Slithytove

I can't speak for anyone else, but it's my personal attitude that Mary isn't so much "innocent" as that her actions are understandable -- or at least that it's possible to interpret her actions in a "caught between a rock and a hard spot" sort of way. As I've probably said before, I choose to take the most positive view of Mary that I can honestly justify to myself, because if I took a negative view of her, I'd probably stop loving the show, and I don't want that to happen. So it's simple self-preservation. I think there is an enormous gulf between "understandable" and "forgivable". For instance, "He found out the truth, so I killed him" is certainly understandable but it isn't in any way excusable. Doing something bad for a logical reason - e.g. to benefit yourself in some way - makes sense but it doesn't mean it is okay to do it, and it certainly doesn't mean that other people should forgive you for it. That's why I hate the reconciliation scene. However, in general, I can happily carry on loving the show whilst taking a thoroughly negative view of Mary! Of course, it bugs me that John and Sherlock seem determined to let her off the hook, but all shows have their annoying moments....

If he was a sensible man, maybe. But he wasn't. And he thought he was untouchable. People wouldn't dare to try and harm him, because he was so powerful and knew so much about everybody and had them all in his grip. I think that's what Magnussen believed. That was his weak spot. He expected nothing less than for Sherlock Holmes or anybody to just shoot him. I think a lot of the plot holes people see in fiction (any fiction, not just Sherlock) stem from us expecting fictional people to act in a much more rational manner than people do in real life. Not to mention, trained assassins seem to be able to penetrate governments of armed countries, soooooooo I don't see how Magnussen's office would be a challenge to Mary. Well, the assassin costume would be a bit of a giveaway if she walked in the front door, so presumably she broke in. How? Climbed up the sheer walls of a modern office block, up to the penthouse, and somehow got inside? Not to mention that she was in the early stages of pregnancy, a time when you can feel nauseous just walking across a room, let alone climbing up a building! I think Moftiss couldn't work out how she got in, which is why Sherlock never explained it but referred vaguely to her leaving by the same way that she had entered.

I've read a very interesting meta on the Johnlock Conspiracy, which was very detailed and almost had me convinced...almost...But I can't really believe they are going to have a gay romance at the heart of a very popular ( and very profitable) mainstream show, particularly with one centred around a character as iconic as Sherlock Holmes. As a Johnlocker myself, I would like it to be otherwise, because I feel they ought to be together - but, on the other hand, it might rob the storyline of all it's tension, as this often happens when characters finally declare their love. Of course, I realise that a lot of people find Johnlock incomprehensible, but my personal feeling is that Sherlock does love John in his own strange, repressed way. Not sure if it is entirely reciprocated, but It does always seem that John "doth protest too much" when people think he and Sherlock are a couple.

While Moftiss do seem to specialize in using dialog spoken rapidly and confidently in order to plug plot holes (cf. John's exposition on why the Tong spray-painted the death-threat code behind a row of library books), I don't think this one is quite so readily dismissed. For example, the "Janine could give John an alibi" explanation fails on two levels: 1. Janine did not know that John came in with Sherlock. Sherlock had carefully kept John out of security-camera view, so Janine had no reason to even suspect that John was with him. 2. Even if Janine had known about John, Mary apparently didn't even know that Sherlock was in the building. If she had, why would she have gone ahead and confronted CAM, knowing that she could be interrupted any second? And even if she had been rash enough to do that, why would she have stood with her back to the door? So she didn't know Sherlock was there, and therefore she had no idea that John was there either, not until she saw Sherlock. And she had no way of knowing how either of them got in. I can see only one possible flaw in that reasoning -- what if Mary wanted Sherlock to find her with CAM? Perhaps she overheard John's conversation with Sherlock, so she knew they were meeting at CAM's building and surmised that Sherlock wanted to gain access to CAM's private area. So she broke into CAM's office and hid until Janine let Sherlock into the elevator, then quickly knocked out Janine and the guard and went up to CAM's flat, where she carefully set herself up to be caught in the act by Sherlock. (It's also possible that Janine was in on the whole plan -- that's already been discussed). But if you can figure out why Mary would have wanted to do that, you have an even more convoluted mind than I do! I agree that Janine didn't know John was with Sherlock, but I don't think it would be very hard for him to convince the police that that was how he had got into the building. No disrespect to John, but nothing that we know about him suggests he would be capable of breaking into a heavily guarded penthouse, as Mary presumably did. In fact, I would like to know how she did it. Presumably Janine didn't let her in as well, so did she scale the walls of the office building? She must have felt a lot better during the first trimester than most of us do! Mary did not, presumably, know Sherlock was in the building, otherwise she would either have abandoned her plans and fled or got on with killing CAM instead of standing over him whilst he begged for his life. Does it make much difference to her supposed reluctance to kill him for fear of implicating John? Given that she is an assassin, her most likely reason for asking if John was with Sherlock would be to find out whether she had got to kill him as well. She's a professional killer - how long would she retain her liberty, or stay alive, if she allowed sentiment to cloud her judgement? Zain is probably right in saying that we're unlikely to agree on these issues, as they all reflect the amount of Mary's culpability and we are clearly divided over that issue. I suppose it helps to explain why, in real life, one sector of the community can feel strongly that a person is guilty whilst another sector believes just as strongly in his innocence. O. J. Simpson springs to mind, but I'm sure there are many other examples. When you think about it, CAM's security arrangements are seriously flawed. Given his wealth, power and the fact that he must have many bitter enemies, you'd think he would be better protected. Strangers are able to access his private lift, from a public floor of his office building and in full view of his employees, without being questioned. An assassin breaks into his penthouse, somehow, and gets past his PA and security guard to threaten him with murder. An armed man (John) is allowed into his home without being searched. And does he have no security cameras, either at his office or his home? Wouldn't the police want to see the footage of Sherlock's shooting, even if Mycroft managed to prevent an investigation of CAM's murder? In real life, the newspaper tycoon Robert Maxwell was so obsessed with security that he even bugged his own home, so he could find out what his wife and kids were saying about him! You'd think CAM would want that level of security too....

