Episode 3.2, "The Sign of Three"

[Arcadia]

When you say something is eating Sherlock, T.o.b.y, what do you mean by that? I think he's a bit nostalgic, at times, for the good old days, but that's about all. He also seems determined to "think of it as a new chapter." (Or would, if that confounded Mycroft would stop needling him!) Do you see something other than what I just said? Just curious.
 

[T.o.b.y]

When you say something is eating Sherlock, T.o.b.y, what do you mean by that? I think he's a bit nostalgic, at times, for the good old days, but that's about all. He also seems determined to "think of it as a new chapter." (Or would, if that confounded Mycroft would stop needling him!) Do you see something other than what I just said? Just curious.

 

 

I definitely do. Come on, something is wrong. It's obvious from the conversation with Mrs Hudson onwards, if not earlier. Think of how Sherlock's face twitches when he looks at the empty chair, for example. That chair has been empty for months, ever since he came back. Why is it suddenly bothering him now? (In His Last Vow Sherlock comments on the removal of the chair by saying "I knew you were gone". He didn't think before the marriage that John would eventually move back, did he?). Think the sigh and "into battle" when Sherlock gets dressed. According to Mary, he was "terrified" before the event. When John tries to address that, in the park while they are waiting for Bainbridge, Sherlock just up and leaves, which I take to mean that he doesn't want to discuss it, which means there is something that could be discussed.

 

Then there's the ending, of course. The lovely, sad ending. A person who is nothing but a little nostalgic for the good old times does not slip away early and walk off into the dark with a face like that.

 

I guess there are two possibilities. Either Sherlock is sad about losing John, which could be inferred from Janine asking "do you have a vacancy" and Sherlock pointedly looking over at his former flat-mate, or Sherlock is sad for himself, because he's realizing by contrast that he is all alone and, because of "the kind of man" he is, always will be. Probably a combination of both. Only I don't quite get the vacancy part, because John can and will continue to go on cases with Sherlock after he is married, just the way he did before when he was already living with Mary. Oh well, I guess the expected baby is more important here than the marriage certificate.

 

One thing I think is for sure, Sherlock genuinely likes Mary and he really does not object to the marriage as such. Quite the contrary. In spite of his deeply ingrained egocentricity, he seems to be capable and willing to be happy for other people, these two people, at least.

 

There is one moment in the episode that truly breaks my heart every time. It is when Sherlock says "I cannot congratulate you on your choice of companion", then looks at Mary, and adds "actually, now I can." No wonder John couldn't help hugging him shortly afterwards. Nobody could have refrained form doing that.

[jesskayding]

See I think Mycroft hit the nail on the head. " remember Redbeard " Sherlock got attached. He was loosing his human Redbeard.

[Arcadia]

 

When you say something is eating Sherlock, T.o.b.y, what do you mean by that? I think he's a bit nostalgic, at times, for the good old days, but that's about all. He also seems determined to "think of it as a new chapter." (Or would, if that confounded Mycroft would stop needling him!) Do you see something other than what I just said? Just curious.

I definitely do. Come on, something is wrong. It's obvious from the conversation with Mrs Hudson onwards, if not earlier. Think of how Sherlock's face twitches when he looks at the empty chair, for example. That chair has been empty for months, ever since he came back. Why is it suddenly bothering him now? (In His Last Vow Sherlock comments on the removal of the chair by saying "I knew you were gone". He didn't think before the marriage that John would eventually move back, did he?). Think the sigh and "into battle" when Sherlock gets dressed. According to Mary, he was "terrified" before the event. When John tries to address that, in the park while they are waiting for Bainbridge, Sherlock just up and leaves, which I take to mean that he doesn't want to discuss it, which means there is something that could be discussed.

 

Yeah, I see what you're saying. I definitely think it's a bittersweet episode; change usually is bittersweet, especially if you liked where you were.

 

Still ... the look at the chair; I'm willing to bet he gave it that same look more than once before this episode. Obviously he misses his best friend -- and going on cases with John won't be the same as living with him -- but I didn't interpret it as anything other than that.

 

The "into battle" and the "terrified" ... I'm pretty sure I'd feel the same way if I had to give a best man's speech! (And that doesn't sound right, given that I'm a girl... ) What I mean is, I just assumed that was a normal case of nerves.

 

Disappearing from the bench ... he always does stuff like that, doesn't he, he's not into "chatting." Or listening. Or sharing feels. Or patiently waiting.

