killing him, he would surely kill himself because he would never cope with years of boredom. Instead, Mycroft hands him a different death sentence. Sherlock has knowingly sacrificed his life to help someone else. Hardly the action of a psychopath. Mary, on the other hand, acts entirely for herself. She intends to shoot CAM, and does shoot Sherlock, to keep herself out of jail and because she wants to hold onto John. She tells Sherlock that she will do anything - a clear threat that she will make sure he dies next time - to avoid losing John. Her love for John is selfish - she lies constantly and tricks him into a phoney marriage based on a lie, she is willing to murder his dearest friend to keep him, and she never seems to consider that, if she really loved him, she should get out of his life. Sherlock accepts the consequences of his actions, even though he knows it will mean never seeing John again. Mary tries - and succeeds - to avoid all responsibility. As characters, I think their morality is very different. Regarding the flash drive - if she wanted John or Sherlock to know about her past, couldn't she just tell them? A lot safer than actually creating evidence against herself. And someone who did not hesitate to shoot a friend is hardly too sensitive to be able to talk about her previous crimes.

I really don't find John's behaviour romantic or heroic. To me, it seems self-serving and cowardly. He values his own domestic happiness over his loyalty to Sherlock, and he wants to stay with Mary but doesn't have the courage to look her past deeds in the face. Yes, I know Sherlock told him to forgive her - so what? That doesn't take away John's responsibility to choose between right and wrong. Shooting an innocent, unarmed man who offers no harm to you or anyone else is wrong, wrong, wrong. I do have strong moral qualms over John's decision to know nothing of Mary's past. I understand he could do nothing to help her victims, though knowledge of who they were and why they died might help him to prevent her killing again. After all, she has hardly turned over a new leaf - when confronted with a problem, her immediate response was to kill. However, even more than the practical side, John should know because the who, how and why of people's deaths are important. Motive is important. Method is important - no-one wants to die, but a cruel death is worse than a painless one. For instance, in real life, there was the assassination in London of a Russian former secret agent turned journalist, poisoned (possibly on the orders of the Russian government) with polonium. That was a dreadful, lingering way to die. Did Mary inflict that type of horrific death on anyone? If she did, does it matter? If not, why not? And who did she kill? Did she kill to save other lives? Did she shoot people in front of their children? Did she blow up people's cars and kill whole families along with her targets? All these things have happened in real life assassinations. How can John close his eyes to everything and live with her, never asking these questions? The comparison to Dexter is interesting. I think both are psychopaths, or at least Dexter is at the beginning. His character seems to alter over time, as he seems to develop the ability of empathise, to some degree, which he certainly didn't have in the early episodes. His urge to kill is, of course, contained by " the code" just as Mary's was utilised by the CIA, presumably up to the point where she went freelance. I find Mary more callous, because Dexter didn't murder his innocent friends, hang out with the victim's family or generally act as if entitled to forgiveness. They are, of course, very similar in their ability to lie and to charm people, and in their total lack of remorse. I can bear Mary-the- psychopath, though I wouldn't be sorry if she was killed or ran away in S4. What I can't bear is John as Mrs Psychopath's devoted husband. As for A.G.R.A, do you think Mary was dim enough to keep evidence of her own guilt? I think it was a fake, a test. John passed by destroying it unread. If he had failed her test and read it...Well, we know how Mary treats people who stand in her way.

