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Post Your Moriarty Theories (Spoilers)


Jim Moriarty

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In the Hounds of the Baskervilles, Mycroft has no idea that Sherlock had his authorization card. Sherlock has to call on him only because Sherlock and John got caught the first time. So yes, Sherlock does collaborate with his big brother, but then that same brother seems awful quick to give his younger brother what he needs and when he needs it. Seems to beg the question, what kind of authority and power does Sherlock have in his own right?

 

  In "ASiB" at the "Palace", Sherlock stands and says: "I'll need equipment." 

 

 Immediately and without hesitation Mycroft replies: "Anything you require."

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I do hope that it won't turn out this time Sherlock staged the whole Magnussen drama with the consent and planning of his big brother.

 

 

Funny, I hope exactly the opposite :)

I don't want to feel pity for Mycroft, but if Sherlock truly had staged everything in the Magnussen "solution" on his own, I can't but feel truly sorry for Mycroft. He's always put Sherlock before himself (no matter how spiteful he is at times). If Sherlock wasted no second thoughts on throwing his brother to the dogs, I feel like that's something I couldn't forgive easily. It's a bit like with Magnussen. I didn't like him but I feel sorry for him. He didn't deserve to die no matter what kind of a... he was. Just like Mycroft doesn't deserve that as a Christmas present.

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I can't feel sorry for Mycroft at all. He has tormented and belittled Sherlock all his life and still does it at every opportunity. Sherlock has been able to pull himself up, prove that he is every bit as much of a genius and has made a successful place for himself in the world.

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Just because Sherlock and Mycroft sometimes work together doesn't mean that Mycroft is running the show.  They occasionally have interests in common, at which point they form an ad hoc coalition.  But as soon as that emergency is over, they're back to squabbling again.

 

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I think that Moriarty will return, but he'll be deaf. 

 

In-universe reason: whether it was a blank cartridge (though I've heard that those are dangerous at close range and in your mouth definitely qualifies as close) or a sophisticated gun-shaped noise-maker, that thing Moriarty "shot" himself with set off a LOT of decibels very close to his ears.

 

Meta-reason: Moriarty has been associated with music, and I think this is the kind of twist the writers would pull...

 

As for Mycroft, my feeling is that he was meaner to Sherlock as a kid than he is now, and is perhaps even remorseful about that now (though he'd never admit it directly). Though I don't really feel sorry for him over Sherlock selling his laptop to Magnussen; I feel that Sherlock never really intended Magnussen to get it, and probably had some plan that involved nicking the Mary files from the vaults, grabbing/destroying Mycroft's laptop* and getting away, but the plan was foiled when the vaults turned out to be in Magnussen's mind. 

 

*I mean, Irene Adler's phone has built-in explosives; surely Mycroft's laptop does!

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I think that Moriarty will return, but he'll be deaf. 

 

In-universe reason: whether it was a blank cartridge (though I've heard that those are dangerous at close range and in your mouth definitely qualifies as close) or a sophisticated gun-shaped noise-maker, that thing Moriarty "shot" himself with set off a LOT of decibels very close to his ears.

Good point -- if he isn't dead, he may at least be hard of hearing. (Though that wasn't a particularly large gun, as I recall, and people do fire rifles and shotguns with the explosive part fairly close to their ears.)

 

Meta-reason: Moriarty has been associated with music, and I think this is the kind of twist the writers would pull...

I'm not familiar with that idea (though it has been said that mathematicians have a natural musical sense). Could you elaborate?

 

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  • 1 month later...

For some reason I can't get the Moriarty thing out of my head tonight. As far as I can see, there are the following possibilities:

 

- Jim Moriarty from series 1 and 2 is alive. In that case, either

  - the shot was real but not fatal and Moriarty spent the years after The Reichenbach Fall in hospital and rehab.

or

  - the shot was fake

If one of these scenarios is correct, then I don't understand how his body could disappear without any of Mycroft's people noticing anything or asking any questions. I would have at least expected a comment in series 3 about the corpse having been missed.

