Eurus

[Arcadia]

We've discussed Eurus at length over on the TFP thread, but it's gotten pretty jumbled up with a host of other discussions. So here's a place to sort out what we do and don't know about her; theories, observations, questions, etc.

[Arcadia]

So I'll start!

One of the issues we've been puzzling over is the two different aspects of Eurus as presented in TFP; the adult Eurus that has taken over the prison of Sherrinford, and the little girl on the plane.

The little girl clearly represents Eurus' feelings of being disconnected from the rest of the world. But she's also a "real" figure, in the sense that she has conversations with Sherlock.

So does Eurus have control over when the "little girl" side of her comes out? Or does she come out at random? Is the little girl really a separate personality? Or just a role that Eurus plays?

 

And most important to me ... why was Eurus in "little girl" mode when Sherlock found her in her room? Was it something he did that brought out that side of her? That's what I would prefer, but if that's it, I can't figure out what it was he did.

 

Or was he just "lucky", and she just happened to be in that mode when he found her? Because if she'd been in her adult psychopath mode, wouldn't she have tried to kill him, or refused to help him, or run off, or something?

 

Or did she retreat to that mode on purpose because ... uh, why? Because she wanted Sherlock to rescue her? Then why go through all that other stuff? Or is she just so crazy that there's no rhyme or reason to any of it?

 

Okay, a million other questions, but that will do to start with...

[T.o.b.y]

Thank you, Arcadia! I have been wanting to make a villains thread but you beat me to it and there's most to talk about concerning Euros anyway.

 

Don't have time to really spell out my thoughts right now (off to work) but I will be back later so... Be warned! :-p

[Amber§]

So I'll start!

 

Or did she retreat to that mode on purpose because ... uh, why? Because she wanted Sherlock to rescue her? Then why go through all that other stuff? Or is she just so crazy that there's no rhyme or reason to any of it?

 

 

I'll go for this one. I think that a part of Euros wanted to kill Sherlock, another part of her knew she was in trouble, that she needed help. A third part of her was too proud to ask for help and a fourth part loved Sherlock and Mycroft as her family.

So, maybe to council all this troubles and contraddictions inside her, she turned in the "girl mode"; after all, kids follow their istincts, their most impressive feelings. Maybe Euros diperately needed help and she "decided" to become a kid and let her brother help her.

 

After all, it's not completely Euros' fault if she's like that. She suffers a lot and she tries to escape.

 

That's my point of view...maybe rewatching the episode I'll change my mind <_<

 

[bedelia1984]

 

 

And most important to me ... why was Eurus in "little girl" mode when Sherlock found her in her room? Was it something he did that brought out that side of her? That's what I would prefer, but if that's it, I can't figure out what it was he did.

 

 

I wonder if one some level, what we started to see in the Molly scene, and then more so in the scene where Sherlock has to choose between John and Mycroft and instead chooses to sacrifice himself,was that Eurus is starting to see Sherlock as a bit of a hero. That is, she sees him as someone who will go to great lengths to rescue those he cares about. And she's starting to feel like she'd like to be one of those people herself. And in the end, that overcomes her original plan (if she had one, maybe she was just experimenting on him for fun)?

 

Of course it is so hard to read her motivation, because her behaviour is consistently erratic.

 

As I have said before on other threads, I am not convinced that her motivation was ever simply love of her brother. I would consider her capable of great manipulation, and of course presenting herself as a little girl lost, plays to the side of Sherlock that wants to be a hero (something she may remember about him from his pirate days as a child), and this may all be very calculated.

[Arcadia]

I have to admit, I'm more ready to believe she is calculating than anything else. I think that's one reason that it would be more satisfying to me to learn that Sherlock out-thought her. Well, wait ... I guess the point is that he used his emotional intelligence to defeat her. Or to rescue her, actually.
 
I think I'll go check and see if Ariane DeVere has finished the transcript for this episode, that might help me clarify my thoughts on it. So far I feel like I'm just running in circles....

 

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

I don't think Eurus (if that's actually how they're spelling it, instead of Euros) is actually trying to hurt anyone. She's not sadistic, she's clinical. So all those challenges were her way of testing Sherlock in order to learn more about him. Remember how Sherlock used John as his "lab rat" in "Hounds"? Like that, only more so. Far more.

[bedelia1984]

I might agree Eurus is not actively out to kill Sherlock (though she's at least reckless with his wellbeing, especially if we consider the childhood house-burning), but what about all those other poor schmucks who get mixed up in her experiments? Her body count is pretty high, and that's only based on what we see of her being her true self for a few hours.