 

Then there's the ending, of course. The lovely, sad ending. A person who is nothing but a little nostalgic for the good old times does not slip away early and walk off into the dark with a face like that.

 

I guess there are two possibilities. Either Sherlock is sad about losing John, which could be inferred from Janine asking "do you have a vacancy" and Sherlock pointedly looking over at his former flat-mate, or Sherlock is sad for himself, because he's realizing by contrast that he is all alone and, because of "the kind of man" he is, always will be. Probably a combination of both. Only I don't quite get the vacancy part, because John can and will continue to go on cases with Sherlock after he is married, just the way he did before when he was already living with Mary. Oh well, I guess the expected baby is more important here than the marriage certificate.

 

One thing I think is for sure, Sherlock genuinely likes Mary and he really does not object to the marriage as such. Quite the contrary. In spite of his deeply ingrained egocentricity, he seems to be capable and willing to be happy for other people, these two people, at least.

 

There is one moment in the episode that truly breaks my heart every time. It is when Sherlock says "I cannot congratulate you on your choice of companion", then looks at Mary, and adds "actually, now I can." No wonder John couldn't help hugging him shortly afterwards. Nobody could have refrained form doing that.

I'm with you all the way on the rest of it, tho. For a moment he thought he could be like the rest of them, then he remembered he wasn't. I can relate; I've left more than one celebration because I didn't fit in. I can't say it eats at me, though. I find other ways to be social.

 

And I've been thinking for some time now that Sherlock has a bit of a self-esteem issue, which he covered up with bluster in the first two seasons. But in S3 we're seeing things from his p.o.v., and the self-doubt (self-loathing?) shows in the speech, and a couple other times. But I don't think it's something new, I think we're just seeing it for the first time.

 

Does any of that make sense? I guess I'm just saying I don't think Sherlock is any sadder than anyone else would be under the same circumstances; one era's ending, but another one's starting, and he seems to me he's decided to make the best of it.

 

I still feel bad for him, though. Sniff.

[jesskayding]

Yeah my heart did drop @ that part... Starting when he headed toward Janine & she decided to give the SciFi geek a try... It was beautiful, the way he put on his coat in 1 fluent movement& walked away sullen, with happy dance music in the background. Oh What a Night.... Oh what a night...

[Carol the Dabbler]

I've just been retitling the episode threads (to include the series number as well as the episode number), and thought again how neat it would be if "The Sign of Three" had turned out to be Episode 3.3.  I wonder whether Moftiss -- once they'd chosen the episode's title -- tried to make it turn out that way?

 

[sfmpco]

In my head I'm always fighting the way the episodes are numbered.  So tedious.  There are 9 episodes, and I think they should be numbered that way.  That's the way I think of them.

[jesskayding]

You know as an artist/ illustrator. I loved the mural w/ the birds on the yellow wall. So simple & beautiful.

[Bakerstreet Irregular]

I loved that whole venue. So open and sunny. I loved the way  it lit up Sherlock's eyes.

[T.o.b.y]

Mmmm, if we're talking about colors, here's a nice shot of Molly - all hail one of the few people who can actually wear yellow:

 

[T.o.b.y]

And here, I want to tell Tom to get out of the picture... Poor Tom.

 

[T.o.b.y]

Oh, just one more, and then I will stop, I promise. But this one is hilarious. It speaks volumes...

 

[Bakerstreet Irregular]

Here's a couple for you, Toby

 

   

 

 

 

 

  

[T.o.b.y]

Awwww, thanks. Really, one of these days, I'll fall in love with Molly. She makes the best little faces. Oh dear - I think it just happened.

[Bakerstreet Irregular]

i would really like to see her and Lestrade get together...at least a nice date once in awhile.

[Slithytove]

I hesitate to point out the obvious, but there is the Johnlock explanation of Sherlock's evident unhappiness in TSOT. Maybe Sherlock is upset because he is in love with John and is losing him to someone else. In that case, liking or disliking the bride would be irrelevant - the loss would be the same. Obviously Sherlock is not the type of man who would make a big declaration of love, particularly if he was uncertain that it would be reciprocated, so he might react by putting on a brave face and throwing himself into the wedding plans as a way of overcompensating.