 

- Jim Moriarty from series 1 and 2 is dead. If so, maybe

  - there are two Moriarty's

or

  - an entirely different character is using Moriarty's image for his own purposes

Again, in both cases I would have expected the series to give us clues. For example, has there ever been any hint that the Moriarty we saw was not always the same person? Was there ever a situation where he would have had to be in two places at once for the story to make sense? I don't recall anything like that.

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... has there ever been any hint that the Moriarty we saw was not always the same person?

 

Well, there was a comment somewhere on this forum about his beard stubble having grown awfully fast in "Reichenbach."  Hang on, I'll find it.  Yup, here it is:

 

In the scene where Sherlock rides a TAXI and watches video from Jim, he then tells the driver to stop and he sees that Jim is sitting behind the wheel. Jim without a beard.

 

That same night, Sherlock and Watson go to the journalist's house and they find Jim out there pretending to be an actor Richard Brook. This Jim has a beard  <snip>

 

So...how to explain such situation?

#1 director's mistake?

#2 fake beard used by Jim-The-Actor?

#3 cabbie-Jim was simply a man in a mask?

#4 Jim has a twin brother?

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Oooo...someone had good eyes. Didn't catch that at all.  Or maybe there was more of a time difference going on in the episode then the audience is aware of?

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There IS an indeterminate amount of time between those scenes. But my money's on mistake by the director. :-)

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Out of Mia's four possibilities, I agree.  The time wasn't all that indeterminate -- the taxi ride occurred after dark, the scene in Kitty's apartment was presumably that same night (still dark), and John surprised Mycroft after that.  The trees in front of Bart's had leaves on them (though admittedly so did the tree on "Baker Street" in "December" in "Scandal"), so long winter nights aren't in the equation.  Unless Mycroft is accustomed to returning to the Diogenes Club in the wee hours, Jim appears to have grown his stubble over a span of no more than six hours.

 

Possibly he's one of those men who develop a five-o'clock shadow a couple hours after shaving?

 

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That's definitely it. The big reveal from TRF :)

We better tell them that we caught on to it. We even have screenshots ~

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It is all about Entropy.

Ever since this thought crossed my mind, I cannot think anything else...

Moriarty works according to the principle of the second law of thermodynamics and Humpty Dumpty is a reference to it.
He is using opposing forces, that attract each other, to get things done with little effort e.g. using the system to keep people out of the Tower to get himself locked in, or using Sherlock against the jurisdictional system to keep him out of jail.
In the Reichenbach Fall he sets up the police against the criminals, the secret service against investigative journalism and himself against Sherlock.
Moriarty sees himself as the smartest villain and finds an opponent in Sherlock.  During the swimming pool scene, earlier, he realises that Sherlock is not up to it yet because of the uneven power balance.

According to the law, for as long as opposite powers attract each other you have stability, until they collide.  His life's ambition is to enact the law and create the biggest chaos ever.  The scene on the roof is also a test for Moriarty ("You're ordinary.").  Sherlock counters it, demonstrating to understand Moriarty's tricks, and says; "...prepared to do anything, prepared to burn, prepared to do what ordinary people don't do. - You want me to shake hands with you in hell, I shall not disappoint you. - Oh, I may be on the side of the angels, but don't think for one second, that I am one of them."
When Sherlock also indicates he sees through the suicide plot, Moriarty restores faith in Sherlock, to be the one; "You're not ordinary. No, you're me. You're me, thank you." i.e. you are like me end we are destined to become one, entropy.  He can now continue with his plan.  

Sherlock later confesses to have had 13 alternatives for ending the rooftop scene.  Being 'equal', Moriarty must have had a similar amount of options lined-up.

Sherlock did not die and so Moriarty cannot be dead, it's the law!
You can compare it with a comet on collision course with earth and having a near miss.  It'll return on its next orbit and that time it may strike.

In 'His Last Vow' Sherlock keeps his promise and shoots Magnussen (CAM) triggering the return of Moriarty.  
Let's hope the writers can speed up the orbital speed of Moriarty and do not let us wait for another two years to the next series.
All in all, it is a bit like a magician.  If you look to closely, and get distracted by the deception and you miss the trick.

