She pushes him in that scene, to "go see him again". And she pushes him to get Sherlock on a case again, because Sherlock is scared their marriage will ruin the friendsip.

First of all, this is what she says:

MARY: Are you gonna see him again?
JOHN: No – I’m going to work.
MARY: Oh. And after work, are you gonna see him again?

Not more, not less. 

And as for the "I like him." There are people who criticise this very sentence. Because John is hurt and angry and instead of comforting him, being on his side, from the beginning she sides with Sherlock. "He needed a confidante" (other than you). And then "I like him". It is at the least ambiguous. 
 

People may criticise it or not. What she said  is what she said, and it's the opposite of a disuasion from seing him .And if she didn't want her husband to see his friend, she wouldn't remind him, in the morning, that he will.

I do believe we see her actively persuading John to see Sherlock, so I guess we are interpreting the scenes very differently.

No, she's not an intermediary. She is more of an enabler for John.

Exactly. John really, really does not need help but has to come to terms with it on his own. And least of all does he need a girlfriend who does not actually support him. And the moustache thing may be played for fun but it is another proof that Mary does not tell him the truth while people like Sherlock and Mrs Hudson who truly care for him do. 
 

Last edited by SusiGo (June 16, 2015 6:59 am)

She's a trained assassin, secret agent, whatever you wanna call it. The moment Sherlock walks in she knows what's at stake for her and acts accordingly. She certainly knows how to deal with such surprises.

But consider that it's most weird: we've talked about it already, but a trained ex-assasin, meeting Sherlock Holmes' best friend (both repeatedly torn through the mills of yellow press, sure she will have read some articles at least around TRF), when he is accidentally on his own, the most vulnerable. It is not very likely that she never thinks about that Sherlock might deduce her the second she knows who he is in the restaurant. The only way I can explain this is that not only the writers keep telling us what a clever person she is, but that she thinks so herself, and stretches her life lie not only to John but to his best friend as well and is certain to pull through with it.

In TEH that means that she is trying to be as nice as possible in order to win Sherlock's trust. Because if Sherlock trusts her, he probaby won't investigate into her past. And we see that it works almost immediately, because even though he deduces her to be a "liar" he doesn't pay any attention to it because hey, she's nice and supportive...!
 

And now someone can say that she was nice and supportive because it is her character.

But think of how different she suddenly behaves at the beginning of HLV. To me, it always seems like she is not as nice as she appeared to be in TEH and TSoT.

And there is of course another possibility - that she knows much more than she lets on, that she has in some way been involved with Moriarty (who likes to employ snipers). Because it is a very big coincidence that during Sherlock's absence John meets the sweet assassin turned nurse who coindicentally works in his surgery and seems to be the only person able to comfort him. And to me it would be a stretch of the imagination to believe that she does not view Sherlock as a potential threat, Sherlock, who is famous for his brilliant deductions.

So what does she do? She is a clever woman and realises at once how insecure Sherlock is when meeting John again, that he is vulnerable because of his feelings. So she tries to win him over. She shows sympathy for his plans (need of a confidante) and promises to bring round John. And Sherlock, being compromised by his emotions, walks into the trap. This is the man who has a thick dossier on John and yet he does not do any research about Mary. 

Last edited by SusiGo (June 16, 2015 8:54 am)