 

Well, it's never going to be canon but the writers have given us enough teasers - the stag night, for a start, but there are a number of other hints too - to allow us to make this interpretation if we want to. I must admit I've always assumed Sherlock was gay, right back to ACD's original stories, so I can easily see him being very upset when the object of his affections gets married. John, on the other hand.....Bisexual, maybe,

 

It's still hard to understand why Sherlock is so amiable towards Mary from the beginning. Admittedly she seemed sweet in the first two episodes, but when has that ever worked with Sherlock? Sarah, for instance, was patient and helpful in TBB and he was horribly rude to her. He manages to ruin all John's attempts at relationships but then Mary comes along and he's putty in her hands, even after she shoots him. Why? What makes her different, in his eyes, to Sarah or any of John's other girlfriends?

[Bakerstreet Irregular]

I always thought he was quite tolerant of Sarah. More so then the others. Yes, he huffs and rolls his eyes, but then she points out the cipher that Soo Lin was starting to translate. And in the tunnel he tries to comfort and reassure her as he tries to untie her.

 

She wades into that little dust up at the circus. I was kind of hoping that Sarah was the Mary Morstan stand in. Oh well.

[Arcadia]

It's still hard to understand why Sherlock is so amiable towards Mary from the beginning. Admittedly she seemed sweet in the first two episodes, but when has that ever worked with Sherlock? Sarah, for instance, was patient and helpful in TBB and he was horribly rude to her. He manages to ruin all John's attempts at relationships but then Mary comes along and he's putty in her hands, even after she shoots him. Why? What makes her different, in his eyes, to Sarah or any of John's other girlfriends?

Well, from the dialog in HLV, we are supposed to assume that John somehow intuitively knew she was "dangerous," and that's why he was drawn to her. (Lot of nonsense imo but that's what they said.....) Anyway, maybe it's supposed to be the same for Sherlock?

 

If pressed for a more sensible answer I would say it's because she offered to help bring John and Sherlock back together. It seemed to me Sherlock didn't really pay any attention to her one way or the other until that moment; in fact, that's when he noticed her enough to deduce her. So maybe he thought that meant she wasn't a threat to his relationship with John; completely the opposite, in fact. ???

 

Dunno.

[jesskayding]

Not only that, maybe on some level Sherlock can relate to Mary. She has a false identity, that hurt John. Sherlocked faked his death for 2 years, that hurt John. I don't know - they both seem to do what needs to be done for survival @ least in their minds.

 

Can you guys tell I'm getting more & more OK with Mary.

[Slithytove]

Yes, but he was friendly towards her long before he knew they shared any common ground. (If, indeed, they do - to me, their motivation and their actions seem very different.). She did offer to talk John into accepting Sherlock's behaviour but Sarah did her bit too in TBB, and didn't even complain when Sherlock crashed their date, but he was barely civil to her and made it clear that he wanted her to leave. He was reassuring towards her after she was nearly killed, but that hardly amounts to a declaration of friendship.

 

I'm hoping it will turn out that Sherlock had a secret motive for getting close to Mary, which would also explain why he seems to have made no effort to deduce the truth about her, but I'm not holding my breath....

[T.o.b.y]

I hesitate to point out the obvious, but there is the Johnlock explanation of Sherlock's evident unhappiness in TSOT. Maybe Sherlock is upset because he is in love with John and is losing him to someone else. In that case, liking or disliking the bride would be irrelevant - the loss would be the same. Obviously Sherlock is not the type of man who would make a big declaration of love, particularly if he was uncertain that it would be reciprocated, so he might react by putting on a brave face and throwing himself into the wedding plans as a way of overcompensating.

 

Well, it's never going to be canon but the writers have given us enough teasers - the stag night, for a start, but there are a number of other hints too - to allow us to make this interpretation if we want to.

 

Yes, they have. And I'd like to use a quote from A Scandal in Belgravia here: If it's not deliberate, then how come I can see it, and I don't even want to? Since series 3, I think it is downright hypocritical of the writers to poke fun at viewers who look at the story from that perspective, or to act like they have no idea why people do so. It's beginning to remind me of the old Britcom "Are You Being Served", which featured a character who was like a compilation of every single cliché about gay men turned up to eleven, and the showrunners persisted in declaring that no, no, he was not gay at all, just a "Mamma's boy" (he lived with his mother, of course - actually, she lived with him, but different story), while the jokes and innuendo kept getting less and less subtle.

 

If you don't want people to "get ideas", you write your scripts differently. Of course, they'll get them anyway (just look at all the more outlandish "ships" that float about in fan land), but what they did with the boys in the last three episodes was heavy encouragement, if you ask me.