Why would she think she couldn't persuade him to be silent about the murder of someone else, and yet expect him to say nothing about his own attempted murder? Ot, if you believe she didn't mean to kill him, to say nothing about the grievous bodily harm she had inflicted on him? Seems to be expecting a hell of a lot.

Frankly, I think the "John would be a suspect" comment is another of those throwaway lines used to plug a plot hole, in the hope that viewers won't say, "Hang on a minute.......". They had to give some reason why Mary didn't shoot CAM, because his death was being saved for Sherlock and the grand finale. Personally, I can't see that John was at any serious risk of being arrested. As Janine had let him and Sherlock into the office, he could not be accused of breaking in. Even if the police thought CAM shot Sherlock and then John shot CAM, at what point would anyone have laid out Janine and the guard? How did John get the gun off CAM, if the latter had already shot Sherlock and was evidently not afraid to shoot to kill? And what did he do with it, after he had used it? The obvious reason for not shooting CAM would be the presence of an eyewitness - Sherlock. But she shoots Sherlock, causing life-threatening injuries, so she might as well kill CAM as she originally planned as it is very likely that Sherlock will die too. However, that would deprive us of the dramatic ending, so there has to be some reason why she doesn't do it - but I don't think it's very convincing.

But.....the guard or Janine or both must surely have seen the person who attacked them. She had to get close enough to hit them, and it's far-fetched to suppose she could creep up on both of them unseen. They would know it couldn't have been Sherlock (too tall) and if it was John, how did he manage to change out of the all-black outfit and into his normal clothes? If John had wrestled the murder weapon from CAM's hands after he shot Sherlock, what did he do with it then? Mary "left by the way she came", which is very vague but presumably means she broke in, as it's unlikely that Janine would have invited a ninja-style assassin into the office. It wouldn't be beyond Lestrade's capabilities to investigate John's claim that a third party, i.e. the gunman, had been present and had forced an entry into the building. And Janine might want to protect her job - though I doubt it, as she later enraged CAM by selling her story to the rival tabloids - but it seems unlikely she would lie about letting them into the office, if it meant that John would go to prison for life for murders he didn't commit. She would have to be incredibly selfish to make him pay such a price, just to keep her job.