 

Also, her description of sexually assaulting the prison guard was out-right sick, even though the episode never re-visited it. In other threads people have mentioned how much more commonplace these mentions of non-consensual sex have become in series 4- well mainly thinking of Smith and Eurus here, but still that is two out of three of this year's villains.

 

Eurus' interaction with Morairty was likewise bizarre, I'm still unsure whether it was supposed to be sexual or not?

[T.o.b.y]

I would love to add my two cents concerning Euros, but just a quick question for now: What's all this about Calverton Smith and sex? Am I being too naive, did I miss a scene or...? I didn't catch anything sexual in his behavior or crime record. All I understood was that he found a disturbing pleasure in killing people and in confessing his murders. Someone help me out here?

[bedelia1984]

T.o.b.y, this is something I need to rewatch myself, someone on the TFP thread mentioned it, I think, but here is a quote from this article in the guardian describing it:

 

 

There are particularly sinister scenes while Smith is drugging and strangling Sherlock, demanding that Sherlock keep looking him in the eye as he dies, and passing shots of Smith’s crotch allude to some sexual gratification.

 

 

 

Of course part of people's reasoning must be coming from the Jimmy Saville similarities with this character too.

[Arcadia]

I don't think Eurus (if that's actually how they're spelling it, instead of Euros) is actually trying to hurt anyone. She's not sadistic, she's clinical. So all those challenges were her way of testing Sherlock in order to learn more about him. Remember how Sherlock used John as his "lab rat" in "Hounds"? Like that, only more so. Far more.

 

In the subtitles and elsewhere, it's being spelled as Eurus.

 

She's not sadistic in the sense of enjoying other's suffering, perhaps ... but her manner of dispatching people is certainly, er, brutal. Dropping three helpless Garridebs onto the jagged rocks below, drowning a kid in a well... At least Sherlock shot his victim in the face, there was no prolonged terror or suffering involved. She may not be trying to hurt people (because she doesn't even know what "hurting" means?) but she sure manages to.

 

Eurus' interaction with Morairty was likewise bizarre, I'm still unsure whether it was supposed to be sexual or not?

 

That's certainly the impression I got.

 

T.o.b.y, this is something I need to rewatch myself, someone on the TFP thread mentioned it, I think, but here is a quote from this article in the guardian describing it:

 

There are particularly sinister scenes while Smith is drugging and strangling Sherlock, demanding that Sherlock keep looking him in the eye as he dies, and passing shots of Smith’s crotch allude to some sexual gratification.

 

I didn't notice any crotch shots (and don't particularly want to ), but I was acutely aware how that scene resembled the deleted scene from HLV, where CAM visits Sherlock in the hospital. The way Smith leans in close to Sherlock's face, as if he's about to kiss him. The soft, caressing way he speaks. And the fact that Smith describes himself as deriving pleasure from the act of killing was very, uh, suggestive.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Even so, I balk at calling that evidence that CS is gay or bi or anything other than (perhaps) sadistic. Some little boys get off on squishing wooly-worms. Maybe Smith never outgrew that phase.

[Arcadia]

I haven't seen anything speculating on his sexual orientation ... all I've seen is the observation that his attention to Sherlock has sexually abusive overtones, similar to CAM's in the deleted scenes.

[bedelia1984]

I do think it is possible that they wanted to portray CS as a necrophiliac, but that there were limits to what the BBC would allow. The fact that the story las so much in common with Saville is enough to create just a hint of it, and the scene in the morgue where CS handles the body suggests it slightly.

[Arcadia]

Yes, I caught that as well. When he ordered the doctor to "knock next time" that kind of clinched it for me.

[Surelock]

 

Eurus' interaction with Morairty was likewise bizarre, I'm still unsure whether it was supposed to be sexual or not?

 

Maybe that 'prison guard' that Euros told Sherlock she had sex with was actually Moriarty? 

 

However Euros wanted to surprise Sherlock again (as she had before when she disguised herself as Faith and John's therapist). She didn't want to give any hints of how she had gotten Moriarty to record videos for her. So she decided to lie about Moriarty being a prison guard and just made vague references about him in order to throw Sherlock off.

[bedelia1984]

 

 

Eurus' interaction with Morairty was likewise bizarre, I'm still unsure whether it was supposed to be sexual or not?

 

Maybe that 'prison guard' that Euros told Sherlock she had sex with was actually Moriarty? 

 

However Euros wanted to surprise Sherlock again (as she had before when she disguised herself as Faith and John's therapist). She didn't want to give any hints of how she had gotten Moriarty to record videos for her. So she decided to lie about Moriarty being a prison guard and just made vague references about him in order to throw Sherlock off.

