It doesn't help that they play that aspect up too - repeated references to morphine, etc. 

 

Liberty wrote:

It doesn't help that they play that aspect up too - repeated references to morphine, etc. 

 

Yep, or that they let her kick that coin so Sherlock has to bend over and pick it up with a fresh wound..

Last edited by Zatoichi (January 29, 2015 9:20 pm)

Magnussen wasn't interested in Mary or John or Sherlock.
Sherlocks death would have solved Marys problem with Magnussen......he would have hoarded the info on Mary....as he did....and maybe used Sherlocks death to get @ Mycroft anyway.

That is an interesting question, Susi. When reading this I remember the outcast scene between Mary and Sherlock where she says she almost killed him and so forth. Maybe the shooting of the coin was some kind of test? She misses the middle thus never wanted to thus exactly placed the bullet into Sherlock?

Last edited by mrshouse (January 30, 2015 10:47 am)

Hm, yes, makes the most sense. Sherlock turns from looking almost repelled to a very quick:"sort it out!"

SusiGo wrote:

There is one thing in the chronology of events that makes me wonder - when exactly does Sherlock have his epiphany and realises that Mary did not nearly kill but save him and that she should be trusted (please note that he does not say he forgives her)? Look at the order of events:

- He is shot by Mary
- Mind palace = being shot by Mary the bride / "That wife! John Watson is definitely in danger!" 
- Mary threatens him in hospital
- Sherlock tries to deduce Mary in his mind palace and sets his plan in motion
- Mary follows him as expected to Leinster Gardens and threatens to kill him again 

This is not speculation but what we get in the show. And then - out of the blue and without any positive move on Mary's side - Sherlock starts to excuse what she did and begs John to trust her. This is not logical. This change of mind is explained nowhere which lets me conclude that it is either bad writing or that there is a hidden agenda. As the show is usually not badly written, I opt for the latter. 

I always thought he figured it out while in hospital. After all, he didn't have much else to do but thinking, and we clearly see him turning down his dose of morphine so to be able to think easier.

I also agree with what swanpride wrote. Sherlock has no problem doing all the things mentioned in his post, because he thinks he has good reason to. And so he doesn't have a problem forgiving Mary when he sees that she thinks she had good reason to do what she did. John is the one who thinks more like regular people do, always have. Sherlock works on a very different spectrum, and it seems Mary works a bit like that too.

But Sherlock has never required of himself to forgive someone else, or have them apologize to him. I don't think he sees the need, really. I think he just settled it in his mind when he figured out why she did it, and that was that. I honestly think that's how he works in many cases. It's the "normal" people like Molly and John that requires to forgive and be forgiven. 

(That is, Sherlock required that John forgave him.But I think he's so used to being the one that people need to forgive, I've never seen a situation where he requires other people to apologize to him).

Last edited by Vhanja (January 30, 2015 11:20 am)

For me it was clear that as soon as he understood her intentions and reasonings, he was fine with it. After all, he expects everybody else to be fine with all his actions as soon as they understand his intentions and reasonings. So it makes sense that he would show others the same courtesy. So I don't think he forgave her, per say, just accepted it the way he wants other people to accept what he does.

For me that's not bad writing, it's good writing when you don't have to spell everything out because a character's action makes sense within the frame work of said character. And for me, Sherlock's actions does make sense, ref. my paragraph above. 

Swanpride wrote:

Yeah, Mary put Sherlock through a lot of pain. But that's my point. It is exactly the kind of solution Sherlock would come up with. He once tortured a dying man for information. He experimented on John multiple times. He left an old woman strapped to a bomb for hours in order to have time to investigate. He dated Janine for the sole purpose of breaking into the office of her boss. He let John believe that he died for two years after forcing him to watch his supposed suicide. It is no wonder that Sherlock has no trouble to forgive Mary, because if Mary's actions are not forgivable, than he himself would be beyond John's forgiveness, too.

I guess literally ripping a hole through a friend who offered his help the minute before is just the point where it crosses the line for me.. torturing serial killers or letting people live through a period of fear in order to catch the big bad guy does not. But I guess we all set our boundaries different.. 

Last edited by Zatoichi (January 30, 2015 11:49 am)

In all those moments mentioned above, we got to understand Sherlock´s motivation through storytelling. We knew why he acted that way. We could connect and relate to him.

No such case with Mary. We never see into her motivation - and her shooting Sherlock lacks any. Sherlock doesn´t figure everything out about her in hospital - in fact, he has one of the scariest visions of her, dressed in her femme fatale clothes, taunting him, menacingly defying him... and after this Sherlock suddenly claims it was surgery, Mary saved his life etc.

It´s as if two storylines (in both of which Mary was a different character) were just mechanically connected together without neccessary connections concerning psychology of the characters and chronology of the story being made.

This story really cannot be taken as it is outwardly presented to us. It cannot be taken at face value. Because it just doesn´t hold in this form.

Last edited by nakahara (January 30, 2015 12:03 pm)