I've been pondering Sherlock's remark about Mary being unable to shoot CAM because her own husband would become a suspect, as they had broken into the building. It doesn't make sense to me. For a start, they didn't break in. Janine let them in, and presumably she would confirm that when she recovered consciousness. Even if she couldn't remember, due to the head injury, the ring would still be in Sherlock's pocket. Admittedly, it would be a bit odd to bring along a friend when you are proposing, but Sherlock is odd. It wouldn't be hard for John to stick to that story. Also, Janine and the guard were both knocked out. Surely one of them must have caught a glimpse of the assailant who attacked them at close quarters. Presumably she was masked, but it could not have been John unless he brought a complete change of clothing with him and somehow disposed of the black outfit. Anyway, why would he have shot Sherlock? Sherlock says she couldn't shoot CAM because of John becoming a suspect, but surely the fact that he himself would witness the murder would be a bigger problem for her. The only scenario in which John could become a suspect is one where Sherlock is dead too, otherwise he could immediately exonerate John. So she would have to kill Sherlock too. Now, the police might suspect John had a motive for killing CAM but why would he kill Sherlock as well? Seems highly unlikely. The bullets would have come from the same gun and, even if John had disobeyed Sherlock's earlier instruction about not bringing his gun, it would not be linked to John in any way. And how would he have disposed of the murder weapon, anyway? I don't see how John was in any real danger of becoming a suspect.

I'm afraid I watch films shamelessly just because Benedict is in them, though my family tease me about it. I've seen all those mentioned so far with the exception of Third Star. I'm a bit afraid to watch it because I'm a terrible baby and cry easily at sad films, and I don't want to start sobbing in front of everyone. I'll have to buy the DVD and watch it when the house is empty. August: Osage County was another film where Benedict had a comparatively small role but he was adorable as Little Charles. It was interesting to see him as a gentle, uncertain character, as he seems to be frequently cast as spiky, difficult intellectuals. And then there is Frankenstein.....Not available on DVD but worth seeking out at the cinema. It's being shown again in the UK at the end of October/beginning of November. Benedict as the creature is particularly heartbreaking. Hopefully his stage version of Hamlet will also be filmed, as it's the only way most of us will ever see it. At least we can look forward to his Richard the Third on tv. If ever anyone had the voice to speak Shakespeare's beautiful words...

Well, no, I wouldn't. But we now have two examples of Sherlock doing precisely that sort of thing -- Mary and the Camden Garroter. Sherlock, yes. His values are unbelievably skewed. ( His childhood must have been very peculiar. I suspect that nice Mummy & Daddy, and maybe Mycroft as he got older, have a lot to answer for.). But not John. He wouldn't vote for the Camden Garroter, any more than he would be morbidly fascinated by Irene or Jim. His "normal", common sense morality exists to throw Sherlock's eccentricity into even sharper relief. And most of us wouldn't admire the Camden Garroter either, nor would we be able to shrug off a devastating bullet wound, to ourselves or a loved one. I agree that Moftiss seem to expect us to swallow the bullet-as-surgery/determination-will-bring-you-back-to-life/Mary-is-okay/it's-wonderful-that-John-forgave-her scenario but their writing is obviously open to many interpretations. If not, we wouldn't be arguing about it nine months later! To be honest, I don't worry too much about Moftiss's intentions. Even if they want us to accept the bullet-as-surgery idea, for example, that doesn't mean we can't question it. When something is in the public domain, it belongs legally to its creators but they don't own, and can't dictate, the audience's responses. For example, you might create a character whom you see as noble and restrained, but if some of your readers consider him prim and priggish, you can't say they are wrong. All you can say is that your writing wasn't meant to convey that particular response. Even if your work is as clear and precise as possible, people will read and interpret it according to their own values and their own experience. The same applies to fictional worlds. Maybe a different morality prevails in Sherlock's world, as some of you have suggested - though I think it is meant to reflect our own, otherwise it wouldn't be entertaining when he goes against our expectations - but we still judge it by our own ethics. That's how fiction works. To give an extreme example, suppose you read a book set in a world where it is normal practice for parents to kill their own children if they show signs of being sickly or disabled. These killings are so much a part of their culture that they are commonplace. Let's say that resources are limited and are not allowed to be " wasted" on the weak. One parent, motivated by love, cannot kill their child but flees with him, pursued by the authorities. According to the morality of this fictional world, the parent is a criminal. We can understand this morality but, to us, the parent is a hero, because child murder is abhorrent to us and we see the fictional world through the filter of our own ethics. So, in Sherlock-world, it may be okay to shoot your friends and expect forgiveness, just as it may be okay to gloss over your best friend's near death and your wife's criminal past, but we are not obliged to find those things acceptable. We have our own value systems which the writers can't dictate. Sorry. Not trying to be pedantic, but I do feel that there is a two-way connection between writer and viewer (or reader, listener, etc.). As the audience, we bring something to the table too. The