 

 

But her next line was something about not knowing if it was a man or a woman, and how by the end you couldn't tell the difference? So I took that to mean she had either killed or horribly disfigured her partner.

 

I found it a really nasty little aside, actually, and a bit puzzling that they introduced that side to her- Sherlock assuming that her partner had been coerced, and then her one-upping him and saying she'd disfigured them- it obviously painted her as terrifically nasty and evil, but it seems at odds with the 'little girl lost'- like, is she supposed to have become a complete monster in prison?

[Surelock]

 

 

 

Eurus' interaction with Morairty was likewise bizarre, I'm still unsure whether it was supposed to be sexual or not?

 

Maybe that 'prison guard' that Euros told Sherlock she had sex with was actually Moriarty? 

 

However Euros wanted to surprise Sherlock again (as she had before when she disguised herself as Faith and John's therapist). She didn't want to give any hints of how she had gotten Moriarty to record videos for her. So she decided to lie about Moriarty being a prison guard and just made vague references about him in order to throw Sherlock off.

 

 

But her next line was something about not knowing if it was a man or a woman, and how by the end you couldn't tell the difference? So I took that to mean she had either killed or horribly disfigured her partner.

 

I found it a really nasty little aside, actually, and a bit puzzling that they introduced that side to her- Sherlock assuming that her partner had been coerced, and then her one-upping him and saying she'd disfigured them- it obviously painted her as terrifically nasty and evil, but it seems at odds with the 'little girl lost'- like, is she supposed to have become a complete monster in prison?

 

 

Almost everything about Adult Euros was at odds with the 'little girl lost'. If she did disfigure the guard or whoever it's not much different from how the Governor mentioned she mind controlled some guy to kill himself and his wife and kids.

 

However I'm more interested in the 'little girl lost' then I am with Adult Euros because at least the 'little girl lost' is consistent on her own (as long as we ignore her connection with Adult Euros).

 

I think one of the little girls more notable lines was 'Why do grown ups never tell the truth?' I think this may say something about Euros' past. Maybe she's speaking from experience when she said that? Like maybe when Uncle Ruddy came to take her away to the asylum, he told her she was going to a 'nice place'.

[Arcadia]

 

 

Eurus' interaction with Morairty was likewise bizarre, I'm still unsure whether it was supposed to be sexual or not?

 

Maybe that 'prison guard' that Euros told Sherlock she had sex with was actually Moriarty? 

 

However Euros wanted to surprise Sherlock again (as she had before when she disguised herself as Faith and John's therapist). She didn't want to give any hints of how she had gotten Moriarty to record videos for her. So she decided to lie about Moriarty being a prison guard and just made vague references about him in order to throw Sherlock off.

 

 

But her next line was something about not knowing if it was a man or a woman, and how by the end you couldn't tell the difference? So I took that to mean she had either killed or horribly disfigured her partner.

 

I found it a really nasty little aside, actually, and a bit puzzling that they introduced that side to her- Sherlock assuming that her partner had been coerced, and then her one-upping him and saying she'd disfigured them- it obviously painted her as terrifically nasty and evil, but it seems at odds with the 'little girl lost'- like, is she supposed to have become a complete monster in prison?

 

I think maybe that was just another way of showing how she was devoid of any understanding of human emotion of behavior. She didn't understand which feeling was pain, she couldn't tell the difference between laughing and crying, she couldn't tell the difference between having sex and dismembering a body, and in her passion she apparently didn't notice the gender of her victim.

 

I think they were showing us she has normal sensations, but can't identify them, or distinguish when/if they're good or bad. She's even rationalized away good and bad (and it's interesting that her language about good and evil is not dissimilar to the way Sherlock dismisses a belief in God).

 

And can a person be considered evil if they genuinely don't understand what evil is, or how it is different from good? She's an abomination, but it's not, apparently, her fault. I don't know, I haven't crytallized my thoughts about her yet. But I think they wanted to make her the scariest person imaginable, to help us understand why Sherlock was so traumatized by her. Whether they succeeded in the that or not I'm not sure, because they undermined it a bit by also have her be the "little girl lost." But I sort of think that was intentional too, to show that it's not always so easy to separate innocence and guilt.

 

I think they were going for complicated, here. Maybe too complicated, I'm not sure. It's an awful lot to cram into 90 minutes. But I've seen more done in less time, so ... hey. Besides, we have to have something to talk about for the next ten years. See, they're just being kind to the fans! :D

[bedelia1984]

Yes there really is that inherent contradiction in her character- apparently a genius to the level of Newton, but incapable of learning the difference between right and wrong?