Any time you want to find something (assuming you can recall some of the words), try the forum's advanced search function (accessed by clicking the little "cog" symbol next to the quick-search box at the top of any page. The reason I'm curious to see those remarks is that I'm wondering whether you and I interpreted them differently (which would explain why I don't remember them from your description). So the distinction you're drawing is between killers who target good people and killers who target bad people? Or am I missing something? An asset is an asset only as long as it's productive. As I mentioned, CAM did follow through with his threat to Lady Smallwood when she stopped playing ball. So eventually it'll come down to let him flick Mycroft's face or he'll see that Mary dies. I wrote a very detailed reply, and lost it when the forum went offline. Damn. So.... Yes, of course there is a difference between killing good and bad people. I doubt if those who celebrated the shooting of Osama bin Laden would have been so happy if Mother Theresa was the target. (I know she died years ago, but you get my point.) However, I am not saying it is okay to kill the bad guys. I am not going to cheer anyone's death, including a terrorist's. I am trying to understand the viewpoint of people who feel that the past is the past, we have all done things we are ashamed of, love can redeem us and John is romantic - even heroic -when he chooses to remain in deliberate ignorance. I assume that these people see Mary less as a person who has committed a string of murders and more like a soldier killing in the line of duty. If not, I think their position is untenable. After all, we would probably welcome a soldier home from a war and help them resume civilian life, but we would not say to Jack the Ripper, "Well, that's all in the past. Let's move on...." I was trying to give Mary the benefit of the doubt, and the only justification I can see for killing is to save lives. I can see this might happen sometimes, like the assassination of a terrorist bomber if they could not be stopped any other ways. However, I doubt this happens often. I suspect most government- ordered killings are political. You may believe that your county's secret service is always on the side of the angels, but I doubt this is true of any nation. I also pointed out that freelance killers are even less likely to be acting for the good of humanity. Bad people hire hit men for bad reasons. In ASiP, Sherlock deduces that the shooter is a person of strong moral principles who doesn't fire until he has to, to save an innocent life. I would expect that moral man to want to know, at the very least, who his wife has murdered and why.

Thank you for your reply. If people have been saying that, then I simply didn't notice, probably because it doesn't strike me as much of a reason. If you happen to remember some specific examples, I'd be interested in seeing exactly what those people said. What if the hidden killer is targeting some wacko who is busily slaughtering a schoolyard full of children? Not disagreeing with your basic point, just wondering where your boundaries are. So if John had refused to play along, and Magnussen had indeed relayed Mary's whereabouts to her old enemies, would that have been John's fault? I don't think that's what you're saying, but am not sure. We do know that when Lady Smallwood developed a backbone, Magnussen turned up the heat on her husband until he killed himself. So yes, Magnussen is clearly a threat unless the Morstan-Watson-Holmes family is willing to play his game indefinitely. The only reason I remember the gist of these remarks is that I've reacted by thinking, "No.....love isn't an excuse...." To be honest, I can't remember who said what. I even forget where some of my own posts are on the forum, and can't navigate my way back to carry on the conversation. As for the madman shooting the schoolchildren, assassins aren't hired to do that sort of job. That is what armed police are trained to do. Assassins may be employed by the security forces to get rid of people a government deems to be dangerous, in one way or another, to its interests. I can see that they might be used to save lives, e.g.killing terrorists if there is no way to arrest them, but it is equally likely that governments use them to eliminate political opponents. Then there are freelances who are hired by Very Bad People to commit murder. People who hire killers are unlikely to be doing so for humanitarian reasons. They are likely to be terrorist groups, criminal organisations or individuals who need a hit man to get rid of someone who is inconvenient. I seriously doubt that many assassins are employed in the service of mankind. No, I'm not saying John would be to blame if he did not co-operate and CAM revealed Mary's whereabouts to those who want her dead (vengeful relatives of her victims, presumably.) I mean that that threat was another nasty little mind game but it would be foolish of CAM to carry it out. Knowledge of Mary's past is the leverage he needs to control Mycroft, so why would he throw it away? He would lose that leverage if she was dead or imprisoned. Therefore he doesn't identify her to the police after her attack upon himself and Sherlock, and he would be an idiot to identify her to her potential killers. She is an asset he has acquired and he has no reason to destroy it.

Well, yes, people have said repeatedly that they believe in the redemptive power of love, they can forgive Mary because she acted out of love for John, and that his forgiveness of her because he loves her is a wonderful thing. Moftiss seem to expect us to buy this argument too ( unless they have a trick up their sleeve - here's hoping!) As far as soldiers/ assassins are concerned, I have always been horrified by war and have done my share of anti war marches, etc, but assassins fill me with disgust. For instance, I was very young when JFK, Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy were assassinated but I remember the shock and revulsion we all felt when those hidden killers struck down unarmed, unsuspecting and defenceless men. That is the work of assassins and they are pretty much beneath contempt, whether their victims are prominent people or nobodies. Regarding CAM, he only said he would put Mary's life in danger if John did not allow him to humiliate him. He was a businessman and would have known better than to waste an asset. He had wanted power over Mycroft and now he had Mary, therefore he had John, therefore he had Sherlock, therefore he had Mycroft - why would he throw that away by getting Mary killed?