The point about John being afraid he will stop loving Mary is a good one. It would make sense of his apparent ability to shrug off Sherlock's injuries, and also his refusal to learn about Mary's past. If he does believe he found " the one" when he met her, it is rather sad, because that woman doesn't exist. Despite Sherlock & Mary both insisting that John chose her because he is drawn to dangerous people, as if he had unknowingly identified her dangerous side, the obvious truth is that he fell in love with the person she was pretending to be. Of course she had to pretend. For a start, she couldn't show John her calculating, ruthless side - the side which would earn her a life sentence and also allow her to decide that her best chance of freedom was to shoot her friend - because he wouldn't have fallen in love with her. (Yes, I know he is supposedly attracted to danger but that doesn't mean he wants to marry it.) Anyway, if people go into hiding, they have to change more than their names and jobs. They have to become entirely different people. If they don't, they get caught. You only have to look at real life cases to see that this is true. If anyone is attracted to dangerous people, it is Sherlock. Of course he has nice friends - John, Molly, etc - but he is much ruder and more arrogant with them than with those who hurt him, e.g. Jim, Irene, Mary....He even seems to like Janine better after she has sold her story to the tabloids and made a profit out of him. (Not that I blame her!) I don't really think you can say Mary was good for Sherlock "except for the one shot". That shot was a game changer. You wouldn't say "He was a really nice man, except for the time he strangled our Granny", would you? Nor do I think you can say that Mary was good for Sherlock except for the time she shot him and he nearly died. (In my opinion, he did die - why else did they show us the scene where he flatlined? But I know that some people feel it was not death but near-death. Either way, it would take a lot of forgiving.)

I honestly don't think that it would be cold to refuse to forgive the person who had very nearly ended your life, and caused you a huge amount of damage and suffering into the bargain. I think it would be completely understandable. In fact, you'd have to be a bit of a saint to forgive someone who hurt you so badly. Similarly, it would be normal and human to reject someone who, after lying to you about everything that matters, maimed and, in effect, killed someone you loved. I think it would probably kill your love for the perpetrator but, even if you still loved them, I don't think it would be hard to understand why you couldn't forgive them. Love and loyalty to the victim would get in the way.

Interesting. I must say that I differ completely from most of you in my feelings about Mary. I thought she was lovely in the first two episodes. The third was, of course, designed to shock and it succeeded. I think we'd all guessed that she would be involved with CAM, probably as a blackmail victim, but I for one certainly didn't anticipate her killing Sherlock. They could have done something interesting with her character - maybe let her be the next Big Bad - but no.....One moment and she's a ruthless ninja who guns down her friend, the next she's heavily pregnant and weeping in her forgiving husband's arms, in the family home of her victim. And his Mum and Dad are in the next room! And it's Christmas! Ugh. I don't feel pity for Mary. She may have had a horrible life, she may have no peace because she's on the run, she may truly wish to start again as a doctor's wife in the suburbs, but nothing can excuse the shooting of Sherlock. There is no "get out of jail free" card which excuses the murder (or attempted murder if you ignore the flatlining scene) of someone simply because they are an eyewitness. He was not hurting her. He was not threatening her. He was offering to help her and she put a bullet in him. The fact that she didn't kill him outright is hardly a justification for what she did. She shot him and left him, at best, to bleed out on the penthouse floor. For all she knew, she had hit a major organ and he was dead. But, of course, she was safe because good old Dr Watson would never go looking for the shooter when there was a victim needing his help. As Sherlock said in TSoT, John Watson will save your life... I suppose that, as the victim, it's Sherlock's prerogative to forgive his attacker. Even with the stupid "surgery" explanation, I don't think it is clear why he forgives her so readily and even pushes for John to do the same. Even if he really believes his own explanation, it was a brutal way of resolving a problem and you'd think he would have doubts about anyone who reacted with that level of violence. Of course, it might be part of a cunning plan - after TEH's explanation of the strategy used to bring Jim down, nothing would surprise me - or it could be that Sherlock likes people who are bad for him. I've explained this theory before, so I won't go over it again, although I think it is true. John, on the other hand, isn't the victim but the victim's closest friend. I think it is much harder to forgive an injury to someone you care about. Admittedly, we don't know how John dealt with the issue during the gap between the Baker Street confrontation and the Christmas reunion, apart from Mary's reference to months of silence, but he makes no comment about Sherlock's injury during the Christmas scene even though you might think it would be the major stumbling block for the Watsons's reunion. Yes, he's very pissed off - about what? That she shot his best friend? That she has a criminal past that could put her in jail? That she lied to him about everything? That their marriage is null and void because she used a false identity? All of these things? And what pissed him off most of all? We don't know but, whatever it was - even if it was Sherlock's near-death experience with a bullet in his torso - he's ready to move on. I believe we're supposed to see this as admirable, as a sign of John's big heart, but it just seems disloyal to me.

