besleybean wrote:

I have my own views on this, but feel I may have already overstepped the mark on this board and do not want to make myself even more unwelcome!

You haven't, at least not in my opinion Don't be afraid to say your opinion just because some people disagree. (Maybe I'm not the one to judge because I'm just as bad as you are with posting my opinion everywhere :D but really, why not. We are all free to voice our thoughts.)

Religion, to me, is comparable to a hobby. Or maybe a taste in music. Some people like listening to Justin Bieber, some prefer Green Day, and some listen to nothing but Ed Sheeran. I don't care. It's an opinion, something that's wonderful to love and believe in and share with like-minded people, but it's nothing to fight over. Because nobody will ever have proof that Justin Bieber's music is better or worse than Ed Sheeran's music. Just like nobody will ever be able to prove the existence or inexistence of god, or that Muslims are better than Christians or whatever. It's something you believe in, or you don't.
Therefore I don't think that religion is a good thing to use for supporting your argumentation. Whereas some things, that have been proven and are nothing to debate or have an opinion about, are. Like the fact that we are all equal, and that we all have the right to live.
I know I'm wandering a bit from the subject, just had to throw that in. 

Lily wrote:

Sherlock's remark in HLV really confused me: 'Your best friend is a sociopath who solves crimes as an alternative to getting high.'
I never read it that way, I always assumed that Sherlock took drugs - presumably cocaine - because it helped him to think even quicker, stay awake for a longer time, solve crimes even better and faster, stimulate his brain and overcome the boredom.
But this makes it sound as if the crimesolving is actually just an alternative to taking drugs, not something that really matters to him.
Is this really how Sherlock sees himself?

What did he take in the beginning of this episode, anyway? He seemed agitated and moody, even aggressive towards Mycroft, but seemed to be totally fine only minutes later.

I found that rather confusing as well since it as, as you mentioned not canon, however, I think that Sherlock does love solving crimes. I mean, you do have more than one passion, don't you? Especially if you've decided to give one up.
For the latter I would suggest cocaine (canon), but I'm not familiar with possible mood swings. I think in the beginning it's not even so much the drugs that make him angry, but Mycroft being there and searching for drugs as well as John interrupting his work.

 

anjaH_alias wrote:

Hanka wrote:

miriel68, you're not really contradicting me here. I'm okay with people murdering others on TV, it happens, it should be shown on TV/in literature. I am just very unhappy with the way it is dealt with: not at all. Sherlock kills somebody, then there's about a minute of people being shocked, and then, surprise, three minutes later, Sherlock just comes back to solve yet another crime. Mycroft is over it. John is over it. Nobody even implies that this is wrong, a murderer not facing justice because he is oh so intelligent and needed (why? He just 'solved' a problem in the worst possible way). The characters are joking again already, and apparently ready to go 'back to business'.

I actually don´t get what you feel here, but I can tell you what I feel since Sunday: I feel a huge cramp around and in my breast whenever I am thinking about that scene. It´s so dark, really dark. I see that child crying, which brought himself into that hopeless dead end situation. I understand it and I see and feel how it suffers, how everybody around him is suffering. The jokes I hear are bitter gallows humour, grim, not funny at all. Sardonic. I am really touched and feel sad.
I can´t understand what you read in that scene, I don´t see what you see. It´s one of the most striking, impressing, tragic and thinkworthy scenes which I saw since ages. It makes me think about that matter, I am asking myself questions - what if or if not? -, and this is much more moving and deep as any of that morally clotted, political correct blab of so many other films I saw. I really salute to Stephen Moffat here - what he made is courageous and profound.
And so I can´t understand how anybody can watch this with his/her everyday point of view, doesn´t see the beauty of that scene and is resistant to that tragedy. Is it self protection or am I too romantic?

 I'm with you here, I did like that scene, it was very well done. I think I spoke too harshly when I s

sj4iy wrote:

beekeeper wrote:

Swanpride wrote:

More important, Sherlock Holmes had his dark side, too. He was not all lawful, he often let criminals get aways with their crime when he considered their motives sound. Sometimes he acts himself like a blackmailer in a way, pressuring guilty parties to pay for what they want to keep secret. We have gotten so used to "Sherlock Holmes the Hero" that we have forgotten that he was not written as one, but as a flawed character - with a fascinating intellect.