 

I can see room for sympathy for her, because her actions, even if they are self-interested, don't achieve the aims that she wants- everything she did made her increasingly isolated instead of less so. Even her own self-awareness seems shot- when she is reacting to Sherlock's tests, it is as if she doesn't even know what she is feeling herself- 'all those complicated little emotions, I've lost count,'- but really she must feel totally flummoxed, if someone asked her to identify them, she would likely get it all wrong.

 

In a way, it is surprising that Moriarty had the death wish and not Eurus. Her quality of life is pretty terrible in comparison to his.

[Carol the Dabbler]

... it obviously painted her as terrifically nasty and evil, but it seems at odds with the 'little girl lost'- like, is she supposed to have become a complete monster in prison?

That's the only question here that I feel comfortable answering unequivocally: No.

 

By the time she was taken to Sherrinford, she had already trapped Victor in the well (where she was quite aware he would drown), set fire to her family's home (though that may have been unintentional), and then burned down the nice hospital they had taken her to (though that final point may or may not be precisely true).

[Arcadia]

Yes there really is that inherent contradiction in her character- apparently a genius to the level of Newton, but incapable of learning the difference between right and wrong?

 

I can see room for sympathy for her, because her actions, even if they are self-interested, don't achieve the aims that she wants- everything she did made her increasingly isolated instead of less so. Even her own self-awareness seems shot- when she is reacting to Sherlock's tests, it is as if she doesn't even know what she is feeling herself- 'all those complicated little emotions, I've lost count,'- but really she must feel totally flummoxed, if someone asked her to identify them, she would likely get it all wrong.

 

In a way, it is surprising that Moriarty had the death wish and not Eurus. Her quality of life is pretty terrible in comparison to his.

But was she even capable of realizing that? She may have been completely miserable; but how would she know? She can't distinguish misery from joy, it would seem.

 

The more I think about it, the more I think the point they were trying to make was that this is what Sherlock would have become if he had managed to completely stripped himself of the ability to feel, as he seemed to be trying to do. It's hard for me to imagine what such a person would be like, but I think they were trying to show us, through Eurus.

 

But then why the little girl persona? Because her inability to connect with people also kept her from becoming a fully developed human being? Which, come to think of it, does sort of describe Sherlock, as well.

 

Do you suppose Moftiss really thinks all this stuff through? :d

[Surelock]

 

But was she even capable of realizing that? She may have been completely miserable; but how would she know? She can't distinguish misery from joy, it would seem.

 

The more I think about it, the more I think the point they were trying to make was that this is what Sherlock would have become if he had managed to completely stripped himself of the ability to feel, as he seemed to be trying to do. It's hard for me to imagine what such a person would be like, but I think they were trying to show us, through Eurus.

 

 

And this is another reason why I find Euros to be such a boring character.

 

How many times have we seen the cliche 'Oh you would be like this person if you went down the wrong path' character in stories? 

 

Nowadays it just feels really lazy when writers resort to this because even an average reader can figure out what the repercussions of a character's poor decisions can be. We don't need such details spoon fed to us.

 

 

But then why the little girl persona? Because her inability to connect with people also kept her from becoming a fully developed human being? Which, come to think of it, does sort of describe Sherlock, as well.

 

Do you suppose Moftiss really thinks all this stuff through?  :D

 

Of course they do, especially Gatiss. I mean he's the one who said he wants to challenge his audience and tells his critics to go and read a children's book.

[J.P.]

Yes there really is that inherent contradiction in her character- apparently a genius to the level of Newton, but incapable of learning the difference between right and wrong?

Gosh, I absolutely hate the Newton comparison. The way she's described - Newton was just another goldfish to her. Plus he didn't seem to have an ability to reprogramm others' brains.

 

But back on track: I think children learn right and wrong through emotions, and the ability to read the emotions in others. It has nothing to do with the calculating capability of their brains. It's like expecting a computer to distinguish between computing an orbit of the next weather satelite, from the trajectories of the nuclear missiles about to hit another country.

[Arcadia]

I think that's why I find Eurus fascinating. I keep trying to imagine going through the world with no emotional context, and I can't. To me, it sounds boring beyond endurance, for one thing. Aha ... maybe that's why Sherlock was always complaining about boredom ...

 

Which reminds me, who wants to take a stab at explaining this to me?

 

SHERLOCK (quietly, thoughtfully): I said I’d bring her home. I can’t, can I?

JOHN: Well, you gave her what she was looking for: context.

SHERLOCK (looking round at him): Is that good?

JOHN: It’s not good, it’s not bad. It’s ...

(He looks away and screws up his face, searching for the right words, then turns back to his friend.)

JOHN: It is what it is.

 

(From Ariane Devere: http://arianedevere.livejournal.com/92287.html