I think that the story is far more simple & way less complicated than we all make it. I don't know that those of us who approve of the way CAM was disposed of or the forgiveness of Mary by Sherlock and John are less moral than anyone else. I think that all of us have expressed that we are not cool with killing real life people in real life. Those of us who have accepted these things, accept that this is fictional entertainment. The ability to separate the two keeps any of us from becoming Sherlock, Moriarty , Mary, John, Magnussen or even a Mrs. Hudson. If we did in real life, we'd all be in a loony bin somewhere. So taking John @ face value, as a fictional character... It's not far fetched that a man who didn't flich when being confronted by Moriarty on the first time of meeting, tries to date Mycroft's assistant, became instant best friends with a man that @ times was assumed to be the murderer (SIP), stopped @ his flat to pick up a gun for protection, prioritizes his friendship with Sherlock over other women, allows Sherlock to call him stupid time & time again, tolerates Irene Adler after breaking his best friends heart, actually pleased to see her in Sherlock's bed, remains friends with Sherlock upon him sharing that he experiments on him by putting compounds & chemicals in his food... Would forgive Mary for such a horrendous act. He told us right away who he was. Dr John Watson: People don't have archenemies. Sherlock Holmes: I'm sorry? Dr John Watson: In real life. There are no archenemies in real life. Doesn't happen. Sherlock Holmes: Doesn't it? Sounds a bit dull. Dr John Watson: So who did I meet? Sherlock Holmes: What do REAL people have, then, in their... REAL lives? Dr John Watson: Friends... and people they know, people they... like, people they don't like, girlfriends, boyfriends... Sherlock Holmes: Well, as I was saying, dull. To John, real people don't have enemies. ( very fictional concept, of course real people have enemies) So upon all these events and many others, it is not far fetched to see John forgiving Mary for what she did. What happend fits the character of this fictional person in this fictional show. Sorry to have to write these things separately. I am intimidated by Multiquote. I'm not saying that anyone who is fine with the shooting of CAM or Sherlock is less (or more) moral than those who find these scenes unacceptable. I'm not particularly surprised that there is a lot of support for CAM's murder, because we are used to stories where the hero kills the villain. I just anticipated a general consensus that shooting an innocent - and Sherlock is an innocent party in the penthouse scene - was unforgivably wrong. Just because that consensus failed to materialise doesn't mean that some people are less moral than others, but simply that we interpret the scene in different ways. For instance, one person may interpret a killing as self-defence and another as straightforward murder. Even with shared values, these different interpretations will obviously reach different conclusions. There is, of course, a vast difference between reality and fiction but defending the actions of a fictional character doesn't mean that you have accepted that they are fictional or that those who criticise their actions think of them as real. Even if you are reading the most far-fetched SF or fantasy, your reactions are underpinned by your own beliefs. I don't think you can just switch them off. Everybody judges characters by their own ethics, even if they are not aware of it. That's why some works from the past can make us uncomfortable because morality changes over time. To give a rather ridiculous example, when one of my daughters was small she liked the Doctor Dolittle books, which I used to read to her at bedtime. I soon wished I had not embarked on the one where Doctor Dolittle goes to Africa, when we reached the portrayal of the Africans as laughable buffoons. Obviously Hugh Lofting, the author, thought that his characterisation was funny whereas I thought it was racist, because I brought my own values when I read. (I ended up skipping chunks of the book, and paraphrasing other bits, because I couldn't bring myself to read them out loud.). A book can confirm or challenge your values but, if it doesn't, how can it have meaning for you? I'm not sure what your point is, regarding John's character. Do you mean that he is the forgiving type? Certainly he forgives Sherlock a lot but then he forgives the person who, in effect, killed Sherlock. He loves Mary but he loves Sherlock too. If you loved two people, and one of those people caused terrible damage and suffering to the other, could you forgive them? Should you forgive them? Personally, I find it easier to forgive injury to myself than those I love, but maybe that's just me...I have been described as "terrifying" by my daughters, whenever I've sprung to their defence.