In the Canon, Holmes never killed anyone, with the exception of Moriaty which was a bit complex. He did not kill CAM. He possibly killed Tonga in the Sign of Four but that's complex as several pistols are described as being fired and we don't know whether he was carrying a gun at all. And that was sheer self defence.

To me, there is a real difference between being willing to make a personal decision not to report someone to the police, which is what he did from time to time, and firing a shot that killed someone. There is no British legal requirement to report a crime, it IS discretionary. 

To have shot a blackmailer in order to save the marriage of a contract killer really does seem...well, its quite a different Holmes.

CAM was not self defence and there is no possibility that Sherlock felt personally threatened. Even with the taxi driver in SiP, John arguably believed, given what had gone before, that he was acting in defence of Sherlock's actual life. There would be no way in British law that Sherlock's shooting of CAM would be considered anything other than first degree murder (I went to law school-in Britain-, btw, - as well as being a graduate chemist :-) )

 

That's why it's called 'fiction'.
 

Because it displays ethically questionable actions as totally acceptable and not worth thinking of longer than a few minutes as well as changing major characteristics (referring to canon)? I don't think so.

I agree with the people who criticized the way Mary is portrayed. She has killed multiple people, not only during the time she worked as an agent, but also later, apparently for money. And still, John takes her back. Still, Sherlock sees her as a victim, somebody who needs to be protected. Somebody who doesn't deserve going to prison for what she did. Which, in my opinion, is wrong. I've talked about this (murder and justice) a lot in another thread (I don't like HLV / Criticism), so I'm not going to bring all that up again.
Secondly: I disagree that killing Magnussen was the only option. Everybody knows Magnussen. He is famous in England, and apparently, the public doesn't hold much against him except maybe publishing shitty newspapers. It would be possible, easy even, to hoist him with his own petard. You'd only have to spread some horrible rumours about him, I mean, it wouldn't even have to be a lie, he's done enough such things. There are so many victims who could just team up. I mean, what do they have to loose? Obviously, some people would have to make sacrifices, and yeah, maybe he'd even win a court procedure. However, that would leave him and his reputation tarnished. Especially because all he does is spread rumours, too - he won't be able to prove most of the stuff he'd tell about the judges. People wouldn't believe it.  Just like Magnussen said, if you work in news, you don't need proof. It's easy to destroy a reputation with nothing but rumours. I mean, it could even work that way - somebody in the news would have to buck up and try. I would've found that much more interesting than having Sherlock shoot him. (Which is something that happens, I know that. People kill others. But a) not Sherlock, especially not to save somebody else, and b) I missed the judgement (see afore mentioned thread).)

sj4iy wrote:

Hanka wrote:

I do agree with most of you, and I never denied that Magnussen was a bigger threat to humanity than a man with a gun/knife. He is a threat to a lot of people- to their sanity, their happiness - but not directly to their life. He ruins lives, but he doesn't end them. And yes, there is a big difference. By stabbing somebody with a knife, you actively decide for this person to stop existing. By making their life horrible, you may give them a LOT of arguments for killing themselves, but you do not make a decision for them. I'm not saying that what Magnussen did isn't horrible, of course it is, but it isn't concrete, you know? But, yeah, even if it was, even if he'd single-handedly killed five people, it still wouldn't justify killing him. It would only prove him/everybody who thinks like him, right.
Nobody should end another person's life, whatever the other person may have done. I mean, I do know that this is not how our world works. Sherlock is being very realistic in having its main character kill Magnussen because that's what people do in desperate situations. The problems I have are that a) it is very un-sherlocky to make this big of a sacrifice (I mean, Sherlock expects his life to be over) for somebody else (yeah, I know, character development, but that was just too much for me) and b), more importantly, that this murder, because that's what it is, is presented as an okay thing to do. Sherlock doesn't face justice. He does not get any kind of punishment for what he's done, but is called to come back and save the world. Yes, granted, it's a TV show, but this is just very, very morally wrong and unrealistic - to me. If you tell people that in this one case, murder is an acceptable action, you concede this point to every murderer out there. You tell them that, yes, there is a reason to kill another person. But it is upon none of us to decide who should live and who shouldn't. And, I guess, because of this opinion of mine, I am

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