John is far less deferential to Sherlock than Watson was to Holmes. He calls him out on his behaviour, in S1&2, when he thinks he is being rude or heartless. He is Sherlock's moral compass, somewhat more obviously than his 19th century counterpart, who was simply the benchmark of decency and reliability for his volatile friend. I can't imagine Watson being bold enough to refer to Holmes as " a complete dickhead." I do take your point about real life. We extend sympathy to fictional characters whom we would shun in reality. I love Moriarty's ridiculously mad schemes but I would be horrified if I met him in real life. However, even in fiction, I don't think wrongdoing should be given a free ride - we are not supposed to find Jim forgivable but Mary is okay because she loves John and vice versa. I believe that the difference between Sherlock's killing of CAM and Mary's actions (planning to shoot CAM and actually shooting Sherlock) is not visibility but motive. Sherlock wants to save lives (Mary & baby) and protect those he loves. Mary wants to save her own skin and keep the life she has created for herself. There is a difference and you would think John could see it. I just can't see how John could hope to build a happy marriage based on lies and violence, particularly horrifying violence against his best friend. I can see that many people feel that Mary loves John and wants to protect him, thus she attacks Sherlock; John loves Mary and thus he forgives the attack. I can't see how that is any justification. Suppose, for instance, that Sherlock had not been Mary's witness but her lover. Would it be okay for her to say, "it would break my husband if he found out I had an affair, and I thought my lover might tell so I shot him?". It is basically the same scenario, except that Mary is hiding something much darker than a love affair.

I live in hope that, in S4, we will discover that they had other, better reasons for their reactions to Mary - reasons which make Sherlock seem less gullible (the shot was surgery? it's okay for you to stay with a killer because you like danger?) and John less self-serving. I'm not holding my breath, though.

Ah, I think I'm finally beginning to understand the issue. Well, I never saw John as so much of a "good man", not an exceptionally good man, anyway. Of course, he has a pretty strong moral / ethical code (he'd need it, as an army doctor, getting into all sorts of tricky situations). I like to argue that as a soldier, John was little more than a "hired killer" himself, but there we get into a totally different territory. But even as a civilian, he's kept his gun, and as we saw in A Study in Pink, is prepared to use it if he feels there are no alternatives. So shooting people to protect others is not totally out of the question for either Sherlock or John. Mary attacked Sherlock in an attempt to protect her husband from a truth she believed would "break him". It wasn't a very good decision, and she misjudged her two men a bit, but okay. My impression was always that John was a lot more upset about her "lie" to him (pretending to be someone she isn't and letting him fall in love with that) than about the shot or the fact that she once killed people for a living (again, that's what John himself did not long ago). In then end, I think love is blind, and John's love for Mary especially so. But that is understandable. He's been looking for her for so long and she appeared during a horrible time in his life and changed everything for the better. He couldn't let her go, I don't think. It'd be a bit much to expect that of him. It is interesting that we see John in rather different ways. For me, ACD's Watson was always a prime example of basic human decency. Where Holmes was brilliant, difficult, mercurial and idiosyncratic, Watson was solid, kind, loyal and reliable. I have always seen John in the same way. Yes, he is not afraid to use his gun in defence of someone's life, because he believes it is morally right to protect the defenceless, but he would never harm anyone to further his own interests. Mary is prepared to murder CAM to keep herself out of prison and to do the same to Sherlock to ensure that John remains in ignorance (and she remains free, if Sherlock dies - if he survives, there is the possibility he will uncover her past and perhaps have her arrested.) I do not believe that this can be justified in the name of love. If so, everyone who falls in love and chooses to get rid of an inconvenient spouse or lover who gets in the way has a defence. Incidentally, I don't think Sherlock was right to kill CAM. I do think his case and Mary's were very different. Mary shot him to protect herself, i.e. her freedom and her marriage to John. Sherlock killed because he wanted to protect Mary, and her unborn child, from the threats CAM had made. Killing meant Mary would escape the consequences of her actions. Sherlock killed in the full knowledge that it would have drastic, negative consequences for him. And, of course, Sherlock is "on the side of the angels" and saves lives by catching murderers. CAM is a cruel man who ruins lives. However, I still think that Sherlock made the wrong decision. You can't execute people because they are cruel and dangerous, however despicable they may be. (I think that ACD's Holmes was wrong, for the same reason, to think that Milverton's murder was okay.) Mary's life had been threatened but was not under direct threat at that moment. There was some leeway to find a way of protecting her without committing murder. So I think Sherlock made a bad move for good reasons. He chose to throw away his life( as far as he knew) to fulfill his vow to keep the Watsons - all three of them - safe and happy. Unlike Mary, he was sacrificing himself, whereas she was saving herself - but, in both cases, the decision to shoot was wrong. I agree that John is much more upset about Mary's lies than about Sherlock's shooting or the killings in her past, and that is exactly what I find so appalling. He is more concerned about his own domestic happiness than the fact that his best friend - the other person he claims to love most in the world - suffered an agonising injury which nearly led to their death, and which they survived only by a (somewhat unlikely) miracle. On top of that, he decides to keep his wife by remaining in wilful ignorance about the other people she killed. The comparison between soldiers and assassins is debatable, unless you believe in pacifism under all circumstances ( a perfectly respectable belief, as held by Quakers, etc). I would not have thought many people would have thought that soldiers in a war zone were the same as assassins hired to take out individuals, usually not in combat. There is also the fact that John was an army doctor, who would not normally be involved in killing people. However, even if you think Mary and John are on the same moral footing, it does not alter the fact that he chooses to know nothing about the crimes she has committed, not because he thinks they can be justified but because he is afraid, as she tells him, that he will stop loving her if he knows the truth. His deliberate ignorance, like his ability to let go of the harm she did to Sherlock, is selfish and, in my opinion, quite callous. It is not what I expected from John's character. Yes, Sherlock forgives her and tells John to do the same, but since when did John Watson follow the moral guidance of Sherlock Holmes?