I think you expressed that very well, Slithytove, and I agree with you. That's one area where fiction really needs to be tidier than real life, just so we know who to root for. The way you state it, yes, I agree with you. But that statement is based on your interpretation of the scene, which differs a bit from mine. Admittedly, I am doing my damnedest to interpret it in a way that will allow me to keep liking the show! But I don't see Sherlock as non-threatening. He is clearly intending to take the gun away from Mary, and she has only a split-second to decide what to do. I'm not saying she made the best choice, but she does (even more so that Major Sholto) have "a lifetime of unfortunate reflexes." I can't really see Sherlock as threatening in that scene. Holding a gun on someone is threatening - stepping forward, unarmed, to disarm them isn't threatening, it's brave. I can see that you might mean that it was her liberty which was being threatened, or her opportunity to kill CAM, but I doubt that any of us would consider that it is ethical to shoot someone to avoid arrest or because they were thwarting your attempt to commit murder. Therefore, unless Sherlock was a physical threat to her, which he wasn't, I find it hard to see how his intention of disarming her changes the scene's morality.

Your post isn't pompous at all, Arcadia, and your idea that Mary isn't a character in her own right but a way of illuminating Sherlock and John is interesting. I suppose I can tolerate her more if I see her as a plot device than as a fully developed character. I've got to admit, though, that it's hard to do because I felt a strong emotional reaction to her shooting Sherlock. It wasn't just the shooting itself, though the Mind Palace scenes are amongst my favourite scenes from the entire series because they are so gripping, but the subsequent behaviour of Sherlock and John. The former makes ridiculous excuses for his own murderer (sorry, but I do think he died when he flatlined) and the latter wants to close his eyes to everything. So, yes, maybe that is Mary's role, to cast a fresh light on their characters - and it's not a very flattering one.

I really, really hope that there is some brilliant story arc which will make sense of everything, but somehow I doubt it. S3 didn't resolve TRF but muddied the waters instead, so I suspect the same will happen in S4. I'm afraid that Mary's story arc will be designed to wring sympathy for her, particularly if she's going to expire tragically in the last episode. I'd bet that she either took up killing to avenge her family or she only killed those who "deserve to be killed", or both, and that will be considered okay. I'd also bet that John has forgiven her completely, even though he doesn't really know what he is forgiving her for (except nearly killing his best friend.) And, of course, Sherlock will be wholly unchanged by committing murder. Hope I'm wrong about everything! I agree that you can't base your morality on tv programmes. When 24 was criticised for encouraging violence towards prisoners, Kiefer Sutherland said that if the US army and government were imitating a tv thriller, we were all in trouble! However, I don't think you can rule out morality when you respond to a story (on tv or otherwise.) It has often struck me that we have to have a value system which is more or less shared, or stories wouldn't work. For instance, we can begin to get the idea that someone is a villain even before he gets into villainous mode, if we see him do or say small things which are callous or malicious. Similarly, when a character refuses to make a sacrifice but then, at the last moment, steps up and does it, we all have the same gut instinct - the same response based on our sense that he is doing the right thing. Lots of stories are based on someone doing the right thing - or the wrong thing - and they only work if we have a strong, shared belief in what is good or bad. I haven't expressed this idea very well, so I hope you understand what I mean. My theory has been somewhat shaken by other people's responses to HLV. For instance, I assumed that everyone would think that shooting an unarmed, non-threatening eyewitness was unforgivable, particularly if the witness was a friend. Evidently, this is not so. (Please understand that I'm saying everyone should share this view - it's just that I assumed there would be a general consensus on this one. I was clearly very wrong!) However, I think the general theory holds. We do have a broad moral consensus and film makers depend on it, even when they try to subvert it. Take Dexter, for instance. We may or may not feel that it is okay for a psychopath to kill other psychopaths, but we are unlikely to like Dexter if he just murders anyone at random, for fun. I've got no problem with liking the bad guys. I like Moriarty! But we are never under any illusion that he is anything but a villain. With Mary, the writers seem to be twisting our arms to make us still find her adorable, even though she is presumably a killer and certainly shot Sherlock in cold blood. Also, if we are talking about fictional Sherlock-world, shouldn't morality be reasonably consistent there? I might like Moriarty as a fictional character but, in John Watson's fictional world, we wouldn't expect John to like him and, sure enough, he detests him. Yet the same John holds no grudge against his wife who killed (or very nearly killed, depending on your interpretation) the other person whom he loves best. The same John doesn't even want to know why she is hiding from a life sentence. It just feels so wrong.

