Lupin wrote:

@kazza: aancientsgate: So wait? You're saying we all saw him fall and hit the pavement, so that discredits my theory... but the fact that we saw him fall uninterrupted into the pavement should discredit your theory of an air bag or net. John watched the entire fall. Any passerby watched the fall from the hospital. It was into the street. It seems that, if we limit ourselves to what the viewer saw and take it as truth, then any sort of device to dampen the fall should be ruled out too.

John didn't see the last 10-15 feet. That little building was in the way. As he finally gets up off the pavement and can see around the building for the first time, he sees S lying in a heap and if you look closely, you can see that truck that's been parked there just pulling away off to our right. My theory is that the truck might be the key to where the net/airbag went-- my thoughts run to a net, since an airbag is so bulky, would take too long to deflate, etc.

If there were an airbag or trick, John and others would've seen it There would be no reason for Sherlock to make that long, heartfelt call to John since John would know it to be a rouse. The sniper kept his sights on John as he was hired to shoot John. When the body hit, a crowd formed around it so quickly it would be difficult to assess who jumped. The sniper would then base the identity on John's reaction.

John could not see a net or airbag. View blocked. And his arrival at the scene was delayed by his being knocked down.

The long, heartfelt call to John was for us, the audience. Lots of angst, lots of tears, lots of fear/horror for our hero, more fear/horror for our *other* hero, John.

The gunman saw what we saw--- clearly, that was Sherlock who jumped; you could clearly see his face. (and kudos to the show runners and to BC himself for having BC do the jump--  I think that was important, to rule out all doubt about who exactly fell). The gunman saw Sherlock fall (just as John and we did), he saw him rolled away on a stretcher covered in blood a mere couple of minutes later. It was enough for him to give him evidence of death. After all, who survives such a thing?

There was *no* break between the direct line of sight John had from the ground to where Sherlock was standing on the precipice. No break in his direct line of sight as Sherlock spread his arms and flew. John saw Sherlock standing there, talking, and he saw Sherlock fall. He did not see the last 10-15 feet of the fall because he could not, being on the other side of that small building. But once he got to the scene, he clearly saw that it was really Sherlock (the idea of it being someone else in make-up is ludicrous, IMO, as is the idea that Sherlock stepped back and tossed somebody's dead body over the edge and then raced downstairs to take its place on the sidewalk), he sure as hell seemed to be dead, and, as they say, a picture is worth 1000 words. If I saw one of my loved ones in that state, right after also having seen him make the leap, I would not stand there and doubt what my eyes could see so clearly.

Lupin, "John saw the whole fall from start to finish" - this doesn't make any sense. There is a clear cut away (if only momentarily) from the fall just before Sherlock is supposed to hit the pavement!

I mentioned this in another thread, but here it is in a nutshell what I thought.


Sherlock did ask Molly for her help, and that is an important clue behind the fake death.

My guess is that he did jump off the roof, but he fell on a contraption (maybe a mattress held outside a window, allowing him to roll inside the room) without reaching the ground. When Sherlock was secured, Molly's team (on ground level) threw the corpse that looks like Sherlock onto the floor, complete with blood effect. They acted very quickly and whisked the body away when Watson came near to it, to avoid suspicions.

Shark_Blade wrote:

My guess is that he did jump off the roof, but he fell on a contraption (maybe a mattress held outside a window, allowing him to roll inside the room) without reaching the ground. When Sherlock was secured, Molly's team (on ground level) threw the corpse that looks like Sherlock onto the floor, complete with blood effect. They acted very quickly and whisked the body away when Watson came near to it, to avoid suspicions.

That was Sherlock lying there--  unless he has an identical twin somewhere or a friend at Madame Tussaud's who could make up a wax image of him in the few hours he had to prep for that whole thing, that was Sherlock lying there. Close up of his face, staring familiar eyes, dressed in his coat and scarf, his hair, his hands, the whole nine yards. John had taken a knock to the head, but he was up and functioning, and he got right up to the body, close enough to grab his wrist-- that body wasn't someone else, and it wasn't made of wax.

John touched him--- he didn't have his hand on the wrist for long, but... he would have been warm, even if John didn't have time to take his pulse. A corpse, even a recently dead person, wouldn't feel like a person who'd been alive just seconds before.

Yes, everyone acted very quickly, whatever in heck it was they did behind that low building and around that truck that was there until John approached. But I don't see someone else's body figuring in anything falling off the roof, lying on the ground there, or being taken away on the stretcher.

Just my take on it, of course. I get the feeling that we're all in for a reeeeeaaaaal big surprise, when the time comes for The Big Answer, lol.