Wow, there's a lot of issues being raised here! I can probably sum up my own thoughts by saying - surprise, surprise! - I agree with Zain regarding the areas where John seems to fall short as a friend or seems to be less than the man we judged him to be. Now, to address a few specific points..... I like the maturity of the Sherlock fandom (I am so ancient, I just couldn't bear it if everyone was screaming at each other) and I hope we can respect each other even if we disagree. For myself, the day I start getting aggressive over a fictional character is the day I know I've been thinking about these stories too much. Would I blame Sholto if he had shot John? Sure as hell I would! Warning someone that you will shoot them doesn't give you the right to do so, unless you are in a situation when you have to do it to save your own or someone else's life. It would be a licence to commit murder. You can't claim something is an "unfortunate reflex" if you have already said you will do it. That's not a reflex action, it is a premeditated act. I disagree that Sherlock patronisingly disregarded Mary's warning. I think he trusted her not to shoot because he thought she was better than that. Maybe he even thought she wouldn't hurt him because she was his friend, which is rather sad, particularly when you think what a lonely man he seems to be and how hard ( and uncharacteristically) he tries to be her friend. He believed that Mary was basically a good person who would not murder her friend. She proved him wrong. I have always maintained that Sherlock's ethics are skewed. ACD's Holmes had, as has been pointed out, his personal morality which did not always coincide with the law, and modern Sherlock is even more individualist. This is why I think he would have helped Mary if she had asked, despite her past, and would have cheerfully lied to keep John in ignorance. It also explains why he pleaded Mary's case with John even whilst he is bleeding internally, to the point of collapse, from the wound she inflicted. However, the fact that Sherlock's own moral judgements are questionable does not excuse John - the man who has previously been Sherlock's moral compass. It was always John who pointed out when Sherlock got it wrong, when he was being rude, callous, inappropriately cheerful, etc. Now he forgives the person who shoots an unarmed man in cold blood, shows no remorse and turns out to have a past as a hired killer? A bit not good, John.

I am firmly of the "Mary is a psychopath" camp, of course, and could happily argue about it from here to eternity, but I will certainly try not to be obnoxious about it. I care about the characters, as we all do, but ultimately they are just figments of someone's imagination. Of course, they seem more real because they are brought to life by some very gifted actors. I suppose one reason why we take such strongly held positions regarding Mary is that there are moral issues involved. On one side, there are those who believe that Mary's love for John excuses her actions, and that his love for her justifies him turning a blind eye to her past and forgiving her for hurting his friend. On the other side, there are those of us who believe that shooting an innocent, unarmed man is inexcusable, and that John's behaviour seems like moral cowardice. Personally, I can live with the idea of Mary as a ruthless killer but I don't like the way John's character has developed in this series. Maybe it would be a good idea if Victor Trevor, or someone like him, turned up to remind John that Sherlock is not wholly dependent on him and that he needs to start being a better friend. Well, really, I just want John back at 221B, minus wife and baby, and back to being the good man and loyal friend we once knew. I am hoping Mary will decide to flee into permanent hiding and take Watson Jr with her.