But why was it necessary to murder CAM to stop him revealing the truth about Mary? If she really killed people, and he really has that evidence, isn't it right to expose her? Not to blackmail her, I agree, but to tell the truth and put the whole thing into the hands of the police. If there are extenuating circumstances, they will be brought up by the defence at her trial. How can it be right for Sherlock to murder someone with the deliberate intention of perverting the course of justice? That's what I don't get. As for the vaults, if CAM can send for evidence when he needs it, then they do exist, even if they are not in one place. I don't see how he can print serious allegations against people based entirely on information stored in his mind. Well, he can try, of course, but he'll soon run up against the law of defamation. For instance, there was a case here, a few years ago, where a young woman turned out to have been murdered by a man in a neighbouring flat, but the police had previously arrested her landlord on suspicion. The newspapers, without actually saying he was the killer, had a real go at him because he was a rather odd-looking, eccentric man and they implied that he was a sinister, creepy character who was up to no good. He successfully sued several newspapers for libel. And the poor parents of Madelaine McCann, the little girl who disappeared whilst on holiday in Portugal, had to sue 11 newspapers plus a Portuguese former detective for suggesting they had possibly killed their child by accident and covered it up. Their friends also sued for libel the same newspapers, who implied that they were involved in the cover up. The point is that newspapers do sometimes suggest that people have committed serious crimes but, without evidence, they are very likely to be sued for libel and forced to print grovelling apologies, as they did in both these cases. If CAM's allegations are true, they need evidence to support them and Mary, for one, clearly believes such evidence exists and could put her away for life. Maybe she wouldn't have been so easily convinced that it was all in CAM's head.

If CAM didn't have actual vaults somewhere, he is the world's worst blackmailer. After all, he gets his information somewhere, somehow, so why not acquire it in the form of material evidence? He has evidently got enough influence and enough money to do so. In fact, Sherlock accepts the "Mind Palace vaults" straightaway, at face value, and it never seems to occur to him that CAM might be lying. Maybe his vaults aren't at Appledore - why did Sherlok think they were? - but they could still exist. Maybe Sherlock should have pushed CAM a bit over that claim. I'm not convinced by CAM's assertion that he doesn't need evidence. Newspapers do smear people all the time but a serious accusation like murder would have to be backed up by evidence. You can allege that Brad Pitt is leaving Angelina Jolie and get away with it, but say that Brad killed someone and you'd have to prove it. I think Mary would be pretty safe in a maximum security prison. I'm not saying the prisoners never get attacked - of course they do - but there are plenty of Class A prisoners who are loathed, by the outside world and their fellow inmates, but remain secure. For instance, the notorious child killer, Ian Brady, has been locked up for nearly 50 years and lots of people, including relatives of his victims, have wanted to kill him but have never managed it. I think the safest, and most appropriate, place for Mary would be jail.

Both versions are being shown at one of our local cinemas - Jonny Lee as the Creature on October 30th and Benedict in that role on November 4th. Can't wait to see them again, and The Imitation Game will be out on the 14th. Bliss. Anyway, if you haven't seen them and get the chance, I would advise seeing both if possible, to see what each man brings to the different roles. No disrespect to Mr Miller, but in my (biased) opinion, Benedict gave the better performance in each case. For a start, he was funnier. The story isn't a million laughs but he does manage to wring a little humour fom both roles. He is also heartbreaking. That is why, if you can only see one film, I would suggest the one with Benedict as the Creature. He is excellent as Frankenstein (and very pretty!) but so moving as the Creature. I defy anyone to watch the scene where he speaks of what love and companionship means to him, and remain unmoved. It is not a frightening story - just incredibly sad.

It seems that Hamlet may be shown in cinemas by National Theatre Live, as was the case with Frankenstein and many other notable plays. Fingers crossed!