I think to clarify is that John saw Sherlock jump and ran around and saw the entire layout of the building along Sherlock's descent after the body fell. I meant that he saw the whole path of the fall, as did anyone else around St. Bart's. If there were some trick along the building, John would've seen it when he went around the small building obstructing his view. It's not like with magicians that can hide things on stage because the audience doesn't get to come on stage. Plus anybody who saw Sherlock would naturally look up to the roof to see where he fell from.

Also, if you watch in slow step forward as he fell. Right before he hits the ground you see him free falling in midair flailing near the roof. In the split-second before the body then hits, it's hard to believe he hit something first, then rolled off it or something. There's also a high margin of error trying that stunt for the first time. This would be the case if Molly were to catch him and pull him into the window or something. The height of the obstruction for John is only a few stories. The blind spot is still a height inadvisable to jump from.

Also, there is a large collection of blood and wounds on Sherlock that were not there during that last freeze frame before he hits the ground. If he had moved to apply any sort of makeup to make it look like he's bleeding, the crowd on the street would have saw. He would have had no time to make that sort of splatter. He could not have prepared it before because people would've seen the blood on the ground.

It seems implausible that something braced his fall in that moment he was off-frame. It's more likely this was just a camera effect used to heighten the shock of the fall by showing him from the ground level view. The one thing I grant you is that we do not see Sherlock's face when he hits the ground, though we do see his hair if you watch when he bounces. We see the face when John runs around to see the body.

Suppose he did fall from a smaller height, having his initial fall braced by some apparatus in the blind spot. Let's assume no one standing around St. Bart's saw the apparatus (it would most likely have had to be set up after Moriarty was dead or Moriarty would have noticed it). He would still have to fall onto the pavement from some height and he landed on his stomach and hit his head. That can lead to serious injury even if he fell from two stories. It seems unlikely that he'd risk getting injured (less likely killed) by falling from a lower height. Some argue he landed in the rubbish truck that we see leaving screen when John comes around, yet the body is in the same exact position it was when the body landed (it tilted onto its side when it hit on the second bounce).

Most likely he used the blind spot obstruction to prevent the sniper or Moriarty's aid from seeing the body at the base of the hospital. Moriarty said unless his people see him jump, not necessarily see him land (leading me to believe they were stationed in a position with a good view of the roof, not necessarily the sidewalk.

Last edited by Lupin (July 31, 2012 5:10 am)

VivaCohen wrote:

I did, however, think it was very uncharacteristic of Sherlock to throw his phone on the roof when he jumped instead of putting it back in his coat or something. What's the point of leaving his phone on the roof, especially when it's filled with texts relating to murders and Scotland Yard lol

What would he need his phone for if he was going to die?
The texts would have been solved cases for the Yard & unlike ordinary people I am sure he would never have been reckless enough to have anythhing on his phone that others could use. That's why they have delete buttons.

Lupin wrote:

Also, there is a large collection of blood and wounds on Sherlock that were not there during that last freeze frame before he hits the ground. If he had moved to apply any sort of makeup to make it look like he's bleeding, the crowd on the street would have saw. He would have had no time to make that sort of splatter. He could not have prepared it before because people would've seen the blood on the ground.

And there again comes my favourite theory about Sherlock doing something to his head and nose on the roof right after Moriarty killed himself. (Somewhere in the www, can't find it back right now.)
As the camera goes round and round him, we think he's nearly going mad in that scene, but the truth can be that he's putting something to his head to prepare the "injured look" on the pavement later on. Blood capsules/cachets?
Sounds a bit strange, though...... GOD, I have to watch all this AGAIN!

Last edited by Mattlocked (August 1, 2012 7:58 am)

Yes, the capsules break when he hits the ground, and then... *urks*

VivaCohen wrote:

I did, however, think it was very uncharacteristic of Sherlock to throw his phone on the roof when he jumped instead of putting it back in his coat or something. What's the point of leaving his phone on the roof, especially when it's filled with texts relating to murders and Scotland Yard lol

His phone would be SHER LOCKED  Seriously. No one except the most skilled hacker could get into it.

It was done for effect. His back to us, the watchers, perched on that awful edge, he said good-bye to John, started to stretch out his arms, and threw the phone down because he was done with it. Without it, no one could use its GPS to track him, wherever he planned to go. Without it, he couldn't use it and its easily recognizable phone number to make calls or texts. There's no way he could have used it again, paid the bills for its service, etc. So we got to see the very dramatic throw-down (if he's leaving his phone, he must really be going....) and he left that part of his life behind, as he had to.

He thought of everything else, he probably wiped the phone's memory (all except John's number on speed dial) before he ever went up on that roof anyway.

I agree with kazza. I don't think him throwing the mobile phone has a significance as far as leaving behind clues or evidence. One possible explanation, depending on your theory on the fall, is that he threw the phone because the body that would wind up on the pavement couldn't possibly have it. It could also just have been for dramatic effect .