I don't listen to audio commentaries, either....l just don't want to know how the puppet master pulls the strings. For instance, I once had a writing tutor who worked a lot in television and she said that, whenever you can't see the star's face, it isn't them. Stars are expensive, so directors have to use their time wisely and use stand-ins whenever possible. Not just for stunts but for ordinary scenes like driving a car, walking in the distance, even a hand reaching for a cup of tea.... I have never been able to watch a film without noticing these moments, even though I don't want to. When Sherlock is running at the beginning of TEH, I kept thinking "that won't be Benedict" and I was even doubtful that it was him in the torture scene until the hair was drawn back from his face.... These little points bug me, so I certainly don't want to know major behind-the-scenes spoilers! Thanks, Pamela, for the info. I will avoid "The Fall" and "Shooting Sherlock" and confine myself to "Fans, Villains and Speculation."

I think she weeps in John's arm because they are dealing with the issue of their marriage - whether or not it will continue - not because she feels remorse for the shooting. The closest she gets to remorse is saying sorry immediately after firing the shot. We never get to see her express any real remorse, not even when Sherlock collapses a second time (even though he has just pleaded her case to John.) I think that it is an important omission which tells us quite a lot about her mentality. There is also the fact that she went after him with a gun, and made it clear that she would stop at nothing to keep John in ignorance. If you feel remorse for something, you don't go out and do it again! Zain has a very good point about Mary not wanting Sherlock to die instantly, because it gives her time to make her escape. It explains why she didn't go for a kill shot ( and makes more sense than Sherlock's explanation that she wanted time to negotiate - why would a shooter assume that her victim would be willing to negotiate with her, after she nearly killed him?). I think that her behaviour does suggest that she is a psychopath - charming and helpful when it suits her, cold, ruthless and lacking in empathy when her own interests are threatened. It is not impossible that she "loves" John because he plays an important part in the way she wants her life to be. Psychopaths value people insofar as they are useful. If John outlives his usefulness or, even worse, wants to finish the relationship, I wouldn't bet much on his survival. It seems likely that Sherlock, whose psychopathology seems to be wishful thinking to protect himself from emotional pain and to excuse appalling social skills, would admire the genuine article. Particularly as Mycroft never misses the opportunity to drum into him the importance of coldness and non-attachment, although it is obvious that neither of the brothers have managed to cut themselves off from all emotions. I would like to see Moftiss run with the idea that John has chosen to stay married to a psychopathic killer but I expect a return to fluffy cuteness in the Watsons' marriage, particularly when Baby Watson appears. I may be underestimating the writers but I'm not sure they have the courage to be that cold. After all, they couldn't even bear to let Irene Adler stay dead!

Maybe he wouldn't have told John if she hadn't tried to murder him. In fact, that seems quite likely.

Sherlock weeping because he has seen Jim kill himself? Interesting idea and I am sure that a normal person would react with shock if they witnessed a suicide, but Sherlock isn't exactly normal. The tears seem to be related to his goodbye to John, and I can only make sense of them by thinking that he must be upset because he is going to be parted , for an indefinite period, from his Significant Other (platonic or otherwise!) To be honest, I don't see why he has to jump at all, if Mycroft's men are going to deal with the snipers anyway. Why stage such an elaborate suicide just to make Jim's network think he was dead? If the fall isn't to convince the snipers, presumably he thinks Jim had other people watching, or why bother to do it? But, if so, how does he know they can't see the airbag? Sometimes it seems like the whole thing was staged for John's benefit! Speaking of John, I was watching TEH (again!) and it struck me what an excellent actor Martin Freeman is. I am a rabid fan of Benedict and find he tends to eclipse everyone else on the screen, but Martin's comic timing is wonderful and he is so good at expressing the painful emotions that John is struggling to suppress. I don't like the direction that the writers have taken John's character in this series but that doesn't detract from Martin's fine acting, any more than my conviction that Mary's deeds are unforgivable means that I can't appreciate Amanda's lovely performance in the role. She made us love her and then she turned evil!