Wow - lots of pages of theories and questions since I last visited! You're a very bright bunch, and Moffat should hire you as script advisers. Maybe then he wouldn't have so many plot holes and logical inconsistencies, and might even rethink the idea that John is a giggling murderer and Sherlock the type of man who can remain unchanged after blowing someone's brains out. If they take that line in S4, it seems they are missing a big opportunity to develop his character. Or maybe Moffat is just fooling us again. If Sherlock had bothered to think of a back up plan in case anything went wrong at Appledore, "leverage" would have been his best bet. Someone as unprincipled as CAM must have skeletons in his closet. I know he has incriminating evidence against important people but I bet Mycroft has files on everyone, up to and including the Queen. I've always assumed that his apparent reluctance to move against CAM was a matter of timing - either CAM was currently useful to him, or a blackmail threat to someone very important had to be defused first, or diplomatic issues were involved. Mycroft seems a man of great subtlety, right from the moment he first appears in canon, and I imagine he weighs up the balance of power very carefully. But how can Sherlock resolve the problem on the spot? I'm not sure he can, because all the writing leads him to that point. All he could do, unless Mary leaps out of the shadows and gives herself up, would be to allow himself to be arrested. It would have been easier for Mycroft to get him off the treason charge than a murder charge, given that the evidence for the former is more questionable than the latter. He did commit murder in front of plenty of witnesses, yet he's still not going to jail, so couldn't his brother have got him off the hook over the laptop? Then they could then have put those great minds together to work out a way to silence CAM now that they know he doesn't actually have evidence against anybody for anything. When you think about it, doesn't this lack of material evidence strengthen Mycroft's hand, rather than weaken it? Of course, I have a bit of a problem with the "keep Mary safe" issue, because I don't think she should be shielded from justice. As for the supposed avengers, even if they really exist, CAM only threatens to contact them if John refuses to be humiliated, and John doesn't. Personally, I think it's another of CAM's power plays but, if it is a real threat, she would be safe enough behind bars. At the very least, she could be charged with grievous bodily harm against Sherlock, although I think the CPS would go for attempted murder. Now, the question of the mysterious Harry.....Could she indeed be afraid to meet Sherlock? I did wonder why they didn't introduce her character at the wedding. Surely they must be keeping her up their sleeves for a reason. Thank you, all of you, for your support over the past days. Family landed safely in Madison on Friday and we Skyped with them yesterday. They are all very excited and the kids seem to love the place, although our 16 year old granddaughter had to go off for a cry whilst we were talking to her. We miss them very much but Skype did help. I was sceptical that it would, but it did make them seem much closer to us. Thanks again.

Thank you, all of you, for your kindness. Today has been a really hideous day, even worse than we expected. It's not as bad as someone dying, of course, but it still feels like grief. Family should be landing in Wisconsin about now. Hope they are all okay. Thanks also for the link - wow, he is such a stunningly handsome man. And can anyone come up with a really complicated new Sherlock theory for us to argue about? Trying to work out a logical argument is quite distracting. Turns out that Sherlock was right about the benefits of pure, cold logic. The examples from L.O.T.R. show, I think, how annoyed we feel when we think a beloved character has done something which we think he basically wouldn't do. Hence the feeling that some of us have about John in HLV - that, in some ways, he wasn't quite the man we knew and loved.

I hesitate to quote "the Lord of the Rings", as I'm a fan but I know a lot of people aren't, but Gandalf's remark in "The Fellowship of the Ring" seems appropriate. When Frodo says that it was a pity that Bilbo didn't kill Gollum when he had the chance, the wizard replies: "Pity? It was pity that stayed Bilbo's hand. Many that live deserve death. Some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them, Frodo? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement." I'm not saying that CAM should be pitied but I do agree that we can't give life to many who deserve it and shouldn't be too keen to sentence people to death. It applies to Sherlock, and perhaps even more to Mary who appears to feel no remorse for anything. Sorry if I'm babbling. Family flew out to the USA this morning. Want to crawl into a small hole and die.

Carol - I know about Liberty's "Extradition Watch" and I agree that our extradition laws are far from perfect. Our current government doesn't have a wonderful attitude to human rights, although the Home Secretary did step in to prevent the extradition of Gary McKinnon, the hacker diagnosed with autism, to the US where he faced 70 years in prison. (Most people were surprised when she refused to allow this, as she is very right- wing.). The point I am trying to make is that I think Mary would have to be accused of a serious crime, by our standards, to fear life imprisonment here or extradition to a country which would impose that sentence. For instance, if she thought she would be imprisoned for adultery - bearing in mind it is a capital offence in some countries - I don't think she would need to worry that she would be extradited. I should also point out that, as far as I know, most countries in Eastern Europe have similar definitions of serious crimes as our own. Jess - if you look back at my answer about Lestrade, you'll see I was talking about the part you've quoted, and making the point that Mary ( and John, if necessary) could have been protected in various ways, if CAM's threat was genuine. However, we don't know if he really knows people who want to hurt her, or if he would really contact them. Above all, he only says he will contact them if John doesn't allow himself to be humiliated, i.e. the face-flicking. Which suggests it's just another one of his nasty little power plays, like licking Lady Smallwood's face or pee-ing in Sherlock's fireplace.