A few side notes:
- Sherlock did some quick thinking deciding to kill CAM.  He knew the government could not go public with this story and he had Mycrofts cover.  He freed Mary Watson from blackmail and lets the (thermodynamics-)law take its course.
- The out of character moment that Steven Moffat referred to could well be that Sherlock was accommodating to Moriarty's wishes.  He prides himself on being independent. In addition there is a (deliberate?) misjudgement on Sherlock's side.  Shortly after he made the remark to Watson; "Alone is what I have, alone protects me." Watson;" No, friends protect people.".  On the roof Sherlock realised that he is not 'Alone' and needs to activate alternative escape options.

So how did Sherlock, and Moriarty, fake their death?
To be honest, I don't care really (anymore).  I am looking forward to a new series with lots of twists and turns with Moriarty back on the scene.

What do you think?

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Glad to see you're back and finally shared your thoughts with us, Rene :smile:.

 

Hmmm, it's certainly an interesting theory, but I have a hard time connecting Moriarty with entropy. Granted, thermodynamics isn't exactly my speciality, but his method strikes me as more order- than chaos-oriented ... Sherlock does compare him to a spider in a web.

 

Then again, he does unravel parts of his web just to have his fun with Sherlock, as with the fake painting. Okay, I'll bow out of this now, I'm contradicting myself :D.

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I'm happy to continue to share my thoughts.

 

The thing with entropy is that you have order for as long as the opposing forces attract each other i.e. during Humpty Dumpty's fall there is a certain stability.  Moriarty is using drive and motives of other people to get what he wants.  He needs to bring those forces within reach of each other to activate them like magnets getting close enough to overcome the friction keeping them in place.  He does not need to own a network, he just needs to orchestrate it.  The network can be a combination of underworld, upper world and the grey area in between.

As Moriarty doesn't own the network, in a command and control style, it is difficult to dismantle.  Alternatively you could defuse it by taking out the conductor, but is Sherlock able to outsmart Moriarty?

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As Moriarty doesn't own the network, in a command and control style, it is difficult to dismantle.  Alternatively you could defuse it by taking out the conductor, but is Sherlock able to outsmart Moriarty?

 

Unfortunately, taking out the "conductor" leaves a vacuum in the middle of the network, and we all know that's not a stable configuration.  Someone will step in to fill the vacuum (or at least attempt to do so), which may be what we catch a glimpse of at the end of "His Last Vow" -- basically "Moriarty is dead! Long live Moriarty!"

 

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And if Moriarty was really smart and not overly egotistical, he would have groomed someone to take his place should Sherlock find a way to best him especially since he was clearly suicidal. But if he was in denial, it may be someone....like a twin brother....who may have been the really smarter brother...seeing that "Jim from IT" was actually mentally unstable.

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I keep thinking that the "real" Moriarty must be back. Who else would they hire Andrew Scott to play? In that case, I wonder where he was for two years and what he wants now. To be distracted and to destroy Sherlock Holmes - fine, but how? He seems to have already tried every option he had there. What could one do to Sherlock that would be worse than destroy his reputation for genius and force him to commit suicide in front of his friends?

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I keep thinking that the "real" Moriarty must be back. Who else would they hire Andrew Scott to play?

 

Much as I hate to say this, I rather hope/suspect it's Jim's evil twin.  :naughty:  Or perhaps someone wearing a clever plastic Moriarty disguise.

 

If it's the real Jim, Moftiss had better have a really good explanation this time, or they'll lose all credibility.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I think it's sherlocks second brother, who posted those images. The one they've been hinting at all season long. He would have known it's the only way to save Sherlock from certain death is to bring Moriarty back.

 

 

I know Mycroft mentioned another sibling pretty explicitly in "Last Vow."  But did you mean that literally, Ember, that there's been more than one hint?  Would love to hear more.

 

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I would really like Moriarty to be back for real - He was one of my favorite characters.

I just find everything about him funny, he goes to a great length just to annoy Sherlock, and.... Well you've gotta like Stayin' Alive, right?

 

 

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I agree he's a great character.  But I don't see how they could possibly explain bringing that actual character back.  I'm perfectly willing to accept his evil twin, though!

 

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