That's assuming an awful lot for a split-second decision. I assume that Mary had been accustomed to working alone. Even though she'd been away from that life for five years, there in Magnussen's bedroom she was back iVvn secret-agent mode, relying only on herself. Trusting Sherlock's judgement would have meant losing control of the situation. I'm not saying that I agree with her decision, merely that I can believe she did the only thing she could think of under the circumstances. Sherlock was posing an immediate threat to her, so she didn't have time to think it through. If he'd stayed where he was when she warned him, maybe they could have come to some sort of understanding. But he didn't give her that opportunity. So I suspect that Sherlock's "surgical precision" claptrap was in part a cover story, so he wouldn't have to admit that he'd misjudged her and put her in an untenable position. It would not have taken much longer to say, "Help me! And don't tell John!" than it would to decide to shoot him. She knows Sherlock, she knows what he does and how he thinks, so it would not require a massive leap of faith to accept his offer of help. Of course, it would not be as certain as killing him. As Mary is a woman with a criminal past living with the world's greatest detective, surely she must have thought he might discover the truth sometime. Maybe she didn't foresee this particular scenario but she must have considered what she would do if her freedom (and her relationship with John) was threatened by him. She could run but she would lose John, and we know that she is prepared to go to any lengths to keep her husband. She could ask Sherlock to stay silent and there would be a good chance he would agree, but it would be a calculated risk. The only way to guarantee his silence would be to kill him. Mary is a clever woman, so she must have considered the risks involved in the Watsons' friendship with Sherlock, and known that murder would be the only way of being one hundred percent sure that he would not expose her. Maybe the decision to shoot him was not completely spontaneous. Maybe, given Mary's profession and her ruthless intelligence, it had already been made. She would be a fool if she hadn't thought about it.

My husband bought me Series 3 as part of my Valentine's Day gift (he never knows what I want, of course, but my daughter does and chooses for him.....) Anyway, forgive me if this sounds stupid but are the "extras" the sort of behind-the-scenes things where they explain how the programmes were made? It is just that I never watch documentaries which explain how things were done. It's a bit childish of me but I don't want the magic to be destroyed by having special effects, etc, explained. Ironic, really, as I can analyse the stories to death but prefer to remain blissfully ignorant about the trickery involved in the filming. I accidentally saw an explanation of the scene in Star Trek where Zachary Quinto as Spock is in a volcano in his copper-coloured spacesuit and I couldn't get it out of my head when I saw the film. If the extras are how-it-was-done stuff, I want to avoid them.

In the UK, you can be detained for 24 hours without being charged, but the police can apply to extend it to 96 hours for serious crimes. You can be detained for 14 days without charge if you are suspected of offences which fall under the Terrorism Act and Moriarty, with his fondness for bombing, would probably be considered a terrorist. I have always assumed that Mycroft, a shadowy figure with no clearly defined official role, would be prepared to do highly illegal things in the interests of national security, so I 'm doubtful that he would worry about hiding Jim away in custody for as long as he deemed it necessary. Particularly as Jim probably wouldn't sue for wrongful imprisonment when he got out ( though he would probably blow up Mycroft's house.....) I have watched TRF again since seeing TEH and have to admit that it makes less sense if Sherlock's explanation to Anderson is true. On the rooftop, he is visibly distressed and is in tears the end. This could be because he had to to something extremely frightening - jumping off a roof and hoping to land on an airbag - but Sherlock is almost recklessly brave, so I don't think it is that. He could be upset because he knows John will be heartbroken, but TEH implies he did not understand the true depth of John's grief. So maybe he is upset because he knows he is going away, undercover, and doesn't want to go, particularly as if means leaving his only friend in the world. If he conspired with Mycroft to dupe Jim, then the former's conversations with John just before and after the Richard Brook newspaper story are, at best, misleading and at worst downright cruel. Why does he need to dupe John in this way? In fact, like the fall itself, much of the deceit in TRF seems aimed at more at John than at Jim. Even bearing in mind the fact that Sherlock is afraid John will give away the truth if he knows it, it seems a bit unnecessary. I prefer to think that Sherlock is fooling Anderson, for amusement or some other ulterior motive, but I am guessing it is the only explanation we will get. Oddly, it doesn't bother me too much - the fall was a great cliffhanger but I always expected the explanation to be a bit daft.