Willow wrote:

Only John failed to understand the why, and his failure to understand the why is underlined throughout S3

I think it's not just that he fails to understand why Sherlock faked his death. He also fails to understand why Sherlock came back, and that's a much bigger problem.

Moftiss have also chosen to raise the stakes; in the beginning of TEH we have someone who has spent 2 years undercover, in considerable danger, coming home naively imagining that home has remained unaltered; there have been an awful lot of novels written about the warrior coming home from the war, returning only to discover that the ideals fixed in his memory no longer exist, and perhaps never existed, so this is has many resonances on many levels.

That's true. That might be one of the reasons why Sherlock was compared to Major Sholto.

The extent to which he just doesn't know this woman is demonstrated in no uncertain terms by her willingness to put a bullet into Sherlock's chest, and yet he still apparently doesn't want to know her any better because he destroys the memory stick.

The relationship between John and Mary would be another interesting part to write an analysis about. I left Mary out most of the time because I wanted to focus on the Sherlock-John-relationship. Only in the fireplace scene the three of them were inseparable. But there's probably a lot to find when you pay attention to the details.

 

Sorting things out is not so easy after all, as we learn during the Christmas dinner with Mummy and Daddy Holmes. John and Mary haven’t been talking to each other for a long time (I wonder if John lived with her or in Baker Street? We don’t get to know), but they’re both there, reunited.
Of course there’s also a very serious reason why John was invited. The Magnussen case has to be solved. John doesn’t really have to be convinced to follow Sherlock to Appledore. They work as partners again, more or less.

If John still had any doubts about what Sherlock feels for him, the video Magnussen shows him of how Sherlock saved him from the fire, and the fact that he’s Sherlock's pressure point, should tell him everything he needed to know.
“Look how you care about John Watson.” Caring is not an advantage? No, it really isn’t, but what can you do.
Again, that’s a parallel to an earlier episode. Once we thought Irene was Sherlock’s “damsel in distress”. Way off the mark. “Sherlock’s pressure point is his best friend John Watson.”


John looks shocked. This is sort of a turning point, but not in the way one would expect. From now on it just gets frustrating, and that’s mainly because of John. Sherlock is ready to sacrifice everything he has achieved up to this point in order to save Mary and therefore John. We expect John to react in some way, but he just stands there and does as good as nothing.

The same thing happens in the final scene when Sherlock is about to get into the plane. For Sherlock, of course, this is the only way out – the other option for him would have been to go to prison for the rest of his life, while John would continue living without him, probably even stop visiting Sherlock after a while … So it’s better to go back to where he came from. Eastern Europe. And death.

John appears surprisingly emotionless and reserved. We’re not in his perspecti

When they meet again later in the CAM building, the first thing they do is get coffee. John and two paper cups of coffee, where have we seen that before? Right.

The final point of the reversed development. It’s over. This is the end.


It’s touching that while Magnussen is talking about John to Mary, the camera is on Sherlock’s face. “Coming here? What would your husband think? Your lovely husband, he’s honourable. So English. What would he say to you now?”

Sherlock walks up to Mary, realising he was totally wrong about her, and offers his help although she threatens him. As if to say, please let me be a part of your life, and if that’s not possible, kill me.
He gets shot, which nearly costs his life, but also saves it in some way.


“Fall now.”
Sherlock is trying to stay alive, but not really fighting, he seems to be giving up rather easily (“they’re putting me down, too”), mainly trying to avoid the pain.

And finally, after eight and a half episodes, we get a real insight into the mind palace. It’s a mortuary.

Except, Sherlock can go upstairs and enter a prettier world, corridors flooded with light, where he can meet old friends. The architecture is very similar to the building in which the pink lady’s corpse was found in ASIP, at the very beginning of the “story of two men and their ridiculous adventures”. So obviously Sherlock constructed all this, the whole more pleasant part of his mind palace, only after he met John.

But all his old friends are dead and/or gone, aren’t they?


Sherlock made the enormous mistake of trusting other people. He let his heart rule his head. He had feelings for Mary, for exa

This just sort of happened.

I wrote this analysis while rewatching series 3 from the DVDs, focusing on the relationship between Sherlock and John, since it carries the whole plot and is vital for Sherlock’s character development. No idea if anyone’s going to read this, it’s very long after all (I'll divide it into several posts), but I tried to make it easily readable. It’s just my personal interpretation of course, I don’t claim that everything is necessarily correct. Sorry about the drama and the lame jokes.

On to the analysis. Series 1 and 2 were mostly told from John’s perspective, and all the time we wondered what was going on in Sherlock’s mind. He often came across as cold and emotionless. Series 3 is told mostly from Sherlock’s perspective. We get an insight into his thoughts and feelings, and we learn that he’s been human all along. We see him laughing, crying, getting drunk, vomiting, getting high, being physically weak, and many other things. We’re also shown who’s really important to him and who he loves the most.

I’ll spare you my analysis for “The Sign of Three” (which is another 3.500 words long), but I think I should summarise it since it’s important for understanding the rest. It all began with Sherlock staring sadly at John’s empty chair and Mrs Hudson talking about how marriage changes people. She made Sherlock’s fears only worse that John will change and that he’ll lose him.


Sherlock Holmes is a lonely man. His only real passion is crime solving, and his chances to find another person who shares his interests are practically zero. He’s only used to loss and having his heart broken. Dogs die (Redbeard), children will grow out of liking detective stories (Archie), and adults are usually more interested in other things. Romance is always considered more important than frie

I'm a bit depressed today, but this thread always helps.

dartmoordoggers wrote:

Seems to me that many decide on Sherlocks sexuality; or lack of it, and then are very selective in choosing evidence to fit their preconceptions. 

Everything in the show is extremely ambiguous. But that's the fun of it. How you interpret it is totally up to you.
 

It's so cool that almost nothing had to be changed. Just cut some parts out and it works.
Lovely.

I was going to take a shower anyway. Now it's also really necessary.

Something about this look ...

Mrs.Wenceslas wrote:

/am I the only one who doesn´t like this dressing gown?/

Perhaps it's a subtle invitation to free him of it?