 

 

 

It's still hard to understand why Sherlock is so amiable towards Mary from the beginning. Admittedly she seemed sweet in the first two episodes, but when has that ever worked with Sherlock? Sarah, for instance, was patient and helpful in TBB and he was horribly rude to her. He manages to ruin all John's attempts at relationships but then Mary comes along and he's putty in her hands, even after she shoots him. Why? What makes her different, in his eyes, to Sarah or any of John's other girlfriends?

Well, from the dialog in HLV, we are supposed to assume that John somehow intuitively knew she was "dangerous," and that's why he was drawn to her. (Lot of nonsense imo but that's what they said.....) Anyway, maybe it's supposed to be the same for Sherlock?

 

If pressed for a more sensible answer I would say it's because she offered to help bring John and Sherlock back together. It seemed to me Sherlock didn't really pay any attention to her one way or the other until that moment; in fact, that's when he noticed her enough to deduce her. So maybe he thought that meant she wasn't a threat to his relationship with John; completely the opposite, in fact. ???

 

Well, Mary is different in that she is more than just a girl-friend. It's quite clear from the beginning that John is serious about her, and I am sure Sherlock knew right away that he had planned to propose that night - it was obvious even for my little brain long before he got out the ring.

 

Sherlock simply couldn't afford not to like Mary, let alone be rude to her. At the beginning, John is stark staring mad at him, and with good reason. If Sherlock had started insulting his fiancée the instant he reintroduced himself, well, um, that would kind of have made things even worse, don't you think? But even after their friendship is (kind of) restored, it would make things extremely difficult and unpleasant for everybody if Sherlock and Mary didn't get along. Imagine disliking your husband's best friend, or your best friend's wife.

 

Still, it seems that Sherlock also likes Mary for herself. Why wouldn't he, actually? She's clever, interesting, funny and definitely not boring. Also, she really loves John (she does - I have to believe that, or the whole story makes no sense to me, I just have to, and besides she's Mary Morstan, that is what she was invented for - oh no, wait, Mary Morstan is dead and never really existed. Damn.), and yes, I do think Sherlock is, beneath his snarky exterior, a good enough person to recognize and honor that.

 

And, he owes Mary. Yes, he does. Mary picked up the peaces for him, so to speak, after he took off to play dead. Sherlock realizes full well that the two years have not changed John for the better (he doesn't get so riled up by the silly mustache just because it looks awful, but because it is a symbol of all that is wrong with John at the beginning of series 3), and the thought could have crossed his mind how much worse it might have been if Mary had not showed up and "turned John's life around". (Heck, for all we know, John could be dead. He had a gun handy, and maybe, if he got really depressed, he might have used it the way Moriarty did, only with more permanent results).

 

I don't see Sherlock as being jealous of Mary, exactly. I don't think he'd want that kind of place in John's life. But by marrying and having a kid and "settling down", John is going places where Sherlock can't follow, and so there is this sense of loss and the whole "end of an era" thing.

 

By the way, I wonder whether Mary craves adventure the way John does, and was getting bored and antsy herself in suburbia, or whether she really genuinely would welcome a quiet life.

[jesskayding]

Hmmm. From the very moment he read her, liar was part of what he saw when he read her the very 1st time. I think he just didn't know what she was lying about. She was very accepting of him, unlike the other women John was with. They seemed insecure about John's devotion to Sherlock... Perhaps even Sarah, per she let's John know she'll be in the shower & that he can help himself, then he has to leave to see about Sherlock. Why no more Sarah, I assume that that behavior was the norm in their relationship.

 

I don't know many women who would be okay with that.

[Bakerstreet Irregular]

I don't think liar would set off to many red flags, it is the rare person who has never done so. But obviously her brand did show up, so they weren't just little while lies...these were something more. But Sherlock had been dealing with great big liars most of his life. His father, if he did indeed have the affair, Mycroft, the criminal elements he had been chasing since he took up "The Work", so what if she was? 

 

 It might hold no significance to her life with John....of course it did...but he could only find that later.....and he did.

[T.o.b.y]

Damn, this is the Sign of Three thread. I got carried into His Last Vow by this interesting discussion with Carol... Could maybe one of the forum-savvy people around move the last post to His Last Vow?

[Carol the Dabbler]

Oops!      My bad!  I've moved a whole string of recent posts into the "Last Vow" thread, starting here.